The importance of critical thinking
Ah, the latest story in a long tradition of stories that the US government has secretly sequestered extraterrestrial spacecraft is once again afoot! A “high government official” has been quoted as insisting that the American government has known about “alien technology” since Pope Pius XII back-channelled information about an ET spacecraft, downed in Italy in 1933, to the United States! Mussolini’s government presumably knew about the existence of this alien spacecraft (and therefore presumably Hitler?) and their intelligence was subsequently recovered by a top secret American operation after the war! This was just the first time that America had acquired bits from the spaceships of Little Green Men, but not the last!
After being summarily dismissed by the New York Times, Washington Post and Politico, this breathlessly told rubbish was disseminated by the tabloids. It is widely believed by people across the globe. There is just one problem. The person making these fantastical claims is no different from the last person making these fantastical claims, in that he hasn’t a single diagram, photograph, body part or piece of technology unknown to science or current metallurgy to back them up. In short, we are just supposed to take his word for it.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, is why we know it’s a lie. There is no evidence because the claim is false. We are being lied to, and we need to stop believing lies. “Extraordinary claims,” as Carl Sagan reminded us, “require extraordinary evidence.”
Now look, nothing would fascinate me more than the prospect that we have been contacted by an alien species. It would be the biggest story in the history of the human race. But it simply hasn’t happened. If it ever does happen we will know it. And it won’t just result in a (yawn) improvement in microchip technology or the creation of the microwave oven. Technology necessary for interstellar travel would blow our bloody minds clean out of our bloody skulls. Imagine taking an iPad back to the 16th century and showing it to Shakespeare. It would be sort of like that — only on steroids.
This is why we need to grow up. This is why we need to acquire the healthy tools of critical thinking. Because credulity that automatically falls for idiocy like that is dangerous. We know it’s dangerous because Republicans are exploiting it every day and using spurious sources and claims they create out of whole cloth to fool gullible Americans every day.
Their latest claim, that the “whole Biden Crime Family” is going down is pure rubbish without a shred of evidence. And, once again, their investigations have come to nothing. The problem is that long after the failed investigation has been forgotten the allegation will be remembered. And that, finally, is the point.
It’s believed because Republicans want to believe it. They want to believe it for similar reasons that many of us want to believe that UFOs and UAPs are of extraterrestrial origin. But we need to constantly be on guard about the difference between what we want to be true and what really is true. We need to firmly understand the difference between speculation and fact. For too many of us, speculation and fact are separated by a fuzzy line, or no line at all.
Most of our problems today would be solved by critical thinking. Widespread critical thinking would have made the election of Donald Trump impossible in the first place. Critical thinking would have solved America’s out-of-control gun problem long ago. It would have solved global warming, racial and gender inequality and poverty. It is the way forward. And in these perilous times, it’s the friendliest and least used tool we have.
When you believe nonsense you increase the fund of ignorance, and the planet, our democracy and our freedom are drowning in ignorance. The way forward is truth supported by facts and evidence, not wild speculation and belief without evidence. We can hardly expect Republicans to understand this if we don’t understand it ourselves. And, as ever, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, stay safe.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.