Sunday Rundown: Practice Uncertainty

I have long been bothered by certainty when I notice it in myself or encounter it in other people. It signals a closed mind and a lack of curiosity that I find depressing, even frightening. An appealing certainty is why people grasp onto conspiracy theories, and why some people in extreme cases commit political or religious violence. It’s something I think about a lot, and if I could put one message for the world on a t-shirt or a billboard, it might be a plea for us all to Practice Uncertainty.

I have read and listened to a number of things that speak to this idea in different ways, and I thought I would run through some of them…

Wrong 1, 2, 3, 4—a series of short essays by science fiction author Neal Stephenson on why and how we believe things in spite of the fact that almost everyone is wrong almost all of the time (I’ll put that phrase on the back of my Practice Uncertainty t-shirt). It’s an “occasional series,” so keep an eye out for more.

Secondhand Time, The Last of the Soviets, a book by Svetlana Alexievich compiling interviews she conducted with people across the former USSR who lived during the Stalin era and then through the glasnost/perestroika 1990s of Gorbachev and Yeltsin. These are jaw-dropping first-hand accounts by people who spent time in the gulags, people informed-on or attacked by people they trusted, witnesses and victims of the human capacity for unthinkable cruelty and sadism in the name of the “Motherland,” and the propensity of everyone, including survivors of the most horrific atrocities, to still defend and even yearn for the past.

Rebel Wisdom series on sensemaking and the epistemic crisis. I especially recommend the episodes featuring Daniel Schmachtenberger. I was addicted to this podcast a few years ago amid the sea of COVID misinformation, and the main ideas are as relevant as ever.

The Constitution of Knowledge, a book by Jonathan Rauch about the relatively recent human project to establish the structures of collective knowledge and consensus reality we mostly take for granted—the legal system, the scientific method, etc., and the institutions that govern these. I didn’t read this, but I’ve watched several long interviews with the author.

In a sea of disinformation, why is Wikipedia so accurate?, a great case study by Brian Klaas (author of Fluke) of a well known pillar of the aforementioned Constitution of Knowledge

The Power of Myth, a recent essay by John Ganz about how the right-wing movement in particular is built on myth, spectacle, and vibes, rather than empirical reality.

Sitting with Uncertainty, an episode of the Hidden Brain podcast that explores physiological differences that might influence why some people are more comfortable with uncertainty than others.

The Alternative to Ideology—Jerry Taylor, co-founder of a libertarian think tank called the Niskanen Center rethinks some of his positions and makes a case against ideology in general.

Reality has a surprising amount of detail—There’s a funny Internet clap-back that goes, “it makes sense if you don’t think about it.” A lot of things seem simple and straightforward if you don’t look at them very closely, and this short essay from a few years ago takes a wonderful walk through that truism.