What If I'm Wrong?

It’s not what you don't know that is necessarily dangerous. It’s what you think you know and are wrong about. If you’re one of those who are never wrong, there’s nothing to see here. Just move along.

It’s being absolutely certain that you’re right and acting upon that certainty that gets you into trouble. How many tests have been failed or botched because you knew everything? How many relationships have been destroyed because you were certain that the other half had, or had not, done something. How many fatal accidents come from knowing you can get around that truck on a two-lane highway, or some other vehicular misjudgment? What if you know that climate change is, or is not, primarily caused by human activity? Both people’s lives (and livelihoods) and the planet’s future hang in the balance of your certainty.

Although I’ve a longer piece on the stove inspired by the Zimmerman-Martin tragedy, no matter which side you’ve chosen, if you’ve reached a conclusion based on limited and contradictory evidence, one, or the other, or both knew something about their opposite; either or both were probably wrong, but at least one acted on his "knowledge" anyway.

At the risk of creating “paralysis by analysis,” let me suggest a simple question to ask before acting: “What if I’m wrong?”