39
votes
The curious joy of being wrong – intellectual humility means being open to new information and willing to change your mind
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- Authors
- Daryl Van Tongeren
- Published
- Dec 26 2023
- Word count
- 1314 words
I haven't even read the article yet, I've saved it to read later, but I can't agree more. In fact, I find myself baffled at how vehemently some people will avoid admitting they are wrong. There is something so freeing about admitting you were wrong, especially in situation where most people wouldn't. It is often disarming in disagreements and even works to your advantage, because you highlight how reasonably held your opinions are.
I've often found that, similarly to admitting I'm wrong, when I am in a disagreement with someone and we are debating the topic, the earlier and more often I concede points to them, the better it all goes. I wish more people didn't consider it some kind of personal failure to admit wrong.
I recommend this article. I'm also going to take the opportunity to promote a book I enjoyed on related topics. I found this book to be interesting, informative, thoughtful and accessible. Being Wrong Adventures in the Margin of Error by Schulz
Came to second the recommendation. That book was like a manifesto for me. The arguments for the value of mistakes and error were eye opening. Revelatory even. I felt like Kathryn Schulz had put into words ideas that had nagged at me when I would hear others brag about being right so much. I would think, "Where's the value in being right all the time?"
That Schulz is an engaging and funny writer didn't hurt either.
I wonder how much our school system plays a role in negatively portraying "being wrong"?
From my schooling 15 years ago, being wrong was a sign that you didn't understand and should try harder. Unfortunately, you don't get a second chance at something unless you're resitting the exam, you can't redo last week's assignment to see if you've improved.
That's not to say I'm blaming our school systems, they're probably doing the best with what they're given, but our teachers are so overworked they don't have time to sit with a student and go through why they're mistaken and how to improve, you just get a few words of advice scribbled in the margin.
Maybe school has changed since then (please tell me how wrong I am, parents!), but I don't think we do enough to show students that humans learn best from making mistakes, which leads to people getting stuck in their ways rather than staying curious.
It really depends on the context. In school the objective is (often, not always) to learn a fact or demonstrate mastery of a method. It is possible to be objectively wrong when you say 1 + 1 = 3 or George Washington was born on July 4, 1776.
In the context of this article - intellectual humility - we're dealing with complex and nuanced issues that may not have one right answer. We're challenging our underlying assumptions and opening our minds to new information. One might believe, for instance, that we shouldn't give money to the homeless because they'll just spend it on drugs. One might change their mind after reading about studies that gave homeless people money no strings attached and found not only that they made decisions comparably responsible to the general population, but also that the money generally helped them get off the street.
It's this second context that I think schools don't teach early enough, though it's definitely in the high school curriculum.
I can see a common through-line with both of these - the reasoning behind the attempted answer. It doesn't matter if a student can recite their times tables, but rather if they understand why multiplication is true and interrogating why their original attempt was wrong (it doesn't work with history facts like dates, but that's the boring part of history anyway). Similarly with complex topics like homelessness, having a holistic thought process is more important than stumbling into a good solution.
You're right that schools don't teach the second context enough, I just think the second context can be applied a lot more broadly than waiting until high school.
Humility in all its forms, but especially the intellectual, seems to be contrary to the spirit of the age we're in, and that just fills me with sorrow and despair. I could point my finger right at corporate-run social media, and while I am fully convinced the ad revenue model incentivizes against boosting conversations demonstrating humility, I can't ignore that the old online communities I would frequent tended towards some acutely unhumble userbases and discourse. The only conclusion I can then make is that this issue has a much deeper root in our culture, likely transcending and predating the online world.
The first step towards change is recognizing the need or desire for change. How can any of us expect things to improve if there is no safe way or place to be wrong? This lack of any home for humility is almost certainly a contributing factor for the polarization we see in especially American society. At some point, this fracture will have to be addressed, and my hope and prayer is that reconciliation and compromise is chosen over bloodshed, but that will not happen without humility entering the equation.
This reminds me of a dating I used to hear all the time at a former workplace, "Strong opinions, loosely held."
When we change what we believe or how we think about the world, that's growth. Sorry nobody wants to choose a slice in time and say that's when they understood everything. It's impossible to know everything, there's too much out there.
I also love the mindset of the lucky 10,000. Learning something new should be a positive experience, nobody should be shamed for it.
An article not welcome overall despite what most people profess. :-)