[mway]

> [...] it doesn't matter how intelligent you or your group are if you are outnumbered by a herd that responds to the appeals and actuation of its lower instincts.

Quite so, at least empirically speaking (in my own observations, anyway).

I guess a natural follow up would be, is there any feasible external (to such a group) or general (trans-group) impetus to either (a) increase abstract reasoning or (b) avoid "baser" framing, assuming that's not intrinsically pointless? Obviously with e.g. politics, this is the goal of many folks (to incite emotionally rather than engage rationally, or to mask emotion as rationality), but I wonder how feasible it is to increase rational discussion (through abstraction, or other means) about rational topics for the sake of productive discourse.

[prirun]

It seems that encouraging this would have to start at a very young age, in elementary school. Parents may not have the capability (cognitive ability) or time to instill this kind of thinking in their kids.

However, school is usually a place where authority, hierarchy, and group-think is reinforced rather than questioned. I can't see schools encouraging kids to do thought experiments like "Let's say your parents don't like it that a boy wants to have a boyfriend instead of a girlfriend. Instead of you just believing whatever your parents say, let's talk about why they believe that, how they might be getting it wrong, and why it's okay if you don't agree with them." Actually, some schools are trying that, with the predictable backlash from parents and others in the local community.

[TeMPOraL]

> how they might be getting it wrong, and why it's okay if you don't agree with them

That's a pretty manipulative way you phrased it here. I'd agree with your example, if you phrased it as "if they could be getting it wrong, and why it's okay if you don't agree with them in that case". I.e. for a honest thought experiment, let's not sneak in the preferred answer in the phrasing, even if we both agree on what the preferred answer is.

> Actually, some schools are trying that, with the predictable backlash from parents and others in the local community.

That's the unfortunate effect of... I'm not sure exactly what. I initially wanted to say "democracy plus media", but perhaps a better way is just... "transparency". The context of this subthread contains, quoting from the top-level post:

> it doesn't matter how intelligent you or your group are if you are outnumbered by a herd that responds to the appeals and actuation of its lower instincts

In case of schools, as you correctly note, when a school attempts - or even discusses - something like it, they'll get a backlash from whichever side feels threatened in a particular case. There's no room for trying and observing anymore, because it's a standard aspect of our society to run disagreements through broadcast media at one level above the actual parties involved. E.g. in school case, it'll run the gossip mill and if that doesn't help, someone will alert the local journalist. For larger issues, it'll hit national news. Etc.

[Nasrudith]

For one if they recognize that they are getting repeatedly ripped off, even the dimmest bulb may draw a conclusion eventually that as great as a feeling the idea of getting rich off of the traffic of the Brooklyn Bridge may be, that guy selling it is scamming you.

Fanatics are remarkably reality resistant but sustaining it within a group is more difficult and expensive in abstract ways, such as worse ability to recruit.