Agreed on both counts. Dissociation with reality is not a place on the political spectrum. Where lies one of the biggest catches in the issue though is when it isn’t simply a fact being debated but a matter of interpretation of the facts. An example would be to say that it is a fact that infanticide is a crime where women are far more likely to committed by a female than a male. One of the few forms of violent crime women are more represented in. This is a fact, but what conclusion do we draw from this fact? A person may argue that this fact proves women are more dangerous to babies than men. Is this true? We have one fact, but the conclusion doesn’t explore accidental killings or other forms of harm like sexual assaults etc. there we then enter the subjective- what would be a greater harm to the child? To keep from too far down that dark path let’s look at another conclusion of the fact- what if we conclude that women are more profound in their violence than men because violence…
.. agaisnt a defenseless and innocent baby is more heinous than violent crimes more common with men like assault against an adult? We are now largely in the subjective and we can’t stand on a single fact or group of facts to support us. We also have one fact but that fact doesn’t exist in a vacuum- even where we can make a factual statement like a baby is more likely to be murdered by a woman than a man- we can’t say that any random man or woman is more likely because we have to look at why the statistics are such- in most cultures infants spend a disproportionate amount of time in the care of women, and the child care industry and even fields like youth education etc. tend to be female biased careers. So then is it that a woman is more likely to murder a baby or that women historically just have more access to babies and if we switched “gender roles” in society would men be as or more likely to commit this crime? If we remove gender and say that it is a fact a parent is the most…
… likely perpetrator of infanticide- we come back to the point that for an infant specifically, most infants will spend the most time in the care of parents. Would the infanticide rate drop or stay the same or grow of every infant was required to be raised by a total stranger? So could we instead look at this fact and conclude that babies are stressful little messes and people are balls of stress and crazy and that where the two meet- bad things may happen? Could it simply be that women, or parents, or caretakers etc. just happen to have a set of circumstances under which it is more likely they would commit infanticide (with a major factor in the crime being access and proximity) and that by conclusion no particular group is more inherently Likely to commit the crime but a set of circumstances can predict a statistical increase in probability?
That is before we bring in the subjectivity of fact and data, sample sizes, demographics, contradictory studies, etc etc.
in the end, even the “objective” thinker is more likely to reject that which contradicts their experience or observed reality. Nutritional science is a multibillion dollar affair that underpins major performance based careers and yet- your friends friend will insist that they shouldn’t follow a balanced scientific fitness plan- that a few supplements and a “grapefruit diet” worked for so and so and they saw results last time blah blah. Ignoring that if it worked so well why so they need to get in shape now? And of course they’ll likely say it was because they stopped… and they likely stopped because it wasn’t sustainable and thusly can’t be said to be an effective strategy for a long term goal. But we tend to trust our eyes over external information. A less “objective” person simply looks for what validates their existing beliefs. That is their metric.
in the end, even the “objective” thinker is more likely to reject that which contradicts their experience or observed reality. Nutritional science is a multibillion dollar affair that underpins major performance based careers and yet- your friends friend will insist that they shouldn’t follow a balanced scientific fitness plan- that a few supplements and a “grapefruit diet” worked for so and so and they saw results last time blah blah. Ignoring that if it worked so well why so they need to get in shape now? And of course they’ll likely say it was because they stopped… and they likely stopped because it wasn’t sustainable and thusly can’t be said to be an effective strategy for a long term goal. But we tend to trust our eyes over external information. A less “objective” person simply looks for what validates their existing beliefs. That is their metric.