I think part of the problem is that the human race is like that story about the six blind men and the elephant, where one guy argued it was like a spear because he had only touched a tusk and another guy argued it was like a tree trunk because he had touched a leg and so on. There are billions of people here, each with their own unique experiences, their own little slice of the truth. It is only reasonable that some think their piece is TRUE and attempts to rebut their piece of the truth must be crazy or something.
When I look back on historical concepts of things, often, they are decent mental models, given the limited information available. For example, Native Americans of the Pacific North West thought that the world was a bit of land floating on water in a bowl. This area is geologically active and when there is an earthquake, water runs up onto the land, not unlike what would happen if you floated something in water and then pushed down on one end with a finger, tipping it. So it's a fairly good mental model for the limited information available to them. It's not accurate given what we know today, but I think it's disrespectful and a disservice to act like it is simply "dumb."
I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to take seriously the piece of the puzzle different people have and how to help people who see things very differently communicate effectively. It's shockingly hard. Most people want to insist, NOPE, you are an idiot and fucktard because I KNOW the elephant looks just like a spear. I have experienced that first hand, by god!
The part that most frustrates me is that the people who are the worst about this are often not the conspiracy theory "nuts" but the closed-minded folks doing it in the name of "science."
When I look back on historical concepts of things, often, they are decent mental models, given the limited information available. For example, Native Americans of the Pacific North West thought that the world was a bit of land floating on water in a bowl. This area is geologically active and when there is an earthquake, water runs up onto the land, not unlike what would happen if you floated something in water and then pushed down on one end with a finger, tipping it. So it's a fairly good mental model for the limited information available to them. It's not accurate given what we know today, but I think it's disrespectful and a disservice to act like it is simply "dumb."
I spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to take seriously the piece of the puzzle different people have and how to help people who see things very differently communicate effectively. It's shockingly hard. Most people want to insist, NOPE, you are an idiot and fucktard because I KNOW the elephant looks just like a spear. I have experienced that first hand, by god!
The part that most frustrates me is that the people who are the worst about this are often not the conspiracy theory "nuts" but the closed-minded folks doing it in the name of "science."