I do this all the time. It's actually one of the reasons I blog: to keep track, in easily searchable and keyword-indexed format, of the reasons that led me to hold positions. It's surprising how often I've found myself searching back through the archive to remind myself of what I'd concluded about something, and how often I curse myself for having arrived at some position before I started blogging.So what you optimally, rationally, perfectly objectively do is allow yourself to forget everything you know about A including all the reasons that justify your strongly-held views on A and to just make an indelible mental note that “The right-wing position on A is the correct one no matter what anyone else says and no matter what evidence to the contrary should come along in the future.”The reason this is the rational thing to do is that you have scarce memory space. By allowing those memories to fade away you free up storage space for information about issues B, C, and D which you are still carefully collecting information on, forming an objective opinion about, in preparation for eventually also adopting a well-informed dogmatic opinion about.
But I do enjoy that rather a few of you come along for the ride.
HT: @Nonicoc
I blog not only for this reason (though totally agree!); also to discover what I actually think. I find I try to impose consistency on my own written bits after the fact.
ReplyDeleteYup. And writing it down forces me to think through things a bit more, including whether there are any gaping holes that a commenter might use to bash me about the head.
DeleteAnother reason why I don't blog - fear of realising my preconceived notions about things are indefensible :)
DeleteI've considered joining the blogosphere, but don't for a couple of reasons:
ReplyDelete1) Time constraints, and this will only get worse with our new arrival in July
2) I doubt that very many people would actually give a shit what I have to say about diverse matters.
Blogging is one of the few things I can do when severely sleep-deprived.
DeleteAnd that explains my diary. All ideas, or what I have written in various places online, goes into it, especially fully developed thought on a topic. It's great now Word documents are so searchable. I record the mundane also, like I know my fountain pen was 29 years on on the 23rd of February gone.
ReplyDelete(Mind you, the odd time I write a diary entry in the morning then try and live it so I don't have to re-work :) )