Your gut can’t think
The late Carl Sagan recounted an incident in which he was asked by a cabby, “Do you believe in UFOs?” Sagan responded with a simple explanation that amounted to, “The evidence is extremely bad.” The cabby, “Yeah, but what does your gut tell you?” Sagan’s response was, “I don’t think with my gut.”
Sagan used this incident as the starting point of an essay on rationality and logic in which he offered some pretty basic thinking points, such as trust the evidence, but check the evidence. Can it be faked? What is your observer bias? Are there alternative explanations for the outcomes you are observing? Do they better explain the outcomes? Are there variables for which you cannot control?Â
Kevin Drum at Washington Monthly has a great post, The Revenge of the Gut, in which he quotes former Bush staffer John DiIulio:
In eight months, I heard many, many staff discussions, but not three meaningful, substantive policy discussions….The lack of even basic policy knowledge, and the only casual interest in knowing more, was somewhat breathtaking.
DiIulio was speaking in 2001 or 2002. Drum links to a recent article by David Frum, former Bushie speech writer.
Huckabee and Paul have not the faintest idea of what they are talking about. The problem is not that their answers are wrong — that can happen to anyone. The problem is that they don’t understand the questions, and are too lazy or too arrogant to learn. But say that aloud and their partisans will shout back: Elitism!
On its face, this retort is ridiculous. How exactly is it elitist to expect a candidate for president to be immune to obvious flim-flam? Or to submit his ideas to criticism–and change them if they cannot stand up?
And yet it also has to be admitted: Many of us on the conservative side have fed this monster. (Rightly) aghast at the abuse of expertise by liberal judges, liberal bureaucrats and liberal academics, we have sometimes over-reacted by denying the importance of expertise altogether . . .
So now instead of holes in our souls, we conservatives are getting candidates with holes in their heads.
Here’s the lesson to learn: It’s always important to respect the values and principles of the voters. But politicians who want to deliver effective government and positive results have to care about more than values — and have to do more than check their guts. They need to study the problem, master the evidence, and face criticism.
Emphasis mine.Â
Sounds basic, huh? Coming from someone whose entire career in the White House was about refusing to study the problem, refusing to master the evidence and refusing to submit to criticism, such a statement is earth-shattering. George W. Bush has been an exemplar of someone who doesn’t understand the questions and who is too arrogant and too lazy to try. Whatever else you can say about Bill Clinton, he was one of the voraciously curious President’s we’ve ever had. He wanted to know everything about everything. His staffers developped a habit of saying, “It’s not ready for you yet, Mr. President.” Love him or hate him, Clinton led a relatively sound policy making executive branch.Â
Drum concludes his post with an interesting paragraph:
The Fair Tax and the gold standard are crank ideas that, while they tell us something about the candidates who support them, will never actually become public policy. “Tax cuts increase revenue,” on the other hand, not only tells us something about Giuliani, but about the entire modern Republican Party apparatus. I imagine that’s why Frum didn’t include it.
IOW, the evidence has proven this core concept of modern Republicanism is hollow and doesn’t work; but the party isn’t ready for a dose of reality yet.
December 17th, 2007 at 12:30 pm
From TPM’s Steve Benen:
December 17th, 2007 at 1:05 pm
I figure “beat the war drum” and bush et al alike, could benefit from the sound policy of smoking a joint before making complex decisions, like Carl Sagan.
Clinton almost made it, problem was, he didn’t inhale.
God rest Carls’ brilliant soul. I’m reading Cosmos right now…again, we are amongst the dumbest led people on Earth.
December 17th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
pokemon - if you haven’t read them yet, try Sagan’s The Demon Haunted World and Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors. Great reading.
December 17th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
Richard - so far as I’m concerned, we should say “Preach it Steve!”
December 17th, 2007 at 2:25 pm
A great leader once told me, that leadership isn’t about being decisive, but inquisitive. Asking the right questions gives you a better chance of success than shooting from the hip. Bush, an intellectually lazy and shallow cowboy-wanta-be has never wanted to be bothered by the facts.
BTW, Carl Sagan’s “Demon Haunted World” is one of my favorite books. Thanks for bringing up Sagan, I just may re-read that book over the holidays.
December 17th, 2007 at 2:46 pm
In the face of tyranny, inquisitiveness is often not a luxury afforded, have to know what you are looking at and what you are going to do, before it shows up. That isn’t leadership, it is Greatness.
One need only look at the dems, running about like chickens with heads cut off for the last 7 years, and know that thinking about what to do, inquisitiveness, is no match for those have had their “plan”, despite how stupid you have thought the “commander” of this disaster has been.
Just think how this might have gone, if instead of pondering, the dems had any person that was a “man of action”. Like JACKSON. Andy that is.
December 17th, 2007 at 4:14 pm
Obi - ages ago, Washington Monthly had a great article about decision making that described the distinction between the Bush and the Clinton approach. The article described the Bush approach as very clean, appearing very orderly and neat, but producing poor policy. The Bush approach tends to eliminate and ignore chunks of information. Information is as often not given to decision makers who evaluate or reject it based on their biases.
The Clinton approach, by contrast, was very messy with lots of unruly discussions and little apparent order, but resulted in far better policy. In the Clinton approach, everyone with relevant information - even if it contradicted other important pieces of information - was expected to be part of the decision. If a decision was almost made and information that contradicted it came along, it was analyzed and discussed and synthesized into the process before a final decision was made. Decisions took longer, looked messier, and certainly felt chaotic, but the process resulted in better decisions.
The distinction was the character of the President. George W. Bush is intellectually lazy, he doesn’t want to see information late in the process if it would require changing his policies. Clinton was insatiable - curious, inquisitive, a brilliant and analytical president who wasn’t afraid to change the policies based on new information.
I’ve been rereading the Demon Haunted World - it’s a good counter balance for the saccharine sentiment of the season.
December 17th, 2007 at 11:28 pm
Thanks to our thinking-mans media, all most people probably know about Sagan is that he used to say “billions and billions” a lot. Thanks to Johnny Carson for letting this wonderful scientist get a generation excited about our cosmos with his obvious rapture about the subject.
Yes, it’s true, rapture is possible WHILE LIVING. Just ponder the all of the seen, and unseen beauty around you. But, alas, we are too busy trying to stop the destruction of our society. Your gut can tell you when you have “low food security” and serves an important function, but I seriously miss Carl Sagan and Americas past fascination with uncovering the secrets of reality as opposed to intolerant subjugation of thought.
In other words… “Somebody, give me a reefer!”
December 18th, 2007 at 5:58 pm
In a sense, dear friend, I believe we do think with our gut. At least, we do so when it is time for great and courageous decisions. And in looking at life, including our dreaming mind. This relates, really, to my own posts recently on gravitas.
I believe that our soul, including our mind, spirit, gut at the ultimate point, carries on a diologue with all its component parts. And when the time comes for a momentous insight into a scientific thought, or a piece of political or religious self-revelation, I think that we percieve this combining, refining, and conclusion of all our parts finally coming together, as our “gut conclusion.” Finally, we are at peace with what was a conundrum. Really, it’s our brain and heart and gut finally “gettting it.” We percieve truth. At that point, resolution. Discovery. And on to the next puzzle in a paradox.
ed firmage