I appreciate your outlook and empathy. I think I’m smart. I know I ignore certain things and probably look stupid. But you are absolutely right that you can’t know what exact information they’re working with as the basis for decisions/statements/opinions. Being able to identify some base misconception can bring about resolution so fast. I still have sudden realizations that uproot some belief I had based on some bullshit my dad said decades ago. If you never had reason to question it, it doesn’t enter the critical reasoning part of your head.
Only example off the top of my head is he once said tetanus was, effectively, caused by dogs urinating on rusty metal. I was probably under 10, who am I to question? Well, tetanus is such a rare topic that I never thought about. Working under rusty cars from my teens onward? Not a problem, dogs aren’t peeing up into my car. Well, a friend mentioned he’d was updating his tetanus shot around 30 since he also works on rusty cars. “Wait, any rusty metal?” it was a dolly-zoom moment. Turns out, any source material that’s contaminated while puncturing skin can do it. It just happens to often be lost nails or broken glass. But I carried that belief for like 25 years.
I appreciate your outlook and empathy. I think I’m smart. I know I ignore certain things and probably look stupid. But you are absolutely right that you can’t know what exact information they’re working with as the basis for decisions/statements/opinions. Being able to identify some base misconception can bring about resolution so fast. I still have sudden realizations that uproot some belief I had based on some bullshit my dad said decades ago. If you never had reason to question it, it doesn’t enter the critical reasoning part of your head.
Only example off the top of my head is he once said tetanus was, effectively, caused by dogs urinating on rusty metal. I was probably under 10, who am I to question? Well, tetanus is such a rare topic that I never thought about. Working under rusty cars from my teens onward? Not a problem, dogs aren’t peeing up into my car. Well, a friend mentioned he’d was updating his tetanus shot around 30 since he also works on rusty cars. “Wait, any rusty metal?” it was a dolly-zoom moment. Turns out, any source material that’s contaminated while puncturing skin can do it. It just happens to often be lost nails or broken glass. But I carried that belief for like 25 years.