About the Tedious Presidential Debates

Everybody in social and mass media is abuzz about the recent debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris...at least that's how they'd like us to think.  I'm guessing that you're not all that much into that kind of nonsense...and I'm certainly not.  I can go back to 2016 when Trump debated Hillary Clinton...and in my estimation, she clearly won and her poll numbers soared.  Then FBI Director James Comey infamously decided to interfere in the campaign at the most crucial moment and, with great fanfare, announced he was reopening an investigation into, of all things, Clinton's emails.  This was happening among the opposition's cries of "Lock her up!", so Comey knew that what he was doing was interference and did it anyway.  Yet in 2024 it's apparently okay for their champion to be a 34-count convicted felon!  So no, I don't care about debates and discount their usefulness, although to be fair the previous one did get Biden to bow out.  I recently listened to someone recount their experiences listening to Tuesday evening's debate after I myself had studiously avoided it...and was affirmed in that avoidance.  If by this time you haven't figured out what you're going to do in this year's presidential election, I don't know what to say to you.  But then again, these elections always seem to hinge on how the stupid, emotion-driven pain-in-the-ass last-minute undecided voters sway, don't they...

Quote of the Week...from Neil deGrasse Tyson

 You can't use reason to convince anyone out of an argument that they didn't use reason to get into.

                                                                                      ---Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Neil deGrasse Tyson is a well-known American astrophysicist who has done a lot over the last few years to popularize science in our general culture...he wrote and narrated for the revamped Cosmos series for which Carl Sagan was initially responsible.  I follow him on Twitter...his wit is not designed to hurt others but rather to educate: the above quote is a case in point.  He's not dividing the world into reasonable vs. unreasonable people, but instead is taking the irrationality embedded to varying degrees within each of us and recognizing that many of the beliefs we adhere to and often promulgate are not based rationally but are rather products of our fears or anger on the negative side and idealized or excessively abstract thinking on the positive.  The trick with dealing with individual people as opposed to reading arguments pro and con about an issue or belief system is that with the individuals it's necessary to be able to discern how much of their beliefs are based on reason and how much derives from emotion or the desire to fit in with their peers.  If it's the latter then I'm wasting my time trying to discuss the point in question with them...they have underlying issues that they won't reveal.  People like to present an unreasonably idealized and typically more abstract picture of their dearly cherished notions while using ad hominem attacks on their "opponents" (they're evil, stupid, ignorant, gullible) and make unbalanced assessments of anecdotal events that support or contradict their positions.  Also, I think that many times folks will employ a kind of "smoke screen" argument to cover up that irrationality within themselves...often involving an excessive focus on symbols instead of substance...motivating them to behave or believe as they do.  And once someone is comfortable with their own narrative about the way things are in today's world of social media, bubbles and feedback loops it is only too easy to surround themselves with likeminded people who share their perspective and ignore or deny evidence to the contrary.  Brave new world: humanity has always had its lack of reason, but the communications technology revolution going on today is amplifying the effects considerably...