Low Information, High Return

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I hear a lot of discussion on the internet and radio about people who jump to conclusions. In the last week alone, I have asked for citations from a half dozen posts, including a few that I really wanted to be true. Some people ignore my requests for citations. They aren’t interested in whether it’s true or not; they are more interested in whether it confirms their preconceived notions and makes them popular. Rather than do their own homework, they pass it on, even though in many cases it’s an uncorroborated string of text overlayed on a JPEG.

Most of what’s available on the internet is not very useful, which is probably why it’s free. You know, I frequently find that the faster something spreads, either the less useful or true it actually is. That’s partly because people are dealing with images and emotions, and their knee-jerk-reactions are usually ill timed and ill advised. When you call them on it, sometimes they say as John Ensign once foolishly told me, “I felt that to do the wrong thing was better than to do nothing” notwithstanding that he should have studied the Sacred Oath of Hippocrates which directs him first to do no harm. Sometimes they are ignorant and they don’t care.

One of my coworkers knowing my interest in Dilbert shared with me this particular segment from that comic strip dated 7 October 2012.

It shows that the educational aspect of doing your own homework is little valued by the lazy and feckless. Wally does not want to do the work to get an informed opinion, because then it’s no longer an opinion. It’s corroborated. The problem with the people who resist my informed opinion is that sometimes they make sense, but that’s only because they work with low information to people who maintain a diet with as little truth as possible. This particular demographic would rather listen to music, watch reality TV, play video games, eat junk food, and collect handouts than do things that are actually substantive, and I’m tired of cowtowing to them.

Earlier this week, the Dean of our College sent us a study on the F-word: flunking. At the same time we shore up the weakest among us and ensure that they perpetuate not only their genetics but also their ideal of “civilization”, my bosses insist that I show people the utility of failure. Failure is not about showing you that you can’t do a thing but showing you where to focus your efforts to achieve. Outside academia, however, so many people reject achievement as a concept lock, stock and barrel as they check things off a list destroying every vestige of freedom on the auspices that it saves one person from failure. In a state like Nevada where the economy is based on risk, that makes zero sense. Under the mirage of gaming and winning, most of the people who come here fail miserably to achieve anything other than getting out of here without a felony arrest.

Most people want us to make life easy for them. This is what attracts them to Vegas- the something for nothing mentality. It’s why I oppose free college for everyone because many of those I do teach seem unwilling to prove to whomever is paying for it that it was money well spent. The do not want to be informed. They want to be entertained and taken care of, with the bread and circuses mentality that brought down Rome before us. Politicians love the low information crowd because it’s easy to reach them- start a rumor on twitter or spread a meme on Facebook, and tens of thousands of people will Like or Share it until it spreads without anyone having to do anything to hear about it besides log in to their accounts. These companies dutifully assist in passing on the jejune because it drives traffic, generates revenue, and enriches them. They are not interested in truth. They are interested in their own enrichment.

One of my favorite scriptures lately comes from the Book of Job and deals with this subject. Job has just opined his state of grace after his ‘friends’ pass on their opinions to him. From Job 38:2-3

Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and answer thou me.

So much of what we pass on and share is nothing more than “words without knowledge”. Very few people cite their source when they even have one. They just throw it out there and let it spread like wildfire without regard for the ramifications, very much like what happened to the Duke Lacrosse team. Meanwhile, people’s reputations are ruined, and damage is done, and no justice is available to set right what is now lost. At other times, they cast things out and dress them up, feeding us platitudes without details, and because far too many people think with their gut emotions, they get behind a bandwagon without knowing what’s actually inside it. Then they act all surprised to discover that Congressional costumery hoodwinked them once again to its own enrichment.

Follow the money. Who benefits? Show me the money. From where does it come? Yes, I work at a job that is funded via taxes, and so I know that they forcibly take your money to employ me. What I do differently, as I told my class last night, is point out that I’m giving them information so that they can make better decisions. I am not telling them that they cannot drink soda or eat sugar or own a firearm. I explain to them what that does so that if they decide to do it anyway they can own the outcome. I want them to choose their own adventure and find that the adventure they chose was choice. I hope it brings anywhere near a commensurate return.