Reductio ad Absurdum: The ideology of doubt and the absurd

It is a difficult thing to become comfortable with doubt as a tool and way of life as a critical skeptic. The word has a negative connotation that is hard to shake.
And to be doubted, especially when we are sincere, is even more unpleasant. Voltaire said, "Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd." What he means is that it is easier to be certain, no matter how silly our certainty is, than it is to doubt and mistrust our own beliefs and those of others.
Yet, it remains incredibly important to continue to work through our experiences using doubt as the over arching system through which we sift those experiences, so that we may never be rendered and reduced to absurdity.

Reductio ad absurdum is the disproof of a
proposition by showing an absurdity
to which it leads when carried to
its logical conclusion.

'Absurdity' is a wonderful word, and it is one of the main tenets of the ideology of doubt. The process of the logical tool known as reductio ad absurdum or, 'reduction to absurdity' is the means by which we can come to doubt and disbelieve certain claims based on how silly or absurd they are. 
An example of this can be found in the previous blog post about mythology. It would have been impossible for Noah to have pairs of each species of beetle on his ark, because of how many species there are. Pointing this out, renders the rest of the literalist's claims completely moot. It's just not possible and it is absurd and ridiculous to even take it seriously.
Using the reduction to absurdity as a tool and remembering its place as a tenet in the ideology of doubt, we can often find the flaws in otherwise reasonable arguments as well. Often times it is not the literalist we deal with, because those arguments are easily reduced to absurdity. More likely, the claims that are more reasonable can sometimes get through. This is why, we lead with doubt, until evidence is provided that can bear up under the weight of the claim.
In a sense, Voltaire's point could be a very good mantra to use when we aren't sure or when we're tempted to believe a claim with no evidence. It is uncomfortable to disbelieve, but it is a willing abandonment of the critical faculties to believe something with complete certainty, which is just absurd.

Skepticism and the myth

Humans generate mythology at nearly all levels of experience. We have myths for deep time describing our cultural or societal memories and we also have more subjective family myths.
This tendency toward creating myths is one of the most amazing aspects of human thought and experience. It provides a cognitive literature of sorts and enhances our feeling of participation with past events.
The lovely thing about these myths is that they are never true. They tell tales that bend the laws of physics, that change the way we know the world works. And why not? They are reflections of the human imagination. Myths show us that time and again, we are brilliant story tellers and that tendency runs through the core of our collective experiences.
Mythology is helpful because it helps (as it is intended to do) to participate in our history, without needing to read that history in a dry old text.
However, myths stop being helpful or good when people take them literally. Any myth that you can think of, from any corner of our planet, even if it has its ancient roots in real but unrecorded deeds, is only literature. It cannot and should not be considered real, true or an actual representation of what actually happened.
It can be fun to think about whether or not the myth is true, because that is the joy of literature, but when those who wish to take the myth literally begin to push the myth onto others, the problems begin.
It is not only that most myths deny or ignore real natural laws but that those who take the myth literally try to squash up the real world to fit in the limited and nonsensical world of the myth.
When this happens by an individual, there is no harm. But when this happens and the myths are forced on the young or on the credulous, terrible damage occurs.

The Coleoptera, (beetles) with about 400,000 species, is
 the largest of all orders, constituting
almost 40% of described insects and 25%
of all known animal life-forms;
new species are discovered frequently.
Noah would have had his hands full.

It may seem innocuous to tell children about the Genesis Flood or that Poseidon or Thor are real, but the consequences are terrible.
First, by instilling a literal view or interpretation on the young, we are actively suppressing their natural curiosity We force them to accept fiction as fact, which makes it much more difficult for them to discern other forms of literature from fact, as well.
But most disturbingly, it forces people to give over their critical faculties and renders them unable to think critically, challenge false claims or even realize the wondrous realities of this world that are true.
Mythology is wonderful, necessary and even entertaining, but it is never the unarguable truth and the critical skeptic must remember this in the fight against credulity, literalistic and zealous fanaticism and totalitarianism.

The ideology of doubt and the cynic

The ideology of doubt is the only ideology that a critical skeptic adheres to. It is the belief that nothing is certain, no one opinion or belief is absolute and there is no source for truth that is infallible and omnipotent. It is the ideology of Socrates who said that all he knows for certain is that he knows nothing at all.

To some, this may not leave much room for childlike awe and wonder when presented with new discoveries or when one witnesses a breathtaking sunset. There is not much wiggle room for the critical skeptic when presented with new information. We doubt it until there is enough evidence to back up the claims. So does this mean that we don't believe anything? Does this mean that we doubt the love and loyalty of family and friends?

The answer is no.

One of the critical skeptic's most valuable tools is simple hope. A cynic does not have hope that his friends truly love him. He doubts even that. The cynic has become jaded by the lack of evidence for the things he once wanted to be true. The cynic allows no light of discovery into their heart.

While it can be a valuable tool, the
critical skeptic is aware of the dangers of
cynicism.

While cynicism is without doubt a valuable tool, too much can poison the mind. Critical skepticism wants to know the truth and wants to find hope for the greater good of mankind in science and medicine.
As an example, imagine that a news broadcast has a focus piece on a new and apparently successful treatment for an especially vicious cancer. The critical skeptic goes onto the web or asks their physician to learn more about the new treatment. The cynic simply dismisses the broadcast out of hand. Why? It's just a news program, which gives it no veracity in and of itself and where is the evidence?

So we see that the difference is pronounced when we realize that the skeptic's reaction is to hope for the treatment to be real and seeks to prove that hope, whereas the cynic believes there's no evidence and therefore the search is irrelevant and useless to them.

A great way of keeping the cynicism at bay is to continue to read and research and observe the world of science and philosophy and medicine with a keen eye. There are a host of excellent resources for the critical skeptic which help to form a foundation to claims made. This way, if we continue to search and research, we can more fully appreciate the greater mechanisms of this world and of those ideas worthy of knowing.
The cynic simply doesn't care.

Intellectual autopilot

It can be frustrating when we are faced with someone who has not done the real work of forming opinions or evidence for those opinions and beliefs. Very often, it seems, one might just believe something because they feel that they are expected to, or because that's always how they've thought. Far more frustrating is someone who offers an opinion and cannot give any reason why they believe it.

The irony is that this person often can't to see the importance of having well founded thoughts and opinions. However this is very often not a malicious or evil intent that leads them to this point. It might be that they have never been taught to be skeptical or to think critically or that they simply didn't know that they weren't thinking critically already.

Switch your intellectual autopilot to
disengage.

Whatever the cause of intellectual autopilot, the ramifications of living this way can be incredibly dangerous the person and to others.

The duty of the critical skeptic is not only to work to guard oneself from the dangers of intellectual autopilot (we are all susceptible) but to help eliminate it in others.
Learning how to catch oneself in intellectual autopilot can also help to detect it in others. The real trick is helping people to see that there is nothing wrong with learning how to reevaluate their convictions when presented with evidence to the contrary of their firmly held beliefs. It is important to anticipate the backfire effect, to make no judgments about their beliefs (no matter how misinformed they are) and to be compassionate. It can be both a little embarrassing and cause guilt to be shown the error on one's thinking.
The reality is, that if successful, it can be exhilarating to be freed from bad ideas and misconceptions. 

The Critical Skeptic and the Scientific Claim

Imagine that you've spent the last few years working to prove a theory. You worked long into the night on countless occasions, sacrificed time with family and friends and had not a few moments where you thought you were going to tear up your research and give up.
Then, finally, you finish your work and submit your results to your peers at the university and wait for their approval to publish, which they finally give, only to have someone come along with evidence that directly refutes what your work claimed. 
What would you do?
This scenario is a common one. Young graduate or PhD students have labored for countless hours only to find that their hypothesis has been neatly disproved by another scientist. One can imagine the internal turmoil and the trashing of offices or labs that might be a symptom of having been proved wrong.
And yet, scientists don't really mind this. Most of the scientific community wants to be proved wrong, because what that means is that they've helped to put in another rung on the ladder to greater discovery. 
This might seem unbelievable, but if you pay close enough attention to any of the scientific educators now prevalent on TV and social media, they almost seem to be excited for someone to come along with a new theory that disproves long-held scientific theories.
From time-to-time, after long hours and huge sacrifices, a discovery comes along that doesn't refute but proves a theory.
For instance, Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity postulated that there are ripples in spacetime. The math was good, but humans had no way to prove this hypothesis until nearly one hundred years later. Scientists at the Laser Interferometer-Gravitational Wave Observatory (LIGO) operated by Cal-Tech and MIT discovered and proved Einstein's prediction by recording these waves from a cataclysmic event in deepest space. When two black holes collided, they sent monstrous ripples through the fabric of spacetime. LIGO has the first-ever recorded evidence of this amazing prediction. Albert Einstein, perhaps the greatest thinker of the last century and certainly the brightest, had his math proved correct by scientists hoping to do just that.

An artistic simulation of the two black holes in question
colliding.

However, the vindication of long-unproved mathematical hypothesis is rather rare. Many more such hypotheses are discarded after having been proved incorrect, however excellent they were in their scientific efficacy.
This is why skepticism is such an important part of the scientific method. We make scientific claims based on evidence collected until those claims are refuted by stronger evidence. It is only by rigorous testing, fact-checking and hours of research that these claims are ever even considered to be viable. 
What if, you may well ask, LIGO had proven Einstein's theory wrong? It would have equally revolutionized the thinking about general relativity.
It must be said that few of the rest of us are scientists in this sense. We don't work at observatories and we don't spend huge portions of our lives sorting out the math to prove or disprove scientific claims.
Still, even in our everyday lives, such claims come to us from a thousand places. There are a million theories a day and many of them seem viable at first glance.
Credulous humans may want to fall into the trap of believing everything they've been told, but the critical skeptic knows better.
Even an extraordinary discovery like the one proving Einstein correct, needs to be scrutinized.
This is why the critical skeptic employs words like, 'apparently' and 'allegedly' and 'supposedly' at all times in these cases.
"Apparently, LIGO has proved Einstein's general relativity theory about spacetime waves correct."
This way, when the next discovery comes along that may disprove further hypotheses made by Einstein, we're ready.
Skepticism is the main motivating factor of scientific discovery. And it also helps us to keep an open mind while continuing the search for truth in all fields of thought and science.

Dealing with the literal mind: the third enemy of skepticism

People are, generally, good. The human mind is a pretty amazing example of evolution's power, if not its forethought. We are sentient and we have the ability to ponder our motivations. That's a very important thing.
As I wrote in the last post, however, there are tendencies within the human mind that are not perfect and that can hamper the critical faculties. One of the worst is credulity, especially when it is blind and willful. The other is the backfire effect. The third, is literal mindedness.
True, psychologists will tell you that there is nothing inherently wrong with being literal. It gives us the ability to be matter-of-fact when problem solving. But when it comes to being able to discern which sorts of ideologies are good or bad, or perhaps natural or dangerous, the literal minded person cannot be bothered to do more than to take the (often) proffered ideology at face value.

Children's literature character Amelia Bedelia
struggled with idiomatic speech and was very literal.

Literal mindedness may be, like credulity and the backfire effect, necessary aspects of human development, but when it is paired with credulity and bad ideology, it can be lethal to the critical faculties.
Let's take for example the person who thinks that the world is only five thousand years old. They've read the Genesis accounts and they've accepted them as is, with not a jot of questioning.
I'm not poking the hornet's nest for a religious shake down, but there are people out there who actually believe this as a literal fact.
The problem with this mindset isn't necessarily that people are unimaginative when it comes to issues like this but that they are unwilling to break away from them, when there is evidence presented contrary to their strongly held beliefs. That's when the backfire effect kicks in.
So how do you challenge literal thinking? By encouraging skepticism.
A practiced skeptic will feel that it is necessary to ask where the proof beyond the Scriptures is for the age of the earth. With one swoop, skepticism can lead us to the true claim that the earth is far older.
Credulity (the willingness to believe without question), the backfire effect (which causes us to hold our strongly-held beliefs even more tightly when challenged) and the tendency toward literal-mindedness (a willingness to take information at face value) are all dangerous to free-thinking humans.
This is why the critical skeptic must work to challenge these and other psychological tendencies in their fellow humans. By working to support and defend free speech, free inquiry and science education, the critical skeptic can help to advance ways of thinking that limit the power of these three dangerous realities.
Think of skepticism as a shield. Learn to think of new information as false, or at least untrustworthy until you can find verifiable sources to back it up. Remember that just because you believe something strongly doesn't make it true and always work to reevaluate your convictions when shown evidence to the contrary of what you have believed. There is no shame in having been wrong and there is no shame in adjusting your stance when presented with evidence.
A critical skeptic isn't going to get it right every time, but she is going to be much more likely to avoid being coerced, falling victim to the hucksterish and tawdry pseudo facts and those who proffer them, and will certainly be much more likely to have a strong, sleek critical faculty.