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An op-ed in the August 16th issue of Newsweek, written by Sharon Begley discusses The Limits of Reason: Why evolution may favor irrationality.



According to the article, studies have shown that people are assholes.



Or, more accurately, that people have apparently become evolutionarily poor at reasoning in favor of using skewed arguments to win debates.


That is, humans have adapted in such a way that compromises their reasoning skills in order to get what they want out of others.

The reason we succumb to confirmation bias, why we are blind to counterexamples, and why we fall short of Cartesian logic in so many other ways is that these lapses have a purpose: they help us "devise and evaluate arguments that are intended to persuade other people," says psychologist hugo Mercier of the University of Pennsylvania. Failures of logic, he and cognitive scientist Dan Sperber of the Institut Jean Nicod of Paris propose, are in fact effective ploys to win arguments.

That puts poor reasoning in a completely different light. Arguring, after all, is less about seeking truth than about over-coming opposing views.

-Newsweek, 16th August 2010, page 24

The fact that this conclusion is so completely correct almost makes me angry. And the alarm that I feel over Begley's summation of these findings is palpable within entire communities, and is a serious factor, I think, in humanity's inability to, bluntly, get its shit together.


Take any number of issues, including poverty, fair trade, civil rights, LGBTQ rights, racism, sexism, homophobia, the economic crisis. Apply logic;

along with a Utopian society, we'd have fewer assholes running around.