The Discovery Channel, TLC, National Geographic Channel, and others have been getting into the Christmas spirit, as they usually do this time of year.
They basically run two types of shows. The first is "historical" accounts of the "real" story of Jesus. You see, everything you have been taught, everything in the Bible is not true. Miracles have simple explanations. Jesus isn't who he said he was. Jesus isn't who his contemporaries said he was. Jesus is not who millions have believed he was for thousands of years. All that is based on silly, unscientific fiction. The show will set all of that straight with theories from modern-day sages solidly arguing how their thoughts trump the collected ignorance of millions of Christians throughout the ages.
The other type of show is the fanciful evolutio-drama. It is a sort of a day-in-the-life of a theoretical animal in a theoretical environment at a theoretical time interacting with a supporting cast of other theoretical animals. I say theoretical, but it is solidly based on information gleaned from a fossil tooth. I saw the stunning computer graphics, so I know its true.
It's great that they have a solid scientific view of the world, instead of all that imaginary Christian stuff.
It's their small way of saying Merry Christmas. Peace on Mother Earth, good will to the highest order of evolved primate.
Sunday, December 25, 2005
Thursday, December 01, 2005
"Average" Does Not Make Right
If one person tells you that 1+1 is 3, and another person tells you that 1+1 is 4, does that mean that 1+1 is really 3.5? That is the average answer. It is the "middle of the road" position.
That may sound like a silly illustration, but it is not unlike the straddling that moderates try to do every day. They will stake out a position of compromise between the two prevailing positions and declare themselves "uniters", "reasonable people", and the like. They use attacks coming equally from both sides to verify their position at the center.
But what good is it to be at the center? It has nothing to do with being right. It is simply the average position. There is no belief at the heart of it. It is a political play to try to please everyone and stand for nothing. It is gutless. It is also senseless, because it does not account for the fact that one (or both) of the prevailing opinions could be wrong.
The average of two wrong answers is a wrong answer. If one answer is right and one is wrong, an intelligent person will disregard the wrong answer and stick with the right one, not average in the wrong answer to make the wrong people more agreeable.
The unending cry of the self-described centrist is "extreme", a label they apply to anyone who does not adopt their averaging formula. In our silly mathematic example, those who claim 1+1 is 3 would be on one extreme. Those who claim it is 4 would be on the other.
But the fact is, the person claiming "3" is not only not extreme, but in fact does not go far enough.
We cannot build consensus by rallying around the average, but by uniting around the correct answer. Perhaps 1+1 is actually 2.
That may sound like a silly illustration, but it is not unlike the straddling that moderates try to do every day. They will stake out a position of compromise between the two prevailing positions and declare themselves "uniters", "reasonable people", and the like. They use attacks coming equally from both sides to verify their position at the center.
But what good is it to be at the center? It has nothing to do with being right. It is simply the average position. There is no belief at the heart of it. It is a political play to try to please everyone and stand for nothing. It is gutless. It is also senseless, because it does not account for the fact that one (or both) of the prevailing opinions could be wrong.
The average of two wrong answers is a wrong answer. If one answer is right and one is wrong, an intelligent person will disregard the wrong answer and stick with the right one, not average in the wrong answer to make the wrong people more agreeable.
The unending cry of the self-described centrist is "extreme", a label they apply to anyone who does not adopt their averaging formula. In our silly mathematic example, those who claim 1+1 is 3 would be on one extreme. Those who claim it is 4 would be on the other.
But the fact is, the person claiming "3" is not only not extreme, but in fact does not go far enough.
We cannot build consensus by rallying around the average, but by uniting around the correct answer. Perhaps 1+1 is actually 2.
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