There was an interesting commentary by journalist Andrew Bolt on today's News website, the reaction to which says a great deal about human nature and the things we choose to believe.Bolt's story is headlined "The War in Iraq Has Been Won", and in it, Bolt presents a picture of Iraq that's very different to the one most of us probably believe.
The story, of itself, is either "spot on", "interesting", or "a fantasy", or "sicophantic US biased propaganda", depending on your political leaning, your love for or hatred of America, and your current belief system.
Some while back, I wrote a piece or two about the nature of evidence, and how the human brain assigns value to information. For those who missed it, I suggested that humans assign value according to two factors. The first is how closely the information you're given reflects what you already believe. The closer the two, the greater value your brain assigns to the information. The second is how trustworthy you deem the source, and while that might sound obvious, it has as much to do with the form... that is, how it looks... as it does with the trustworthiness of the source.
I've believed for some time that the popular view of the war in Iraq is distorted, and that things on the ground in Iraq, while still awful, are nowhere near as bad as populist media and the far left of politics portrays. Bolt provides some interesting evidence which confirms my preconception, so I thought the article fell into the "spot on" basket. Sadly (from my perspective), many of those commenting had a very different take-out and it made me wonder again about the nature of "truth".
Truth, you see, is entirely in the eye of the beholder. Two people of opposing views could take the time to actually go to Iraq and see it form themselves, and, after looking at exactly the same things and talking to exactly the same people, they are likely to come back with entirely different views of what is or isn't happening there.
I don't "know" what the truth is in Iraq. I've simply formed a view based on a) the things I've heard, and b ) what experience has taught me about the nature of information and political bias. I read a lot, listen to way too much talk news and talk radio, and spend far too much time watching TV, so I think I'm well informed. That makes me, in my view, more likely to be right, but hey... I've been wrong once or twice before so this could be #3. The point is, I don't know, and never really will.
That gap just shows us how easily our minds can be manipulated by people who want us to conform to their beliefs.
Ah well... I guess it's just the nature of the species, and I have this overwhelming urge to run off to some mountain somewhere and spend the rest of my life on my own in a cave. Anyone want to come?
2 comments:
Perhaps there is no "truth", just our interpretation of what we see and hear. I suspect that no matter how well informed we are, we never see and hear everything. Personally, I think there is great freedom is not being stuck in our opinions about things. Making going to the mountain a lot less appealing, and making hearing other people's opinions interesting, rather than trying to figure out if they're right or wrong.
Very interesting post.
Yeah, interesting.
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