‘You must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool’

Sometimes people make mistakes that are so horrendously destructive, that no one could ever live with the realization, no matter how innocent was the original mistake. And so it is better for one’s own wellbeing to simply never discover such a consequential error. This is what Megan McArdle calls an Oedipus Trap: mistakes that no one can live with.*

Ignaz Semmelweis Did Not Follow The Science™ and Became the ‘Savior Of Mothers’

The “Semmelweis effect” or “Semmelweis reflex” refers to the tendency to reject offhand any new scientific evidence, discovery, knowledge, or analysis that contradicts the dominant paradigm or perceived scientific consensus (I write “perceived” because in reality there is never a full consensus in any field of science, despite what the media or politicians may insist). In Robert Anton Wilson’s book, The Game of Life, Timothy Leary defines this reflex as “Mob behavior found among primates and larval hominids on undeveloped planets, in which a discovery of important scientific fact is punished.” Thomas Szasz referred to it as “the invincible social power of false truths.”

Mumblings on Epistemic Responsibility

I’m beginning to write again. Though I’ve learned a great deal in the time between my de-conversion from Christianity to my current beliefs, I have not recorded any of my intellectual evolution to this point. Only in sparse commentary on Facebook posts or Reddit boards have I revealed (in an outward manner) my worldview. I’ve been through periods of credulity, skepticism, belief, confusion, and bitterness; all locked between my ears. But recently, a trend has emerged among those people with whom I spend time. People in general seem to have, in my experience as a 31-year-old white male living in the American South, become more openminded. I acknowledge that the data set from which I draw this conclusion is based on my own unique, subjective experience in the world, so it cannot be completely generalized. But my observation of the ‘Other’ in society (anyone *other than* myself) is what leads me to this hypothesis.