How to Avoid Foolish Opinions
To avoid the various foolish opinions to which mankind is prone, no superhuman genius is required. If the matter is one that can be settled by observation,make the observation yourself.
Many matters, however, are less easily brought to the test of experience. If, like most of mankind, you have passionate convictions on many such matters,there are ways in which you can make yourself aware of your own bias. If an opinion contrary to your own makes you angry, that is a sign that you are subconsciously aware of having no good reason for thinking as you do. If someone maintains that two and two are five, or that Iceland is on the equator, you feel pity rather than anger, unless you know so little of arithmetic or geography that his opinion shakes your own contrary conviction. The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there is no good
evidence either way. Persecution is used in theology, not in arithmetic, because in theology there is only opinion. So wheneveryou find yourself getting angry about a difference of opinion, be on your guard; you will probably find, on examination, that your belief is going beyond what the evidence warrants.
A good way of ridding yourself of certain kinds of dogmatism is to become aware of opinions held in social circles different from your own. If the people and the newspaper seem mad, perverse, and wicked, remind yourself that you seem so to them. In this opinion both parties may be right, but they cannot both be wrong. This reflection should generate a certain caution.
For those who have enough psychological imagination, it is a good plan to imagine an argument with a person having a different bias. This has one advantage, and only one, as compared with actual conversation with opponents; this one advantage is that the method is not subject to the same limitations of time and space.
如何避免愚蠢的观点
人类要避免容易产生的各种愚蠢的观点，并不需要超人的天才。假如是一个通过观察就可以解决的问题，那你就亲自去观察一下。然而许多问题通过经验并不容易验证。倘若你跟大多数人一样，对于许多诸如此类的问题坚信不移，以下几种方式可以让你意识到你自己的偏见。如果一个跟你相反的观点让你生气的话，那就表明在潜意识里你明白你那么想并没有充足的理由。有人若是坚持认为二加二等于五或冰岛位于赤道，你会感到怜悯而非愤怒：除非你对算术或地理几乎一无所知，他的观点因此动摇了你相反的信念。最蛮不讲理的论争是双方就某些问题争辩不休，可是都拿不出令人信服的证据。神学中有迫害，算术则没有，这是因为神学只有观点。 因此，无论何时，当你发现自己因为与他人观点不同而恼怒时，你就得留神了；一经检验，你很可能发现你的信念并没有足够的`证据。
使自己摆脱某些教条观念的好办法之一是了解自己生活圈子以外人们所持的观点。你要是觉得有些人、某一份报纸狂热，有悖常理，而且邪恶，这时你就得提醒自己，在他们眼里你没有什么两样。这么想双方都可能是对的，却不可能都是错的。进行这样的反思，应该能使人保持一定的警觉。
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