Interesting Links for 18-07-2014

[andrewducker]

• Microsoft Will Cut up to 18,000 Jobs
  (tags: Microsoft jobs )
• Getting to the heart of the psychological differences between Conservatives and Liberals
  (tags: politics conservatives liberal psychology )
• World Health Organisation calls for the decriminalisation of drug use
  (tags: who decriminalization drugs )
• The Jet Propulsion Lab fixes all defects

Comments

[artkouros]

Now that we know that liberal/conservative isn't a lifestyle choice we can all stop arguing with each other.

[andrewducker]

Or, at least, we can discuss things more usefully.

In my experience, the roots of disagreements are generally:
1) Different priorities
2) Different experiences
3) Errors in logic

If the primary difference between liberals and conservatives is that conservatives are more focussed on being safe, and experience things through the lens of being stressed about Bad Things Happening then understandnig that gives you an avenue for dialogue.

(Of course, that's just one axis to be covered, and there are a lot of differences it doesn't explain.)

[artkouros]

I've found that "errors in logic" pervade the whole spectrum of ideas, even my own - if I take the time to look objectively at them.

[andrewducker]

Oh yes. (Which is why I left them out above)

Although when discussing with friends, I tend to find that it's differences of experience or semantics that cause the most issues.

"Oh, when you said A you meant X, not Y. Well, in that case I agree!" happens a lot. Usually after 45 wasted minutes :->

[philmophlegm]

Number 1: Different priorities makes more of a difference than I think most people appreciate. It's perfectly possible for two people to agree on every issue, but still vote different ways because of the weighting they give to those issues - especially in a two or three party system.

From our conversations on LJ, I reckon you and I probably agree on somewhere above two thirds of issues, yet would vote in different ways. And while I think we'd both describe ourselves as 'liberals'*, I seem to remember that you've previously stated that you saw the social aspects of that as more important than the economic, while for me it would be the reverse.

* I've given up hope of ever explaining what that term should mean to Americans, or even most British people now. Suffice to say that I don't consider most American 'liberals' to be liberal, and they probably wouldn't consider me to be liberal either.

[andrewducker]

Oh yes.

Watching the Independence debate (for instance) it's clear that people largely start out with priorities and then pick the information that fits in best with that. (On both sides)

And even when they aren't doing that, what they value has a much bigger effect on how they intend to vote than anything else.