Framework for Human Behavior II

 

Both Sides Now

I've looked at clouds from both sides now
From up and down, and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall
I really don't know clouds at all

What if that is because there are more than two sides?

In previous blog posts, I have discussed classification systems.  https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2017/06/the-blind-men-and-elephant.html, and https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2020/06/horse-in-striped-pajamas.html. As I paraphrased Mark Twain,   “There is only ONE TRUE classification system, in fact there are SEVERAL of them.”  A basic feature of all of these classification systems is that they are typically not equal except at the most detailed level, and use more than 2 attributes.  If your classification system is only sizes of round holes, remember, square pegs don’t fit in round holes.   Physicists say that there are four forces: gravity, electro-magnetism, strong nuclear, and weak nuclear.  Physicists also classify matter as having mass, charge, and spin.  Economists describe goods by attributes defined as rival and exclusive.  The Meyer-Briggs personality test uses four attributes.  Hogwarts sorted  students into four houses.  The number of classifications, aka sorting bins, is the number of attributes squared.  Liberal and conservative is only a one dimensional classification.  Liberal and conservative are only extreme values of the same attribute.

This was prompted by a  recent article that claimed that Rep. Elise Stefanik used to be a moderate.  That is based only on grading how often a vote was characterized as conservative or liberal.  Grading someone on only one characteristic, liberal or conservative, misses nuances .  If  more than one attribute had been used, what had been classified as moderate, might have been different if more attributes had been used. In a previous blog post, https://dbeagan.blogspot.com/2020/06/a-framework-for-human-behavior.html , I proposed a framework for human behavior that classified individuals based on two attributes that could be characterized as: Rights versus Duty, and Nature versus Nurture.  I would like to amend that framework to add a third dimension, attribute, to my proposed framework: respect for the truth, facts, reality.  By that I mean real facts, not alternate facts.  That means that there are nine sorting bins for human behavior: formed by various combinations of  Rights vs. Duty; Nurture vs. Nature; Reality vs. Fantasy.

By respect for truth, I don’t expect that anyone will always speak the absolute truth. Sometimes they may tell a little white lie, but they still respect the truth.  But those who believe that they can create their own truth, believe that their lies are the truth.   This may explain why it is so difficult to debate policies if the opposite side does not agree to use facts. A debate between opposing policies requires different interpretations of agreed upon facts.  If one side makes up facts, there can be no debate.