Megan McArdle: The existence of a problem does not imply the existence of a solution.
Ann Althouse: The war is over. We won. Iran just won't admit it, and we're not going to give them anything for holding out on admitting what is true.
Magatte Wade. Energy poverty kills more people than climate change ever will
Steve Stewart-Williams: IQ remains the strongest predictor of educational success, yet many teachers misunderstand it, underestimate the role of genetics, and embrace widely debunked ideas like Gardner’s multiple intelligences.
AVI: When your opponents are 50% insane by your estimate, you will never switch to them, even if your allies are 90% insane. At that "balance" you might go neutral, but you will not switch sides. Because...you see quite clearly that the other side is 50% nucking futs. You cannot leave your position until you have a place to land. Therefore, pointing out to people that their side is 90% insane will likely have no effect., They won't see it. All they will see is that some people on your side are upwards of 50% nuts. It's not very Bayesian, but it's how we think.
Was Alan Dershowitz the inspiration for your quote? From the bit I've heard about his statement on his registration as a Republican he seems at best to be the exception that proves your rule as he was pretty adamant there was One Issue that prompted his switch, and he was expecting to effect some change in GOP priorities otherwise. Arnold Kling said something similar when commenting on Dersh's switch "Ordinarily, I see both parties as equally flawed. And in my estimation the Republican Party’s flaws have tended to get worse rather than better in recent years. But right now, I am with Dershowitz. I would rather be criticizing bad Republican policies with Republicans in power than have to endure a takeover by the Eradicators." (See his essay for full context but his definition of Eradicators seems to align with your "90% Insane" to me.). FWIW, the other two changers I read regularly, Neo for a while and more recently Sasha Stone, seem to have switched when they decided 50% insane was better than 90%.
ReplyDeletePJ O'Rourke used to say he was a libertarian who tended to vote with Republicans because they had fewer ideas, "but not few enough." Virginia Postrel said that George Bush was incompetent to become president "but Al Gore is a spawn of Satan."
ReplyDeleteI should have added that I think you are directionally correct (as the kids say) but your numbers make it hard to discern.
DeleteIf I thought Republicans were 90% nuts and Dems only 50% nuts, I'd switch to Dems. When I stopped voting Dem, it wasn't because I agreed with Reps 100% and Dems 0%, only because I agreed with Reps more, and on more issues I was passionate about. I don't expect my party to be a perfect fit.
ReplyDelete"You cannot leave your position until you have a place to land."
ReplyDeleteA similar insight to one I believe in. In order to critique a position fully, you have to be outside of it so that you can see the whole thing. You therefore need somewhere else to stand, as it were, to look back on the thing from a genuinely alternative position.
This is one reason that I advocate the study not only of history but of historic philosophies that may no longer seem wholly plausible: they do provide a real alternative. You don't have to commit to them to 'step into' them for a while, in order to have a genuinely independent position from which to consider the thing you were wanting to analyze.
By the way, the idea that you have to 'leave' a thing to think about it fully is the Neoplatonic theory of creation: that the One, wanting to think about itself, had to separate into 'thinker' and 'thought-about.' That initial division created multiplicity out of one-ness, and began the spiraling out and flowering of creation.
Yes, the numbers are supposed to be evocative rather than precise.
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