We educate our populace in the sciences, but we never educate them about what science is or why it is valuable. We spend at least twelve years educating our children without ever teaching them HOW to think for themselves.
To live a properly "woke" life you only need a handful of things.
1). Empathy. This is where all positive thought for our species has to begin. You have to care, genuinely care, for the well-being of yourself and those around you to live properly. No one is self made and independent in any truly significant way, except perhaps in the case of sociopaths.
2). Learn something new as often as possible. The world is wonderful and scary and amazing and terrifying. Education doesn't end with high school or college. If it does for you? If you aren't the type to just pick up a book? You're part of the problem.
3). Always be prepared to ask one simple question. "Is this true?" . This is the most critical and important step, and the most difficult. It isn't actually difficult to do in practice at all. But it will be difficult to accept, because you have to do this across the board. Including and especially with ideas and concepts you agree with. You will discover that there is bullshit everywhere and that seemingly simple problems you'd think are as simple as "if only we did this instead" to solve, aren't remotely that simple.
But some shit that seems woke just isn't.
It doesn't take a Nobel prize winning level of intellect to do this. It just takes a certitude to begin every inquiry in your life with a few important tenents. Certitude and especially courage, because once you embrace a few simple concepts you'll likely also become that uncomfortable person in conversation accused of calling bullshit on ideas other people value. But this part is crucial, because there is bullshit everywhere. Left, right, progressive, conservative, whatever. Just as their are conservative values that aren't really conservative, their are progressive values that just aren't progressive. Everyone is to some degree peeing on their own feet.
The only problem with this is that if you're not an expert it only prepares you to start recognizing what is wrong sooner than what is right. And it is difficult to build consensus with people like this, because people want easily scalable solutions. Solutions with no downsides. And every solution has downsides.
Too many of us approach issues with a winner take all mindset, especially if an issue resonates personally.
This affects all discourse, and not just the technical. You can't approach any meaningful topic, even with a backpack full of empathy and reason, without pissing someone off. And you often piss off the people behind the idea you champion MORE than those opposed.
Here are some examples that will 100% reliably land me in hot water with progressives. I focus on these because I am a progressive liberal secular humanist, so it is very important to me to get this house in order, even if many progressive minds wouldn't want me in the room.
We need a newer greener energy infrastructure. We know this. The science informs this. But we are going about this the wrong way, with the wrong priorities. Even though we are at some levels of parity between wind and solar compared to natural gas, coal and nuclear from a cost standpoint that is only true upfront. It takes massive amounts of coal and quartz to make solar cells. Yes coal is a primary ingredient in it's manufacture. And despite every silly documentary on earth showing a picture of a sandy dune when talking about solar, you cannot make solar cells out of sand. Sand may be predominantly quartz, but it is too impure. It'll probably break your brain to realize what company predominantly sources the quartz for this too, Koch Industries. And then you have to replace panels every ten years or so. What you end up with (when you toss in necessary batteries and maintenance) is solar having a similar long term carbon footprint to an efficient modern natural gas plant. The same is basically as true for wind. The technology in materials science just isn't quite there yet. And it's something we should be investing in on a national and federal level. Instead we are still relying on so called "free market" incentives and getting predictably short term profit driven solutions whitewashed as "green". The two primary things we can do now that we aren't doing are political footballs. Our infrastructure for distributing power is century old tech where efficiency gains from rebuilding it nationwide would offer huge gains. We still use AC voltage for lighting and home electronics when these things actually operate via DC today, so we have century old inefficiency built into our walls still. And then there is the elephant in the room that will get me in trouble. Nuclear. Nuclear is not terrible. What is terrible is the 60-70 year old Nuclear tech our energy infrastructure still uses. We still utilize light water reactors due to patent and contract pressures, and no longer even consider building intrinsically better and ridiculously safe molten salt systems (systems that CAN NOT melt down, and CAN NOT produce weapons grade waste). Nuclear is by far the greenest easily deployable method that no one will consider, no matter how good the actual science is.
Ok. That's one tub of hot water. Here's another.
LGBTQ. The alphabet people. I used to think this one was simple. As someone who doesn't identify with any of those letters personally I always approached this topic merely with empathy and the reason behind the concept of liberty. Live your truth, be who you are, love who you love, fuck whomever makes you happy, etc. So long as no one is harmed who cares? After all one of the things our world needs is more genuine love. And you have to admire the courage it takes to live those truths in societies that are less like you. It has real consequences that can affect your ability to stay alive in some places in our world, so I think I completely grasp how important this is. I'm completely on board with the idea that the lifestyles of the LGBTQ community are absolutely none of my business, and yet things I must champion so that I can live my hetero life ethically. With one tiny exception that will land me in hot water.
Trans competitive sports. And this is a layered topic. We know reliably, factually, biologically that transgender is a real phenomenon. Unlike haters on the right who deny this, we have a centuries worth of biomedical science behind this phenomenon. It is real. But, you cannot deny the reality either. Someone born presenting male who transitions to female should not be allowed in female mma, weightlifting, track and field, or pretty much any competitive arena of sports without careful acknowledgement of facts. Growing up with testosterone increases bone density, tendon and ligament strength, and the quality and quantity of muscle mass. Required estrogen therapy preserves these physical advantages, go ask an endocrinologist. MTF Trans competitors in sports tend to utterly dominate their respective competitive classes. Women fought long and hard to have their competitive spaces allowed in sports, and it is still an ongoing fight. To add this variable, which denies science, is unfair. It just is. In the other direction FTM Trans it is problematic due to the realities of maintaining a male presentation (testosterone therapy). Testosterone therapy is banned in competitive sports precisely because it creates a slippery slope of unfair advantage. For a FTM Trans it is necessary, so where should that line be drawn? You cannot turn a blind eye to these admittedly tiny issues, because these issues are real. But heaven forbid you bring them up. You aren't even allowed to discuss this without knee jerk hate being spewed in your direction. Women and men are biologically different and in the general areas of strength and stature men are superior all else being equal. We thankfully live in a world where that narrow set of differences rarely matters. Almost every job that exists gives no advantage to men over women anymore, and that's a good thing. But competitive sports is the rare exception, and it cannot be swept under the rug because it doesn't fit with someone's delusional and sometimes dangerous truth. Watch a MTF trans MMA fighter beat up biological females relentlessly in a ring and you'll be unable to not sense the disparity. That isn't to say women cannot beat men in a fight. They totally can. But any women that does is a technically skilled fighter using those skills to overwhelm a physically stronger opponent in almost every case. Transition to your true self all you want. I applaud that sort of decision and I admire the courage of it. But don't expect all reality to just get out of the way because you don't personally like it. What's fair is fair. Live with your limits like so many have to.
Anyone pissed off yet? 🤔
