In American Thinker Randall Hoven writes Science for Stupid Idiots, 9/22/11.

Excerpts:

we get to why we must believe “science,” meaning taking whatever “scientists” say is incontrovertible truth.  If we start having doubts about any of it, we just might start thinking for ourselves.  We will no longer simply swallow what our betters feed us.

The irony is that so many “scientists” have become the enemy they once fought.  They now sit like the elders of the Church at the time of the Guttenberg press.  Imagine the chaos that would result if people could read the Bible themselves!  Better not teach them to read.

Real science is the scientific method.  It means skepticism.  It means publishing your data (as Samuel Morton did).  It means doubt.  It means humility.

HKO comments:

I may not know which end of the test tube the cork goes into, but I do realize that there are so many variables and unknowns in the world of climate that the debate is never over.   Scientists can fall into the same emotional and logical bias traps as any other.   Hoven’s article makes a grand tour of the fallibility of science.

When skepticism is demonized, truth suffers.  Ideologues  present us with a false choice; if we do not ‘believe’ then we are fools, deniers,  and idiots.  This not the logic of science; it is the logic of narrow minded fanaticism.  When ‘non-believers’ are demonized as Al Gore has done so often he is acting like a religious fanatic, not a scientist.

Evolution is a theory, but it is a pretty damn good one.  It does have gaps, which should simply invite further study.  This does not mean that the theory is thus proven false.  And the only alternative to evolution is not creationism.  Creationism can be a poetic metaphor, but as an explanation of our world it is not science and it is foolish to treat it as such.

There is always the unknown, the unfound and the unproven.  Perhaps evolution  will evolve into or be replaced by a better theory.

Philosophers have long debated the intersections of religion and science.  While religion and science may not mix well, they both mix poorly with politics.

When government spends on the scale Washington’s got used to, that’s not a spending crisis, it’s a moral one.  The Irish have a useful word for the times -flaithiulacht- which translates to ruinous generosity, invariably with someone else’s money.  There’s nothing virtuous about “caring”, “compassionate”, “progressives demonstrating how caring and compassionate and progressive they are by spending money yet to be earned by generations yet to be born.  That’s what “fiscal conservatives” often miss: this isn’t a green eyeshade issue.  Increasing dependency, disincentivizing self reliance, absolving the citizenry from responsibility for their actions: the multi-trillion dollar debt catastrophe is not the problem but merely the symptom.  It’s not just about balancing the books, but about balancing the most basic impulses of society.  These are structural and, ultimately, moral questions.  Credit depends on trust, and trust pre-supposes responsibility.  So, if you have a credit boom in an age that has all but abolished personal responsibility, it’s not hard to figure how it’s going to end.

from Mark Steyn’s After America

tips to Gary Meyers

A map of the world that does not include Utopia, said Oscar Wilde, is not worth glancing at. A noble sentiment, and a good thrust at the Gradgrinds and utilitarians.  Bear in mind that Utopia itself was a tyranny and that much of the talk about the analgesic and conflict-free ideal is likewise more menacing than it may appear…. It is only those who hope to transform humans that end up burning them, like the waste product of a failed experiment.

..only an open conflict of ideas and principles can produce any clarity.  Conflict may be painful, but the painless solution does not exist and the pursuit of it leads to the painful outcome of mindlessness and pointlessness..

Perfectionists and zealots can break but not bend; in my experience they are subject to burnout from diminishing returns or else, to borrow Santayana’s definition of the fanatic , they redouble their efforts just when they have lost sight of their ends.

For the dissenter, the skeptical mentality is at least as important as any armor of principle.

Disjointed excerpts from Christopher Hitchens Letters to a Young Contrarian

HKO comment:  Hitchens notes that calls for unity and non partisan approaches are naïve and nonproductive.  It is the conflict that clarifies and illuminates .  Political correctness that effectively forbids speech that offends does little to further clarity.  It is often in the defense of one’s position that one is able to clarify it.

But much of what passes for today’s political discourse is just cheap shots seeking to damage rather than clarify. Opposing views rarely engage each other because they rarely occupy the same intellectual space.  Liberals talk to each other in their media and conservatives in theirs.  They seek to confirm their existing biases rather than to challenge them.  Missions are rarely clear and assumptions are rarely questioned.  They both get so enamored with the fight that they forget that winning is the objective.

Hitchens notes that some opinions are condemned as generating “more heat than light”,  but without heat there is no light.

Pragmatism, a philosophy  devised by William James, John Dewey, and others, is anti-principle.  Pragmatism says that principles are snares and delusions.  Pragmatists teach explicitly that contradictions are inevitable and that it is folly to try to define a consistent set of principles.  Reality, the pragmatists teach, is an ever-shifting flux; what was true tomorrow may not be true today; it’s all relative, and truth is just whatever works now. Or, to quote a well-known pragmatist: it all depends on what the meaning of the word “is” is.

From a speech “Philosophy: The Ultimate CEO” delivered by Harry Binswanger

HKO comments:

While principles are important, one must be careful not to have so many principles that it becomes a refuge from action.  One should have a few critical principles and negotiate the rest.

I have found that the claim to intellectual brilliance may the weakest, maybe the most dangerous reason to select a political leader.

I recall Oprah Winfrey announcing that we should not vote for Obama because he is black but because he is brilliant.  It made me want to run the other way.  I hear supporters for Newt Gingrich tout his intellect, yet less than a week after his announcement he seems to be going down in flames. He thinks out loud and seems to lack any cohesive philosophy outside his own intellect.

I am not anti-intellectual.   Learning (not to be confused with education) is a very important value to me. Intelligence is the ability to hold multiple and conflicting thoughts in your head at one time. It is the ability to see relationships that others miss.  But this ability is limited by lack of experience and by emotional limitations.  The most common emotional limitation among the intelligent is the hubris often associated with the desire for public office.  This is why the most desirable leaders are often those who do not want the job.

Harry Truman may have lacked the academic credentials but he was long on experience.  He had such distaste for high public office that FDR had to berate him to get him on the ticket.

The candidates I like the most are often the once who want it the least.  New Jersey Governor Chris Christie keeps denying he is seeking a presidential bid but he is still actively sought.

My biggest problem with the very intelligent is that they often believe that they do not have to abide by common rules or generally accepted principles as  a guide because they are so smart that they can just adapt to any given situation.  Unmoored from important and guiding principles they wing it because they have the confidence that often comes with intelligence to rely on their abilities.

They think they are smart enough to beat the odds. They know much but underestimate randomness. They do not know what they do not know.

This is not to say that intelligence is not important. It is.  But it is far from enough, and when intelligence is the foremost reason to pick a leader one should be cautious.  Intelligence with experience and modesty becomes wisdom.

Rarely do I hear this as a reason to select a leader, but that is what we need.