What public figure do you disagree with the most?
I’m not naming names.
When you try to determine which public figures are credible, it’s important to understand generally how they get to conclusions, how transparent their process is, and whether their track record holds up.
For instance, if it’s hard to follow a train of thought from premise to conclusion because it’s poorly spelled out, I discount their opinion on that matter. In my mens club, one guy likes to opine about a mystical tribe of overlords who control everything. Unfortunately, the logic to get to his conclusion is oftentimes speculative, and not articulated clearly. Even if someone’s ideas are ultimately right, if their thinking is unclear, they’re likely to become misaligned with reality over time.
A second problem with certain public intellectuals is how to avoid scrutiny, they fail to forecast or make any meaningful predictions. This is problematic because it’s easy to fit retroactive events into an interesting narrative. Unfortunately, failing to make predictions means that it is challenging to assess someone’s corpus. One problem I have with the goldbugs is they tend to talk about how in general a recession will happen, and without reason, take credit when one does happen, regardless of intensity or frequency. This is frustrating because while it’s possible that something like another recession will happen in the future, the lack of predictive power ultimately leaves their ideas unfalsifiable. Failing to have ways of testing your theory prevents it from being analyzed or understood. The more people rely on axioms, the less credible they should be viewed.
A final problem with public intellectualism is inconsistent track records with confidence. If the predictions you make tend to be wrong, then your credibility should go down. The magnitude of your predictions combined with their precision, compared to accuracy should help reality-weight what people are saying.
One idea that I find valuable is to have prediction markets. This way, those who make these bold predictions are able to be held to account financially. It would also be nice in the sciences for refunded grants to those whose work is not replicable. Skin in the game tends to get people to reign in their biases and approximate truth better.
Isadore Johnson's Website 