Process Values

Life is complex. During the legal struggles over baby Charlie, I heard an English conservative journalist condemn American conservative journalists. She said that our conservative press was totally ignoring the facts of the case and just using the most superficial elements as an occasion to lash out against socialized medicine. Well excuse me, when you care more about your position than about how you treat evidence and inference, that is what happens. I'll bet on many other issues that were not as close to her, the British journalist operated in exactly the same way. Life is complex. To make sense of an issue, you have to look at a lot of evidence and closely monitor your ladder of inference. Here's another example. I have always been an admirer of Robert E. Lee. He had a tough choice to make, whether to stay with his country or stay true to his state. He decided differently than I would, but he lived in different time than I. Other than fighting for the wrong side, he was

This blog has so far been spectacularly unsuccessful in attracting a following. I suspect it is because I am not using any of the right key words. I'm not pro-Trump or anti-Trump, I am not liberal or conservative, I am not using key words that would let people find in me someone to support or someone to rail at about their favorite "hot button" issues. Instead I am talking about how to come together, how to stop pulling apart and start pulling together, how to stop unbalancing our country with positions and instead start sharing our considerations, concerns, and constraints so that we can bring opposing forces into balance. There are no lasting solutions, only a constant balancing act. But people don't want to hear that. They want to continue to harangue for their side. I am reminded of something that Joseph Campbell said about religion. Remember that Campbell defined religion as "Mythology misunderstood." And when you fail to understand that religion