A personal motive
Like some other writers, I seem to be most motivated to write when I’m addressing certain specific people. That is, people who have either publicly held or advanced certain beliefs that I either agree or disagree with—mostly the latter, such as in the case of correcting something I believe to be a misconception (regardless of whether I’m the one who’s actually mistaken), or addressing specific criticisms—especially when I feel like my reputation is at risk.
There are many books and articles that have been written out of similar personal motives, from uncredentialled bloggers (like “autism advocates”, as well as myself), to scientists addressing the existence and prolific spread of pseudoscientific beliefs, like the many authors in Pseudoscience: The Conspiracy Against Science.
There’s also social media for those who want to quickly air their grievances, as well as get into arguments, but they don’t usually require the same amount of motivation as writing an article or a post. Twitter, for example, has a 280-character limit. Interestingly, while looking it up, it appears that, just a few hours ago, Elon Musk finally took over Twitter.
As I don’t use social networking sites in general, I don’t believe this change will affect me. It appears that censorship has now been removed, so everyone who wants to quickly air their grievances can do so without any fear of repercussion. I does make me wonder what I’m doing with my content, given that I have no need to censor myself. Why isn’t my blog filled with incoherent drivel? Maybe… it already is. People with ludicrous beliefs rarely believe that their beliefs are anything but indisputable, universal truths. These people are often also the most deluded. It only follows that such a person would not be aware that their writings are intellectually-disastrous drivel.
The need to correct somebody
Speaking of social media, references to these sites have been appearing more and more often in modern non-fiction texts, often with the authors criticising something that was said online, though other sources of material such as emails, letters, or even students asking questions during the lecture are still used.
Writing criticism can often be easier than writing something completely from scratch, as one already has content to work with instead of a blank page waiting to be filled. At the very least, it avoids the problem of writer’s block, with plenty of content already ready to be used.
It makes me wonder if turning off comments was a mistake, though I’m not sure if I even will get any comments. This isn’t by any means a popular site, after all. Which turns us to the next option: social networking sites.
Perhaps, by spending more time on social networking sites, I will find myself aggravated, annoyed, and unable to sleep more often, which will most likely result in more writing, and thus more productivity. At least, theoretically. I realise that this also implies that I don’t get aggravated or annoyed often, but given my abnormal sensitivity to taste, texture, and noise, there’s a chance I actually get annoyed more often than others who regularly use social networking sites. Life may not always be peaceful, but that’s why we have ANC headphones and self-checkouts.
Blissful ignorance
No matter how much I try to convince myself, it seems impossible for my brain to fathom the idea that others do not have the same knowledge as I do. Lacking a theory of mind may be a possibility, but it might not be that simple given that I am perfectly capable of lying and misleading people. For example, I can easily pass that famous test where Experimenter A hides an object in a particular location and leaves only for Experimenter B to secretly come in afterwards and move the object somewhere else. The question to the observer is this: “Where will Experimenter A look first?”
The correct answer—the one that is obvious to me as well as everyone else with a properly-developed brain—is that Experimenter A will look in the original hiding spot, because Experimenter A did not know that it was moved. Those lacking a theory of mind will say that Experimenter A will look in the new spot, because they can’t imagine others not having the same information as them.
But, despite being able to perform tasks like these, my brain still refuses to accept that others may not know as much as me. Whenever I finish a book, I expect everyone else to be able to understand everything I just learned—as if everyone has somehow also read the book at the same time as me.
Similarly, when I discover or realise something new, I also assume others have already discovered or realised the same thing. I cannot explain why I am compelled to think in this manner. Perhaps the issue at hand is mostly emotional.
I don’t often feel the need to correct people, because I’m either always automatically convinced that there’s no way they won’t realise the absurdity of their statement a few hours later, precisely because it’s so absurd, or convinced that they’re just joking around precisely because it’s so absurd.
Of course, those who have actually been out in the real world for long enough will know that this isn’t true; people can genuinely hold ludicrous, self-contradictory beliefs until the day they die. I understand this on a rational level, and I believe this to be true. After all, people don’t magically learn how to think critically just by continuing to exist. There’s a common misconception that wisdom comes with age, to the point that many cultures demand unequivocal respect for older individuals just because they’re older and not because they’ve demonstrated signs of intellectual refinement.
People don’t change that much. People who believe in superstitions and conspiracies when they’re adults rarely ever “wise up” and discard these beliefs as they age in favour of less self-contradictory ones. If anything, they only become harder to convince as their beliefs slowly turn into habit and as age continues to deteriorate their mental agility. Another possibility may also be fear: the fear that one has wasted the majority of their life chasing a dream—the sunk cost fallacy. This is also why, as opposed to trying to correct those who will have to put so much of their life at stake it becomes a question of morality, I believe it’s more important to teach the younger generation critical thinking skills so they won’t have to deal with similar burdens in their old age.
But that still isn’t the reason I don’t often correct people. Even when I see a young child fall prey to cognitive distortions, instead of correcting them, I tell myself that they’re still young and they still have plenty of time to learn how to think on their own as they eventually realise that they’ve unwittingly amassed a collection of self-contradictory or mutually-exclusive beliefs. If this were really true, we should just cancel schooling because children will all learn on their own anyway. We’d just have open lecture halls and children would be huddling around on their own, listening to the professors with uncontested attention.
I have several deeply-ingrained beliefs that fall apart almost immediately upon basic examination, yet I still inexplicably hold them. I assume this is simply an artefact of my age; I’m getting too old to change certain beliefs, but I am optimistic that our future generations will eventually learn from our mistakes, even if not the generation immediately after this.
Clarifying mistakes
In addition to not correcting others, I often neglect correcting myself. I assume that my mistakes are obvious; any sloppiness in my reasoning or lack of clarification—including sarcasm—should be obvious to anyone who reads it, as if they can read my mind.
I also assume people know that I rarely commit to positions (again, as if they can read my mind), and that I often change my beliefs as a result of process of learning. I often read information that corrects my misconceptions and points out flaws in my reasoning because… isn’t that the point of learning? I’ve held many different positions over the years, most of which I thought I had strong emotional attachments to, such as the belief that people who subscribe to pseudoscientific beliefs are necessarily intellectually inferior.
I cannot name many examples, as I tend to discard them from my mind (that was the most recent example) as soon as I realise they’re wrong. Though the only people I know of who can do this are a minority of philosophers and scientists, there’s some short-circuitry in my brain that’s causing me to think that everybody thinks like this, because it’s the only way I can imagine thinking about things. As a result, this contributes to my sloppiness in writing and clarification, because I assume anyone who reads what I write will (magically) be able to understand what I mean.
Too many times I find myself scoffing at people pointing out the obvious given the superfluous nature of repeating what everyone already knows. My inability to comprehend the fact that others don’t know what I know constantly draws me towards delusional conclusions, which in turn hinders my motivation to write or even speak up in front of others, as I believe that the flaws in the reasoning are so obvious that nobody will be able to make it home without realising it first.
It comes as no surprise that I often end up surprised the next day to find out they still hold the same beliefs. Yet, I never seem to learn. As much as it’s obvious how misaligned my belief is with reality, it’s unbelievably difficult for me to contest my intuitive compulsion to believe otherwise—I literally can’t comprehend how others don’t know what I don’t know. Even for knowledge that I just learned literally five seconds ago, my brain automatically registers everyone else as immediately being on the same page as me.
I really wonder if this has to do with autism, but I feel like it has to be due to some other reason. After all, I can easily pass that earlier theory of mind test.
Closing
There’s likely a lot of rambling and repetition in this post as I’ve not edited it properly, but editing will only add even more hours on top of what I’ve already spent writing this. One may argue that this demonstrates a lack of respect for the readers’ time, which I completely agree with, but at the same time I want to defend my complacency by pointing out that I don’t run any ads (and never will) nor collect any user information (never will), and that this is really just a personal blog that I started for fun.
Despite my moral obligation to ensure the quality of and veracity of my content, and to avoid contributing to the pollution of misinformation on the internet, there are certain practical constraints that restrict me from doing everything as perfectly as I’d like, most importantly being the lack of time.
Future posts may contain a similarly less-edited format with more rambling, as this they’re easier for me to write given that this style aligns more closely with the disorganised and capricious nature of my thoughts.
As for the problems mentioned in this post, they are not new problems; I’ve been trying to “fix” my brain and prevent it from thinking like this for many years at this point, but it still hasn’t budged. I’m hoping that I’ll eventually be able to layer so many blankets of more logical and reality-aligned beliefs on top of it that it’ll become so muffled I can no longer hear it anymore.