The Inability to Accept a Fact Does Not Make It Wrong

Paul Krugman, on Arguments From Personal Incredulity:

Somewhere in his writings Richard Dawkins talks about anti-evolution types who argue from personal incredulity — they say, “I just can’t believe that chance could create something as complex as an eye”, and think that they have scored an important point. All they’ve actually done, of course, is rehash their prejudices. (Simulations show, by the way, that chance plus selection can indeed create an eye, in a relatively short time as evolutionary history goes).

I’m getting the same kind of thing a lot on issues macroeconomic. People write and say, “I can’t believe that you are asserting that X. You must be an idiot.” Here X might be the paradox of thrift, the claim that a rise in desired saving leads to lower investment (which is closely linked to the case for fiscal stimulus, which in turn is closely linked to the argument that wars and other bad things can be expansionary.) Or it might be the paradox of flexibility, which says that under current conditions a fall in wages would lead to lower,not higher employment and output.

The point, of course, is that your personal incredulity counts for nothing. I’m basing what I say on a model; the model may not be right, but it does represent some hard thinking conditioned by evidence. If you have a different model, fine; but if all you have to counter my model is a set of prejudices, you don’t have an argument.

Unfortunately, the argument from personal incredulity isn’t restricted to right-wing hacks. My sense is that a lot of what’s going on in our ongoing policy disaster is that important people, up to and including the president, just find it implausible that such a big crisis could be essentially a problem of coordination, that it’s just magneto trouble whose fix need not, in fact should not, involve inflicting a lot of punishment on working Americans. And so our whole policy discourse has shifted to pain and punishment, gratuitously.

But back to my main point: if you just can’t believe I’m saying the things I say, at least consider the possibility that you’re the one who just doesn’t get it.

Last September, Steve Benen wrote a defense of expertise - particularly government expertise:

Now, it's true that to hold public office, one need not have post-graduate degrees and years of broad policy experience. And that's fine, of course.

But as a rule, the political system seems to be more effective when voters elect candidates who aren't idiots. This year, there seem to be an inordinate number of statewide candidates seeking key offices who've never taken a particular interest in learning anything about governing and/or effective policymaking. In some cases, they're even winning.

Some, including Rubio, may find a certain charm in this. "Outsiders" who don't know anything about shaping federal policy are running for the high offices, and that's great -- what they lack in intelligence, understanding, and judgment, they'll make up for with real-world know-how.

Or as Rubio put it this week, "I think the more you are in touch with the real lives of everyday people; the better you are going to be as a representative of those people in a Republic."

Other than politics, there's hardly any aspect of modern life where this would be considered credible. If someone's car breaks down, they don't usually think, "Who needs an 'expert'? What I want is someone who can relate to everyday people."
If someone needs medical attention, they don't usually think, "All these doctors with their highfalutin science; who needs 'em?"

If someone needs to fly from one airport to another, they don't usually think, "I don't care if the pilot has years of training; I care if he/she is in touch with my values."

But when it comes to government, this perspective is deemed irrelevant. With a candidate like Christine O'Donnell, voters are told that she has no background in government, knows nothing about federal policymaking, and has no working understanding of any of the issues she'd be working on -- but that's a good quality for a United States senator to have.

Liberals know that science - including the science of economics - has pushed human knowledge far beyond the ability of people without that specific knowledge to understand.

Liberals also know that "common sense" is the ability to know when to seek the advice of professionals, and ignore those who scorn expertise.