Philosophical Wank
I loved my philosophy classes in university and have often proclaimed the need for basic reasoning to be a requirement for all high school graduates. Alas, despite my hard work of yelling into the void for years, philosophy continues to be absent in most secondary education systems. (Most. Not all. Hello TOK!)
Much to my chagrin, when I left the halls of my undergrad and ventured out into the wide world, I found philosophy has a pretty terrible reputation these days. Even Stephen Hawking declared that it was dead!
To be fair, many prominent thinkers have come to the defense of philosophy. But that discourse tends to reside within the halls of academia. In my own everyday experience, many regular folks seem to be of the opinion that philosophy is a bunch of wank. Even worse, when attempting to engage in rational discourse, I am frequently met with a deep mistrust, as if slow-walking through logical reasoning and hypothetical thought experiments were some form of trick. (I’m just challenging your reasoning, and I hope you challenge mine!)
There are any number of reasons for this. Cognitive biases, the Dunning-Kruger Effect, indoctrination, making one’s beliefs one’s identity, denial, and tribalism, are the main culprits. For certain, our brains are not evolutionarily wired for rational thought. Which, ironically, is one reason why Philosophical education is so important.
Among the myriad issues hindering more widespread adoption of Philosophy, I think one key issue is that in our modern, STEM-focused, technological world, there is a strong tendency to only look for instrumental value in things, rather than intrinsic. That is, we value things insofar as they can do something for us, rather than being valuable in and of themselves.
Last time, I wrote a whole separate article on that topic in case you want to dive down that rabbit hole with me. But for now, I’ll stay on the topic arguing for more people to study philosophy.
While I maintain that education, knowledge, and truth are all intrinsically valuable, it doesn’t mean they are without instrumental value as well. For those of you not convinced by my intrinsic value argument, perhaps it will help to point an instrumental use of philosophy: It can help you understand nuance and evaluate the strength of your own beliefs. Wouldn’t the world be a better place if we all understood how certain we ought to be on any given topic based on the kind of reasoning we’re employing?
Different Kinds of Reasoning
If you studied logic, it is likely you were taught the difference between deductive reasoning (general to specific) and inductive reasoning (specific to general). These are frequently taught as a dichotomy.
Deductive reasoning leads to 100% sure answers, but it is not all that useful because the answers are usually self-evident. For example:
A-All bachelors are single.
B- John is a bachelor.
C- Therefore, John is single.
Sure, we can be 100% certain of the conclusion if both premises are true, but we’re not exactly blowing any minds here. Note, a distinct feature of deductive reasoning is going from general terms (all bachelors) to a specific instance (John).
Inductive reasoning is the opposite; it goes from specific instances to general conclusions. For example:
A- Every time I have slept past 7am, I was late for class.
B- Every time I got up before 7am, I made it to class on time.
C- Therefore, I should get up before 7am to get to class on time.
We use inductive reasoning much more frequently, and it is quite useful in helping us determine what is probably true. But importantly, you can never be 100% sure of the answer.
You see how these two types of reasoning are different? Deductive reasoning takes general truth statements to come to a 100% certain logical conclusion about a specific instance. Whilst inductive reasoning takes specific instances from past experience to make a prediction about what is likely to happen generally in the future.
Being aware of the type of reasoning you’re employing helps you mitigate your level of certainty in your conclusions.
Abductive Reasoning & Conspiracy Theories
Who doesn’t love a good conspiracy? It is difficult to find better examples in the real world of situations where people have not accurately calibrated their level of certainty with the quality of their reasoning.
Why was the flag moving? Clearly we didn’t land on the moon.
Jet fuel doesn’t burn hot enough. Clearly the towers were bombed by the US government.
If the world is round, why doesn’t the water pool at the bottom?
Now don’t get me wrong. There are real conspiracies in the world. Iran-Contra comes readily to mind. As does the ongoing parade of bile-inducing, horror from the Epstein files. But by and large, the most popular conspiracies do not hold up to rational scrutiny.
I bring conspiracies up in this article because they will help me highlight a third kind of reasoning. While some conspiracy thinking makes use of inductive reasoning, (ie The US government lied about mask effectiveness early on in COVID, therefore I can’t trust the US government about anything) the bulk of conspiracies themselves rely on a lesser known type: abductive reasoning.
You are using abductive reasoning when you are trying to take pieces of evidence and put them together to get a best-guess picture of what is happening. Like a doctor who sees a patient with symptoms x, y, and z. The doctor needs to probe, ask questions, get more information and try to piece it all together to form a diagnosis that best explains the clues. Another well-worn example is a detective looking at a crime scene, piecing the evidence together to create the best possible explanation of what happened.
Like inductive reasoning, abductive reasoning cannot lead to 100% certainty, and it largely relies on making inferences from our past experiences.
Abductive reasoning isn’t great. It’s what we use in situations where we are trying to figure out the best possible explanation, often with limited evidence. It relies a lot on our proverbial “gut” feelings because sometimes there may be clues that don’t fit the overall story. How does a doctor determine when the sore throat is a separate symptom not a part of the issue causing the other symptoms? Or when does the detective determine that the knife on the floor was likely dropped by accident the day prior and not part of the actual crime that took place?
The answer is expertise. Experts have prior knowledge that is greater than the average bear’s.
And that’s hard for the conspiracy theorist to accept. Because sometimes institutions do lie. Sometimes, clues are missed. No one is perfect. But the difference is, conspiracy theorists too often start and stop with abductive reasoning. Whereas experts know it is just a starting point.
An expert, may begin with abductive reasoning to get a framework for investigation. But they then need to seek additional evidence that either supports or refutes their working theories. Doctors run blood tests, detectives gather physical evidence and eyewitness testimony. They do this BECAUSE they are experts and they realize the shortcomings of abductive reasoning.
Conspiracy theorists on the other hand, feel a sense of satisfaction in the narratives they create and then stop there. They may claim to seek physical evidence to back up their claims, but frequently that evidence is dismissed because it doesn’t fit their narrative rather than changing their narrative in light of new evidence. (For a prime example of this, watch the end of the Netflix documentary “Behind the Curve.” Truly it is a glorious example of this type of faulty reasoning).
In short, the conspiracy theorist begins with abductive reasoning, feels completely certain in their story, and only accepts evidence that confirms it.
Check yo’self
So basically, when an expert’s explanation does not feel satisfying, the conspiracy theorist then looks at the clues that they have available (which is frequently less information than the experts have). The Dunning-Kruger effect tells them they are just as good at this as the experts. And voilà! They can create a more satisfying story. A good story travels far and travels fast, (especially online) and before you know it, you’ve got yourself a community convinced that Bill Clinton is a lizard alien.
So how can you tell when you are doing an honest critical look while avoiding the pitfalls of faulty logic. Remember that evidence gathered through inductive reasoning trumps abductive explanations. And if you’re ever lucky enough to get a truly deductive explanation that is valid and sound, then that trumps everything else. Don’t let what you want to be true, influence your interpretation of the evidence.
Also, if you FEEL righteous in your explanation. That should be a red flag. You should interrogate where that feeling is coming from. Because often it comes from a very irrational place.
Seek the truth my friends.
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