first impressions...
it is amazing to me how often my initial perception of a person is wrong. i almost always make some type of categorical judgment about a person based on a very trivial or superficial set of facts. usually these are facts are derived from things such as their appearance, their personality, the way they talk, their faith beliefs, etc. what continues to put my head in a swivel is how very often I am wrong about people. and i am not just referring to instances where i judge someone negatively. the flawed nature of my first impressions seemingly shows no discretion with respect to value, it simply heaves itself onto unsuspecting persons with little concern of past lessons or evident contradictions in judgement.
something else that confounds me is that despite my awareness of this irrational phenomena that takes place inside of me, I continue to blindly trust my prima facie (at first glance) assessments of people. One might think that a rational person, and I hope sincerely that I would be considered rational, would come to realize that all first impressions should be subject to scrutiny due to their evidently flawed nature. So, then should I conclude that I simply am not a wholly rational person? This, to me, seems the answer with the strongest explanatory power and seems more plausible than any alternative I can think of to explain the situation.
so, there we have it. grounds for believing that i am irrational. now what?
something else that confounds me is that despite my awareness of this irrational phenomena that takes place inside of me, I continue to blindly trust my prima facie (at first glance) assessments of people. One might think that a rational person, and I hope sincerely that I would be considered rational, would come to realize that all first impressions should be subject to scrutiny due to their evidently flawed nature. So, then should I conclude that I simply am not a wholly rational person? This, to me, seems the answer with the strongest explanatory power and seems more plausible than any alternative I can think of to explain the situation.
so, there we have it. grounds for believing that i am irrational. now what?