"Truth is sought for its own sake. And those who are engaged upon the quest for anything for its own sake are not interested in other things. Finding the truth is difficult, and the road to it is rough." - Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥasan ibn al-Ḥasan ibn al-Haytham, roughly 950 AD.

Recently I observed an argument in which neither side was willing to back off their insistence that the other party was wrong. The question was factual, and in an attempt to be helpful I offered to use my laptop to seek an answer to the question online. Much to my surprise both parties balked. My initial response was to apologize for the intrusion, assuming that I was an unwelcome third party to their discussion. Further confusing me, the two of them insisted that they weren't offended; it simply "Was not worth the time to look it up, they would rather just drop it."

While I finished my lunch I puzzled over this. My laptop was out, I was on free WI-FI and the time it took to seek the answer to the question was minuscule. So why avoid the answer? Wouldn't a resolution to the argument by reference to the facts be a desirable outcome?

For the rest of the day I reflected on this. It began to burn me up little by little. Why would we reject a shot at truth and correcting our own misconceptions? Can we as nation really be this addicted to the "We are the right, they are the wrong!" mindset? I suppose it shouldn't surprise me really.

At all levels we seek answers that have mass apeal far more often then we seek truth. There are people who make their living on data manipulation for both sides, enabling news organizations and pundits to twist the facts in such a way as to make them more appealing to their core markets. What's the end result of this? We only seek the people who tell us what we want to hear. Any voice from the "other side" is rejected outright, and often villified.

"It is proper for you, Kalamas [the people of the village of Kesaputta], to doubt, to be uncertain; uncertainty has arisen in you about what is doubtful. Come, Kalamas. Do not go upon what has been acquired by repeated hearing; nor upon tradition; nor upon rumor; nor upon what is in a scripture; nor upon surmise; nor upon an axiom; nor upon specious reasoning; nor upon a bias towards a notion that has been pondered over; nor upon another's seeming ability; nor upon the consideration, 'The monk is our teacher.' Kalamas, when you yourselves know: 'These things are bad; these things are blameable; these things are censured by the wise; undertaken and observed, these things lead to harm and ill, abandon them. "...Do not accept anything by mere tradition... Do not accept anything just because it accords with your scriptures... Do not accept anything merely because it agrees with your pre-conceived notions... But when you know for yourselves—these things are moral, these things are blameless, these things are praised by the wise, these things, when performed and undertaken, conduce to well-being and happiness—then do you live acting accordingly." - Kalama Sutta