You can always find someone who will agree with you. This has been true in any era, on any opinion, position, belief, or sworn fact

In the past, however, this may not have been quite as apparent, but today we have an array of media with its army of talking heads (and typing bloggists) waiting 24/7 to agree to pretty much anything you can dream up. Choose any topic, no matter how obscure, no matter how popular or soundly agreed on by the powers that be and there are always camps for and camps against — and the inevitable slew of other perspectives: feminine-queerist-libertarian-postmodern-postracial-pre moving out of my parent’s house-conservative yet socially liberal neo Nazi-Ron Paulist, etc etc and on and on.

Now as history painfully shows, the status-quo of fact has often been at best wrong, and at worst depraved. So in many ways finding agreement is a good thing — unification gives the less pervasive voices power and resolve.

But here is the thing: Just because you can find someone who agrees with you doesn’t mean you (and them) are any less wrong (or right!).

How we form our opinions as a society doesn’t mesh with the idea of wrong. We like our information and perspectives to come from sources that speak directly, sternly. Sources that know the whole story and aren’t there to listen what you have to say or raise questions that air out gray area — they are there to tell you what to think. Like say … Bill O’Reilly, or Jesus.

As a history major, my learning entailed primarily grappling with two things: bias and truth. These are two things that most people see as incompatible, and thus disregard everything they perceive as having bias from holding truth at all. What my professors taught me to do as a historian was not to try to block out bias, but to embrace it because there is no way around it. We live in a world of bias: everyone has taken in a different experience, which was based infinitely on unique experiences of people throughout time. In a sense, truth is bias: as soon as we exist, we are predisposed to think different things.

One of my girlfriend’s favorite quotes from college puts it in practical terms: “Be most critical of the things you agree with”.

But whose got time for all this touchy-feely, truth worship anyway- we’ve got a war on our hands! Who’s going to put up a flag of ambiguity and humility necessary to find common truth with the rhetorical bullets flying overhead that say death to you and all you represent?

In the excerpt from Michael Lewis’ book The Big Short, about stock market whiz Michael Burry, which was  linked from here last Wednesday (you can find the excerpt here), the investor complains about having to defend ideas, as it makes changing your mind harder. In other words, that it impairs your ability to rise above bias.

In finding so many irate, positive beyond the mortal plane backing for what we think, it is easy to become possessed with defending them through all obstacles — including fact. In short, it makes the common ground of truth somewhat of a no-man’s land, instead of a place of pilgrimage.

The challenges that we face as a society and humanity (global warming, energy, overpopulation, fresh water, prejudicial hatred, etc.) are uncertain by nature. If we are to choose the best path for all of us, we are going to have to be flexible and open-minded. Truth must lead the way.

We’ve just got a horse-pill of humility to get down before we’re ready.

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