Make up your own damn mind. About religion too!

The noble idea of liberal education is that students will not only have a broad understanding of the universe in which we are a tiny piece of cosmic dust, but also that they will be able to independently think--and think critically.

But, more and more it seems like that the rapid development and diffusion of information technology does a tragic run about this liberal education: it is now a lot more possible than ever before not to have a broad understanding and, yet, comment and critique without any independent, critical thinking:

The Internet-begotten abundance of absolutely everything has given rise to a parallel universe of stars, rankings, most-recommended lists, and other valuations designed to help us sort the wheat from all the chaff we’re drowning in. 

Even more is this:

“We exalt in being able to know as much as possible. And that’s great on many levels. But we’re forgetting the pleasures of not knowing. I’m no Luddite, but we’ve started replacing actual experience with someone else’s already digested knowledge.”

Wait a sec' if I am citing from somebody else critiquing this aspect of predigested knowledge, then am I not providing a classic example of what the author has set out to convince me about?  So, if the author is correct, then no reader will ever cite this essay?  Muahahaha, a paradox indeed!

Ok, seriously, I am sick and tired of uninformed people rating articles and news reports that I frequently bypass the listings that most media sites have--the "most emailed" or the "most viewed" ... I have come to seriously worry about the wisdom of crowds. Hey, wasn't it the crowd that elected Bush/Cheney for a second term?

we have to watch how much outside assessment we let in. There’s something heartbreaking about surrendering to strangers the delicate moment of giving order to the world. In those instances when we bring our cognitive reasoning to bear on our surroundings, when we aim our singularly human powers of evaluation at a piece of art or a fellow person, it’s a fundamental expression of the self. 

Well said.

One could make a similar argument about the role of religion, too, no?  After all, the overwhelming majority of believers follow that religion only because they were born into it.  And they accept the wisdom of the crowd to which they belong.

We look for articles and news reports that support our beliefs and then click on that "like" or "dislike" buttons.  For all purposes, the IT explosion has merely created a zillion different monstrous versions of Faux Noose, er, Fox News.

For the most part, whether it is religion or reading and thinking about the secular world, it turns out that:

Beliefs come first; reasons second.

So, beliefs first.  As one of the sleaziest characters, Karl Rove, put it, we then invent our own reality to support that belief!  Oh well, back to the point:

That's the insightful message of The Believing Brain, by Michael Shermer, the founder of Skeptic magazine. In the book, he brilliantly lays out what modern cognitive research has to tell us about his subject—namely, that our brains are "belief engines" that naturally "look for and find patterns" and then infuse them with meaning. These meaningful patterns form beliefs that shape our understanding of reality. Our brains tend to seek out information that confirms our beliefs, ignoring information that contradicts them. Mr. Shermer calls this "belief-dependent reality." The well-worn phrase "seeing is believing" has it backward: Our believing dictates what we're seeing.

But then, is to read Shermer also a confirmation bias?

A human ancestor hears a rustle in the grass. Is it the wind or a lion? If he assumes it's the wind and the rustling turns out to be a lion, then he's not an ancestor anymore. Since early man had only a split second to make such decisions, Mr. Shermer says, we are descendants of ancestors whose "default position is to assume that all patterns are real; that is, assume that all rustles in the grass are dangerous predators and not the wind."

So, those of us who use reason can blame the beliefs first on those apes in the savanna, the evolution from whom retained this "believing is seeing."  Creationists of various stripes, on the other hand, can blame their respective gods :)

Can somebody in the crowd tell me what to think and do?  Muahahaha :)

BTW, thanks to my favorite go-to-site for the links to both these essays.