RE: Truth vs. Objectivity in left/right debates (was RE: REVIEWS: The Bell Curve: going meta

From: Peter C. McCluskey (pcm@rahul.net)
Date: Tue Oct 01 2002 - 18:07:10 MDT


 lcorbin@tsoft.com ("Lee Corbin") writes:
>> Can you hypothesize any value differences, other than differences in
>> how highly people value truth, that would explain what looks to me like
>> an ideological debate between you and Robin in the thread found around
>> http://www.extropy.org/exi-lists/extropians.3Q01/4302.html?
>> Or do you claim that that dispute was fundamentally different from the
>> kind of disagreement we see in left-right debates?
>
>That kind of debate *is* totally different from left-right
>debates, which, I believe, ultimately rest on values. For

 Why do you think your disagreement with Robin rests on something other
than values?
 The hypothesis that disagreements are caused by things like the desire
to show that one's prior beliefs were wise seems to explain a much wider
variety of phenomena than your hypothesis appears to. It predicts disagreements
such as the one between you and Robin (where as you seem to avoid analyzing
why such a debate didn't get resolved). It also explains results such as more
than 50% of people believing they are above average.
 Whereas it isn't clear to me that your hypothesis makes any prediction
about whether people will be objective.

-- 
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Peter McCluskey          | Free Jon Johansen!
http://www.rahul.net/pcm | 


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