Lippmann, Public Opinion [1922]
On all but a very few matters for short stretches in our lives, the utmost independence that we can exercise is to multiply the authorities to whom we give a friendly hearing. As congenital amateurs our quest for truth consists in stirring up the experts, and forcing them to answer any heresy that has the accent of conviction. In such a debate we can often judge who has won the dialectical victory, but we are virtually defenseless against a false premise that none of the debaters has challenged, or a neglected aspect that none of them has brought into the argument ….
The people on whom we depend for contact with the outer world are those who seem to be running it. They may be running only a very small part of the world. The nurse feeds the child, bathes it, and puts it to bed. That does not constitute the nurse an authority on physics, zoology, and the Higher Criticism. Mr. Smith runs, or at least hires, the man who runs the factory. That does not make him an authority on the Constitution of the United States, nor on the effects of the Fordney tariff. Mr. Smoot runs the Republican Party in the State of Utah. That in itself does not prove he is the best man to consult about taxation.
And more.
After reading Lippmann I’m left wondering what all the
other social scientists have been up to since 1922.
Everything is already there.
[x]#347 fan maandag 5 januari 2004 @ 23:09:19
lieuwe op 6 januari 2004 @ 19:01:46
As it always has been and will be. Alas!