Intelligence doesn’t protect you from believing wrong things. It makes you better at believing them. Smart people are excellent at finding reasons for what they already want to believe. They can construct elaborate arguments. They can spot flaws in opposing views. They can make almost anything sound reasonable. This is motivated reasoning. Your brain decides what it wants to be true, then your intelligence gets to work building a case....
Try to believe the sky is green right now. Not pretend. Not imagine. Actually believe it. You can’t. Even if someone offered you a million dollars, you couldn’t genuinely believe the sky is green. Your mind won’t let you. This shows something strange about belief. We talk about “choosing” our beliefs, but that’s backwards. Beliefs choose us. When I look outside and see blue sky, belief happens automatically. The evidence hits my brain and belief follows....
Smart people aren’t less likely to believe wrong things. They’re just better at explaining why they’re right. I noticed this watching debates about topics I actually know something about. The smartest people in the room often held the most confidently wrong positions. And they had sophisticated reasons for every mistake. Here’s what I think happens: intelligence is a tool. You can use a hammer to build a house or to break windows....
I used to think confidence meant truth. If someone spoke with certainty, they probably knew what they were talking about. If I felt certain about something, I was probably right. This is backwards. Certainty is a feeling. Truth is a fact. They’re completely different categories. I can feel certain that my keys are on the kitchen counter. Walk to the kitchen. No keys. My certainty was real. My belief was false....
There’s a difference between not believing in God and believing there is no God. It sounds like word games, but it matters. Not believing in God is like not believing in unicorns. You’ve heard the claims. You’ve seen no convincing evidence. So you don’t believe. You’re not making a positive claim about reality. You’re just not convinced by the arguments you’ve heard. Believing there is no God is different. That’s a positive claim about what exists....
I was reading a debate about animal rights the other day when I noticed something strange. The argument went like this: factory farming causes tremendous suffering to animals. Animals are sentient beings capable of pain. Therefore, we shouldn’t eat factory-farmed meat. It sounds reasonable enough. But there’s a peculiar little jump happening in that final step — one that a grumpy Scottish philosopher named David Hume spotted nearly 300 years ago....