The "I am trustworthy" part is totally taken for granted and too many supposedly trustworthy people lie straight to the public face just to maintain the narrative they are pursuing.
Ethos is the hardest claim to assert. You have to live that one out; your community must, quite literally, bear witness to your actions which earn trust.
It seems that many like to believe and follow leaders who affirm their beliefs even when they are caught lying repeatedly about important things. Posturing loudly and demonstrating confidence seems to trump all of the other principles for many.
It's similar but more emphasized with chimpanzees.
The problem is that we're not chimpanzees. We are smart enough to make very powerful technology, but not smart enough to use it sustainably.
This requirement places too high a burden on one person. Only a saint (or God) could achieve the standard claimed here. Objectivity on topics should be sufficient. Scientists who lose their objectivity cease to contribute usefully to the discussion.
Ethos is very hard, but pathos is harder, especially in secular society.
Let me be clear, I think arguments about ethos generate the most argumentation and heat right now, but the silent killer is really pathos. People feel comfortable arguing ethos. Most people will not argue pathos openly though.
We have a crisis of pathos in our culture. How do you claim that something is important without an appeal to authority? You can't. We live in a culture that is fragmenting its sources of authority; different groups of people have different sources of authority.
Here's a good example. The external dialogue that a lot of conservatives give on climate change is that scientists can't be trusted. The internal dialogue that a lot of them (though not all) engage in goes something like, "The earth doesn't matter. God is going to come back and set things right. So we don't need to worry about it anyway."
> too many supposedly trustworthy people lie straight to the public face just to maintain the narrative
This is particularly apropos in the wake of Russell Brand's recent video on FB's Fact Checkers for Covid 19 vaccine information [1] funded by BigPharma, having a huge financial stake in bigpharma, and intentionally hiding their funding by BigPharma, and not adding a notification that the fact checkers are in fact funded/invested by/in BigPharma.
I am starting to read completely disinterested 3rd party sources more, because weighing the pros and cons of a thing is more challenging when the supposed experts are deliberating concealing material relationships. Some old Emeritus professor, already retired, with several phds and just a passing bit of information often gives great criticism of a thing without having any stake in the outcome.
hprotagonist|4 years ago
dgb23|4 years ago
It's similar but more emphasized with chimpanzees.
The problem is that we're not chimpanzees. We are smart enough to make very powerful technology, but not smart enough to use it sustainably.
glitchc|4 years ago
beerandt|4 years ago
hacknat|4 years ago
Let me be clear, I think arguments about ethos generate the most argumentation and heat right now, but the silent killer is really pathos. People feel comfortable arguing ethos. Most people will not argue pathos openly though.
We have a crisis of pathos in our culture. How do you claim that something is important without an appeal to authority? You can't. We live in a culture that is fragmenting its sources of authority; different groups of people have different sources of authority.
Here's a good example. The external dialogue that a lot of conservatives give on climate change is that scientists can't be trusted. The internal dialogue that a lot of them (though not all) engage in goes something like, "The earth doesn't matter. God is going to come back and set things right. So we don't need to worry about it anyway."
OrvalWintermute|4 years ago
This is particularly apropos in the wake of Russell Brand's recent video on FB's Fact Checkers for Covid 19 vaccine information [1] funded by BigPharma, having a huge financial stake in bigpharma, and intentionally hiding their funding by BigPharma, and not adding a notification that the fact checkers are in fact funded/invested by/in BigPharma.
I am starting to read completely disinterested 3rd party sources more, because weighing the pros and cons of a thing is more challenging when the supposed experts are deliberating concealing material relationships. Some old Emeritus professor, already retired, with several phds and just a passing bit of information often gives great criticism of a thing without having any stake in the outcome.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44B-OJcOXxc