The kinds of limits to individual human perception and thought that I described in yesterday's blog as "confirmation bias" have been described for millennia. In his Republic, Plato gives us the Allegory of the Cave, describing the limits of individual perception by comparing us to prisoners chained deep in a cavern so our heads can only see shadows projected on the cave wall in front of us. Unable to see the forms that are creating the shadows we see, we can, according to Plato, nonetheless use our reason to postulate the ideal forms that must exist to create our imperfect perceptions. Nearly two thousand years later, Immanual Kant similarly hypothesized that the limits to our perception were a function of what he called "forms of intuition". On this view, our conceptual equipment constrains us to describing perception without any direct experience of the causes of our perception. Fast forward to the modern era, and we find scientists such as Daniel Kahneman (Thinking Fast and Slow) describing the physiology of our emotional and rational response to the environment as it has been shaped by evolutionary forces. More recently still, Hans Rosling (Factfulness) traces specific patterns of misconception--false belief--in our modern world to the kinds of psychological factors Kahneman describes.
In response to these common descriptions of the limits of individual thought and perception, we find two complementary techniques for improving the clarity and accuracy of our thought, providing a foundation for discussion and compromise with other individuals. On the one hand, Plato casts his explorations of various topics in the form of dialogues, suggesting implicitly that one way to overcome the limits of our individual thought is to temper our perceptions with those of other individuals. One could trace the procedural mechanisms described in our Constitution back to this intuition: that document formalizes processes for dialogue and compromise in the social and political realm to overcome disagreements that may stem from the limits of individual perception. On the other hand, there is a long tradition of documenting techniques of formal reason, using patterns of both logical thought and fallacy as a way of honing our individual ability to reason in a way that facilitates agreement with others following similar patterns.
Accountability Citizenship relies on both techniques: we will spend time discussing the context and evolution of our Constitution. We also focus on ways to improve the clarity of our thought, with special emphasis on how to distinguish facts from fake news.
In response to these common descriptions of the limits of individual thought and perception, we find two complementary techniques for improving the clarity and accuracy of our thought, providing a foundation for discussion and compromise with other individuals. On the one hand, Plato casts his explorations of various topics in the form of dialogues, suggesting implicitly that one way to overcome the limits of our individual thought is to temper our perceptions with those of other individuals. One could trace the procedural mechanisms described in our Constitution back to this intuition: that document formalizes processes for dialogue and compromise in the social and political realm to overcome disagreements that may stem from the limits of individual perception. On the other hand, there is a long tradition of documenting techniques of formal reason, using patterns of both logical thought and fallacy as a way of honing our individual ability to reason in a way that facilitates agreement with others following similar patterns.
Accountability Citizenship relies on both techniques: we will spend time discussing the context and evolution of our Constitution. We also focus on ways to improve the clarity of our thought, with special emphasis on how to distinguish facts from fake news.
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