Just A Thought - What if You're Wrong

The thing that often annoys me about modern political thought is the presumed righteousness that a lot of people speak with when discussing or more often than not preaching their ideas to their audience. The idea that the conclusions that you have reached are right to begin begs the obvious question: What if You're Wrong?

Ignoring the warning signs increases the odds of disaster

Take myself for example. I'm wrong all of the time. There are all sorts of things that I expect to happen in the future just to have that expectation blown up in my face.

Recently I have embraced the fact that I'm nowhere near perfect in terms of what I think and what I believe and because of that I have something to work towards. By embracing the possibility of being wrong, I can adapt and this ability to adapt makes me less vulnerable to disaster.

That doesn't mean however that you shouldn't take risks in what you believe. You should always take some risk in the things that you truly believe in. It's only natural to bet on yourself and test your position. But when you leave the option of being wrong in the equation, you don't leave yourself in a fragile position where all your apples are in a single basket that is now on fire.

Rather than take a one solution fits all perspective where the one solution is the one you believe, you should bet on your perspective while also listening to others in the case that your perspective turns out to be flawed.

You may think you have the best path to you destination but if you ignore the warning signs, you might fail to realize that your fastest path involves traveling on the wrong side of the street. Instead of focusing on the destination, you should focus on the empirical evidence that is available at the present and focus on the evidence that stands in opposition to your views and try to construct a better picture.

Of course, maybe you're always right and maybe this idea of gathering more information and considering if your viewpoint has flaws is simply a waste of time. At the end of the day, if you do take the time, it becomes easier to convince others of your rightness rather than simply assuming that you're righteous.