Very nice piece on a critically important topic, Leland,



You have lots of popular great rules of thumb like:

·       Evidence over ideology

·       Expertise over authority.



But I expected to see at least something about consensus, at least of the
scientific kind?



Also, there is the issue where one person’s “expert” is another’s ‘devil
worshiper’, so trusted methods of determining expertise are needed.



Differences like those primarily come from different “motivated reasoning”,
which is one of the most important things, to me, though it looks like
motivation is not valued in this piece?  For example, the strongest
evidence is, and odds are, that nobody can live forever, because nobody
ever has.  Yet I remain faithful.  Just like when the Write brothers had
similar faith.  They had the faith to go against all the odds, all the hard
evidence, and all the skeptics claiming the truth is “man was not meant to
fly” and due to their motivation, finally became the first to fly.



And, just like it shows in the TOC, truth depends on the level of detail
you are interested in.  For example, a quantum theorist’s description of
truth about reality is quite different from the chemists, or the macro
economist’s.  In other words, like one person’s expert is another’s devil
worshiper, the quantum theorist’s ‘expert’, has no reputation amongst macro
economists, and other groups.  So, a lot depends on what different people
want, and what their different perspective is.



“Evidence over ideology” is great, but all current systems, including peer
reviewed journals, everything on the web, and so on, only focus on what
people disagree on.  Everything polarizes people, ideologically, which is
currently ripping apart all these ideals you value.  Just saying you do not
value it, doesn’t make it go away.  And, again, at least to me, ideological
motivation is the most important part.  We need to find ways to bridle it,
not devalue and destroy it.  Sure, motivation can cause problems, but don't
throw the baby out with the bath.



A good example is global warming.  There is no rigorous or trusted (by the
other side) way to measure exactly how much consensus there is on what.
Today, no matter what you find on the internet, someone can claim that is
‘fake news’, so we are all clueless, morally, and can’t make any trusted
argument on anything 'ideological'



We’re building the consensus building and tracking system at Canonizer.com
with the goal of adequately dealing with all these kinds of problems and
more.  For example, the global warming theorists could start to build and
track consensus around exactly what it is they are motivated about.  Then
the ‘deniers’ could create their competing camps around their motivations,
and they could have their own ‘canonizer algorithm’ which they would trust,
because it would only count the experts the ‘deniers’ trust, which would
not be ‘fake news’ to them.



And as the adage goes, that which you measure, improves.  If the experts
can know exactly what all the ‘deniers’ currently believe and why, they can
come up with specific experiments and arguments to address exactly those
problems, to get everyone on board, and continue the measurable consensus
progress.



The experts can work within what the denier’s experts trust, to communicate
to them, from their point of view, and so on.  (i.e. find things like:
“Your trusted experts, who only support what is not fake news, believe
‘x’.  then they can say that ‘x’ supports global warming in this way, and
so on.



Today, everyone just collects and throws any argument they can find, most
of which have no converting power at all, at the other side, over and over,
forever, to nobody listening.  Again, everything in use, today, just
polarizes people like this.  But with Canonizer, you can measure and track
the converting power of the good arguments, so the ones with converting
power can rise to the top, and then stop wasting everyone’s time on what
doesn’t work.



Also, the super camp tree structure helps with building consensus.  Today,
when you find something anyone disagrees on, normally the edit/censor wars
start polarizing everyone, and consensus is destroyed.  The disagreements
are almost always less important than what the consensus is being built
around.  So, with the tree structure, you can push these disagreeable
things down to supporting sub camps, out of the way of building consensus,
where they can still be tracked and valued.


The bottom line is, you need to build and track consensus, so you can know,
concisely and quantitatively, what everyone is motivated to want.  And
THAT, by definition, is consensus.  No censoring required.




On Sun, Jun 28, 2020 at 3:16 PM Waldemar Schmidt <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

> Thank you, Lee.
>
> *Waldemar A Schmidt, PhD, MD*
> (Perseveret et Percipiunt)
> 503.631.8044
>
> *Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value. (A Einstein)*
>
> On Jun 28, 2020, at 12:59 PM, Leland Beaumont <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> TOK List,
> With so much misinformation bombarding us, how do you choose your beliefs?
> To answer that question I wrote an essay “Choosing my beliefs”.
> See:
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__en.wikiversity.org_wiki_Knowing-5FHow-5FYou-5FKnow_gallery_Choosing-5Fmy-5Fbeliefs&d=DwIFaQ&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=Smt8w3is-W2e6Qk4Yzp4n77PzAno_MIAA0f8cwseLag&s=yVhgEGT8PAydWWTzBFF497-qHdg1fhrhvDUGU7ibaQ0&e= 
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__en.wikiversity.org_wiki_Knowing-5FHow-5FYou-5FKnow_gallery_Choosing-5Fmy-5Fbeliefs&d=DwMFAg&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=F6WL4OjZjGNgjfAzixIejlmFxhpWUv7RDfKplajqQmw&s=SN3-dIxdoQBGkcT07Z8Oln-MTinrTjmxbd7aKP7WptQ&e=>
>
> Reality is our common ground. If we can find reliable methods for
> discovering reality, than we can seek out that common ground.
> This is helpful in resolving anger
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__en.wikiversity.org_wiki_Resolving-5FAnger&d=DwMFAg&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=F6WL4OjZjGNgjfAzixIejlmFxhpWUv7RDfKplajqQmw&s=ry2KMpQFiKzNZvta-04-AIeoLdaJEX7JibtBp637uVE&e=>
> , practicing dialogue
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__en.wikiversity.org_wiki_Practicing-5FDialogue&d=DwMFAg&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=F6WL4OjZjGNgjfAzixIejlmFxhpWUv7RDfKplajqQmw&s=fvk37aGRkyCwHtgC7qR9z1awFZzajETrtdeW5xPPZts&e=>,
> and creating common ground
> <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.creatingcommonground.org_&d=DwMFAg&c=eLbWYnpnzycBCgmb7vCI4uqNEB9RSjOdn_5nBEmmeq0&r=HPo1IXYDhKClogP-UOpybo6Cfxxz-jIYBgjO2gOz4-A&m=F6WL4OjZjGNgjfAzixIejlmFxhpWUv7RDfKplajqQmw&s=9RILoUXGOFGuKN-aNDjmy-UNu7v3O2RFWx_O7tJOAHk&e=>
> .
>
> Differences of opinions are useful because they expose us to many point of
> view and the wide range of human experiences. Controversies are useful
> because they can motivate us to practice dialogue and attain new insights.
> Having a reliable method for choosing beliefs increases our contact with
> reality, helps determine fact or fiction, and helps us discover our common
> ground.
>
> How do you choose your beliefs?
>
> I welcome your comments on this, and encourage you to write down how you
> choose your beliefs.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Lee Beaumont
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