Rational Thought - Five Thinking Errors and Our Current Mess

by Dave Kahle

Is there anyone who doesn’t recognize that the current state of our country – and the world – is a mess of almost unprecedented proportions?  While we can theorize about the causes of this collapse in the collective condition, I’d like to submit one key contributor – we are losing the habit of rational thought.

     Whereas for a long time we valued rational thought and respectful discourse, we are rapidly jettisoning those values for more popular substitutes.  Since these emerge out of selfish and emotional places, they contribute to a culture that lacks cohesion and which careens toward chaos.  Here are five thinking errors which are rapidly becoming common.

1. Hysterical child 

     This is the characterization that describes people who promote a position prompted solely by fear, the alure of personal attention and/or the quest for power over others.  They make emotional assertions that have no basis in reality and repeat them with passion.  

     Historically, the Salem Witch Trials were perhaps the most graphic example of this.  As you may know, a group of young women brought hysterical charges against people without any evidence to support those assertions.  For a while, the authorities believed them, but eventually common sense prevailed –but not until a number of people were killed. 

     I see this most commonly today in social media and among politicians. The mainstream media, because it thrives on notoriety at the expense of evidence, is often complicit in giving these people an audience.

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2. Fool

     This is the Biblical name for people who don’t learn from experience and believe obvious deceptions.  These people continue to make the same mistakes, and hold the same positions, even after they have been proven false.  The truth doesn’t matter to a fool, he/she believes what they will, even after it has been shown to be false.

3. Bender

     This is the name for people who view reality from a perspective that bends and distorts the truth to fit into a pre-existing point of view. When they do this knowingly, they are crooked.  When they do this unknowingly, they are foolish.

     Again, the notoriety of social media and the mainstream media provide the   motivation for the attention one gathers by loudly proclaiming a bent version of events.

     I saw this most graphically a few days ago when some minor political figure claimed that the victims of the Hamas massacre were “fake babies.”

4. Deceiver

  These folks make up a story/set of assertions that are designed to influence and motivate people to a set of actions based purely on a fictional narrative.  They make up a fictional narrative, and then try to sell it so as to sway people to a position which is ultimately based on imagination. 

     Examples from the daily newscasts and social media trends are too numerous to mention. This seems like a daily event, with governmen... READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE

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