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Posted

I think we've all heard, or been told, "don't believe everything you hear," or possibly it's other form "don't believe everything someone tells you." It seems to be a phrase usually thrown around by people believe everything their pastor or preacher reads out of an ancient mythical book (with questionable sources to say the least), as well as people who generally believe that although all politicians lie, the government (a group of politicians) has their best interests at heart.

 

As I've been thinking about this it seems like this phrase, more often than not, gets misconstrued. Although, I agree that you should not believe anything someone says simply because they are the ones who said it, that seems to be very different from agreeing with a lot of, or even everything someone says if they have good evidence and rationality to back it up. In fact it seems to me that it would be more harmful if you disagree with someone who has good evidence and rationality to back up their claim simply because you've already believed too much of what they put forward.

 

Now, I am in no way saying that no one should challenge what they hear other people put forward, in fact this is very much encouraged, but, isn't the whole point of learning and doing research is to pass your knowledge to others so they can build off of it in a way that plays towards their strengths? Not everyone can be full time researchers.

 

What do you think? How do you decide whether or not to agree with something someone says? Am I just making up excuses because I agree with a lot of the evidence backed arguments certain people put out?

Posted

It just means that you shouldn't blindly believe what you're told without asking questions or insisting to be shown evidence.

 

When people tell me things that sound implausible, I ask them, "How do you know?"

 

Also see: Baloney Detection

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