Skepticism: what's the difference?

Carl Sagan once wrote an article on the non-existence of God, in which he asked what kind of universe we'd expect to see if God didn't exist. He described such a universe (which looked exactly like our own,) and then asked, if God really does exist, how is that any different from God not existing? It's a nice rhetorical technique, and today I'm going to do something similar with "skepticism."

What would a magazine look like, if it were genuinely devoted to spreading the ideas of critical thinking? That's not too hard to answer- just look at a good critical thinking textbook. They warn the reader about common fallacies that they could fall into, and draw examples from a range of fields- politics as much as the paranormal. They don't pathologize particular beliefs and speculate about "why people believe weird things," for two reasons. First, their focus is on methodology, not ideology: critical thinking lies in how you arrive at your beliefs, not in holding the right beliefs. Secondly, the entire point of a critical thinking textbook is to help the reader spot their own fallacies, not to help them feel superior to others.

What would an organization and its magazine look like, if it were genuinely devoted to investigating the paranormal? Again, you don't have to look far for a model: it would look like a scientific journal. Authors would be able to publish articles on the paranormal regardless of the conclusions they reach, so long as they followed the proper methodology. Authors with different points of view would scrutinize each other's work and engage in healthy debate. Many articles would analyze paranormal phenomena and come to only tenative and fragmentary conclusions. There would be little rehashing of old ground, unless there was something genuinely new to say.

What would an organization look like if it were a media advocacy group? Organizations like FAIR and Media Matters for America point out inaccuracies in the media, and provide arguments to prove their case. Other organizations frankly declare that they want less sex and violence on TV, for example. In each case, their mission is clear: they declare themselves to be media advocacy groups, and that's exactly what they are.

On the other hand, suppose the Skeptic subculture were driven not so much by a desire to advocate critical thinking and open-mindedness, nor to perform scientific research, nor to conduct media advocacy, so much as a desire to feel smarter than everyone else. We already have something of a model in creation science. Jack Chick's Big Daddy is just one example of a common motif in fundagelical urban legends: a Christian student humiliates an atheist professor. (Another variant has the professor saying "If God really exists, then he can miraculously keep this chalk from breaking when I drop it," only to have it bounce safely off his shoe. In each case, the professor flees the room in a panic, leaving the student to preach to the class.)

Of course, the creationists have a problem. They want to feel smarter than everyone else, but their strategy is to embrace a dogma which is totally out of kilter with reality. A much better strategy is to embrace a dogma which is largely correct. Of course, being right doesn't make you a critical thinker: thumping your chest and asserting "the earth is round" doesn't test your skepticism at all. But if you're really concerned with the methodology of critical thinking, that puts a damper on feeling smarter than everyone else, because when you think critically you realize that you oftentimes can't reach a definitive conclusion on important issues, and you can never reach a state in which you no longer have to scrutinize your own belies. Substituting ideology for methodology lets you use some of your pre-existing beliefs as the touchstone of truth, so that you can pretend that you've already arrived at your goal.

When people aren't honest about their objectives, their mission starts to get fuzzy. When Michael Behe speaks to universities, he declares that he's just a scientist, and is more than willing to leave the question of "Who is the Designer?" to the theologians. When he speaks to churches, he talks about how his research will convert people to Christianity. The Institute for Creation Research is ostensibly a scientific institution, but when they're challenged on the loyalty oath which they demand of their "researchers," they reply that they're an advocacy group. Similarly, one expects pseudo-skeptics to claim to be devoted critical thinking in general, but one might find that mysteriously they focus on the paranormal at the expense of media criticism. No problem- they can just declare that they're really a paranormal research institute. If challenged on the fact that they only publish people who agree with their ideology, they can declare that they were really devoted to media advocacy all along.

Naturally, this strategy of substituting ideology for methodology depends on making sure that the ideology is hard to challenge. Genuine research involves attacking the most difficult and unresolved problems, but we would expect pseudo-skeptics to avoid genuinely unresolved paranormal issues like strange rains of fish from the sky, giant pinwheels of light in the oceans, hydrometeors, etc. Instead, it would be in their best interests to stick to rehashing issues that are already well-debunked (Ogopogo, for example,) no matter how unimportant they may be. If your self-image depends on setting up your ideology as a touchstone of truth, it pays to pick your battles well.

We also expect a certain fuzziness of definitions, in addition to the aforementioned "mission creep." Pseudo-skeptics would claim to be interested in the "paranormal," but their real interests would be gerrymandered to fit their ideology. Thus the Loch Ness monster would be "paranormal," because they can prove it doesn't exist. Coelocanths and the colossal squid aren't "paranormal," because they aren't demonstrably false. Conspiracy theories aren't really paranormal at all, but one would expect pseudo-skeptics to spend a lot of time attacking them, since it's in their interest to pick enemies that they can make look silly. And the term "conspiracy theory" can itself be gerrymandered to fit their ideology: Iran-Contra and Watergate don't count as "conspiracies," while the Illuminati and JFK do. Whether these conspiracy theories are correct is beside the point: like Ogopogo, the more ridiculous the claims appear to "skeptics," the more attractive they would be to the self-proclaimed investigators of the "paranormal", despite the fact that no one claims that JFK was shot by a Sasquatch.

If the entire point of pseudo-skepticism were to feel smarter than other people, then we would expect a lot of pathologizing of dissent, just as "Big Daddy" portrays the atheist professor as a contemptible figure. Again, ideology would trump methodology: the mere fact that someone disagrees with the "skeptics" would be enough to mark them as being fundamentally different and inferior. Much ink would be spilled on asking why people disagree with "skeptical" ideology, and establishing a difference between "skeptics" and a chimerical group of "true believers." Instead of a focus on "watch out, here's a fallacy that can slip you up," we would see endless analyses of why those other people, the "true believers," believe "weird things." And, of course, one would expect pseudo-skeptics to declare themselves to be "Skeptics," and to appropriate that term as a general term or members of their movement, thereby blurring the lines between ideology, methodology, and advocacy while simultaneously flattering themselves and emphasising that they are a group apart from everyone else.

It's obvious that my "hypothetical" example is really a description of the modern "Skeptic" movement as I see it. And maybe they're really motivated by a desire to feel smarter than everyone else, and maybe they aren't. But, as Sagan would say, the question is this:

If Skeptics aren't driven by a desire to feel smarter than everyone else, how is the current situation any different than if they were?