Thinking is a Serious Problem: The Dangers of Two-Valued Reasoning

What are “conversations” like today when people differ in view? They are mostly unmitigated disasters, what I call crap-throwing contests. The goal of these interactions is “I win, you lose,” with each party throwing as much crap as possible at the other: anger, guilt, sarcasm, yelling, interrupting, pseudo facts, misrepresentations, outright lies, name-calling, and so on until one person collapses. These interactions are no more conversations than water is stone, and quality thinking is obviously the big loser.

Thinking clearly requires a lot of us. It demands first of all that we suspend all emotional reactions, which obstruct clarity and degrade respect, and face the issue on its merits. Having such reactions is normal; allowing them to intrude into the conversation is a recipe for a bad outcome. I have already addressed in earlier posts the real unpleasantness arising when people fail to suspend emotion.

Second, to think clearly we need an attitude toward conversations that stresses learning, truth, openness, and greater understanding. Most people I know say they have exactly this attitude, but they could not be more mistaken. In this post I will talk about the attitude they do have, one that characterizes their real behavior and which is demonstrably inimical to quality thinking and respectful conversations. This attitude is known as “two-valued reasoning,” and considering the damage it does, I view it as both a moral and a practical “affliction.”

Two-valued reasoning results from a view of the world defined by categorical opposites. Everything is seen from the standpoint of what I like or dislike, see as good or bad, approve or disapprove of, support or condemn. Folks with this standpoint invest huge amounts of emotional energy in the attitude, such that it becomes a fact of their existence (part of their ego) and is no longer merely an intellectual aspect of differing views on something.

People with the two-valued reasoning affliction generally express themselves with great certainty on anything in which they have an emotional investment, and their comments are often framed as “either/or” type propositions. As a consultant to organizations I would often hear comments like, we are either customer oriented or profit oriented, or we are either sensitive to employee well being or we are not. As a counselor to couples in conflict I often hear similar phrasing, as in you can have transparency or privacy in a relationship, or you can have individuality or community, but in neither of these cases can you have both.

People with the affliction not only have an emotional investment in their general view of the world as defined by categorical opposites, they also have an equally strong attachment to one side or the other of any “either/or” proposition. In organizations managers who argue that the firm is either customer oriented or profit oriented have a clear and obvious attachment to one side of this proposition, defended with great emotion (while anyone with a different view is often  attacked). And the same is true in all “conversations” in which the parties have differences, no matter what the subject matter. To describe such interactions as characterized by thinking is absurd.

If quality thinking involves the search for greater understanding of what are often very complex issues, then two-valued reasoning does precisely the opposite----it actively diminishes (strenuously denied by the arguers) the breadth, depth, and sophistication of the interaction.

As an example, at the time of the first Gulf War I encountered a large number of folks who either supported the war or thought it crazy and morally wrong to boot. Typically, this difference in view was articulated by folks on the political right as, “We are going to Iraq to promote democracy,” and by folks on the left as, “We are going to Iraq solely to get their oil.” Two-valued reasoning, and its attendant emotional disturbance, characterized both of these views in any conversation. Folks with the affliction tend to describe very complex situations (like the Gulf War) in such simplistic terms that they border on child-like. They use a pre-existing litany of statements that they accept at face value (if I like it, it must be right) and trot out any time they encounter someone whose views differ from theirs. It’s very difficult to give the name thinking to this.

An additional unpleasant outcome to interacting with those using two-valued reasoning is the impossibility of engaging with them in a productive and respectful way. Since their view is certain, backed up with big emotion, any alternative views cannot be allowed to exist. Whether those alternative views have any merit is of zero importance. What is of utmost importance is that those views be destroyed. So, if you differ from me you are by definition wrong, and often morally corrupt as well. The current political scene gives ample evidence of the prevalence of two-valued reasoning and the accompanying inability to deal openly and respectfully with those who differ.

The great tragedy of self deception: I have exposed the two-valued reasoning idea to some folks and they believe it has considerable value, and that it does describe what they and others they know have experienced. Sadly, these same individuals will not hesitate to immediately trash, with typical two-valued reasoning, those who differ from them. Bertrand Russell expressed this unfortunate state neatly:

            Every man, wherever he goes, is encompassed by a cloud of comforting

            Convictions, which move with him like flies on a summer day.

Failure to subject our convictions to critical analysis ensures two-valued reasoning will prevail, and that we and our society will continue to see ever greater hostility and irrationality among people of different views.