Epistemic Closure, By any Other Name...

There has been a lot of talk recently about "epistemic closure," a term coined weeks ago by the conservative thinker Julian Sanchez of the libertarian Cato Institute, to describe the closure of conservative minds to facts and arguments that do not already reflect their own views. Epistemic closure is also called "cocooning," a term that evokes the image of hiding from information outside one's own bubble. The term is borrowed from the philosophical discipline of epistemology and it means something entirely different in that context. The assertion, as made first by Sanchez and now by many others, is that contemporary conservatives are more likely than contemporary liberals to suffer from epistemic closure of the cocooning kind.

I need to weigh in on this, because:

1. I believe the assertion is true - today's conservatives are more likely than today's liberals to reject facts and arguments that do not already conform to their views
2. It has affected the health reform debate in negative ways
3. It is corrosive to democracy because there can be no debate when one "side" refuses to debate at all
4. A popular movement is needed to oppose this phenomenon, but I don't think the term epistemic closure will help popularize the movement.

I believe the description of this phenomenon is valid, but there is a difference between rejecting arguments and rejecting facts. Rejecting an argument is - sometimes - the natural outcome of discussion and debate. Some arguments can and should be rejected. However, rejecting a fact is difficult and perhaps impossible to justify. Republicans and the right wing should be encouraged to engage in debate if they desire and to oppose liberal and left wing arguments, and vice-versa. But no one should be encouraged to oppose a fact or to be hostile to evidence.

Hostility to facts and evidence is a phenomenon that has been growing on the right in the US for several decades. The current wave may have started with Barry Goldwater's declaration that "extremism in defense of liberty is no vice." Wherever it started, it seems clear to me that all policy options in the GOP have been reduced to a war of principle between the liberty gained by lower taxes and the liberty lost by social compacts. The tea party and birther revanchists ("taking our country back") are just two variants of a right wing movement that is hostile to facts and evidence. From global warming to economic policy, to Obama's birthplace and taxes, these movements have made facts and evidence into enemies.

This phenomenon is corrosive to democracy, and it is a primary reason I worry about the future of the United States. It is an act of stupidity to oppose a fact or to be hostile to a piece of evidence. I worry that there are no true conservatives in power these days. From my vantage point, the House and Senate GOP, birthers and tea party activists are all of a common cloth: they reduce every policy debate to a fight of principles and ideas rather than a debate about the facts and the evidence. These people are radicals, driven by ideologies and not by facts. They are market fundamentalists and religious fundamentalists, whose default stance is total war on their opposition, even if the opposition appears in the form of overwhelming evidence. Need examples? Evolution. Global Warming. The inefficiency of free markets in healthcare.

This stance is not good for a country of 300 Million people that is trying to work out difficult policy solutions in a global economy and a fast changing political landscape. Take the health reform debate. The final Act, as passed, is based primarily on conservative ideas originating with the Romney Administration in Massachusetts, but it did not garner a single GOP vote. It got no GOP support despite 13 months of debate and 3 months in which the Gang of Six (3 Republicans and 3 Democrats) worked in conference to draft the legislation in the first place. I believe the GOP never intended to come to the table on health care because it clashed with their ideology of small government. The GOP could not support an increased Federal role in healthcare, period. Evidence of market failure in private healthcare was irrelevant. Evidence of government success and patient satisfaction with Medicare and the VA system was irrelevant.

This phenomenon deserves universal criticism, from both the right and the left. What is needed is a popular message that is firmly critical of hostility to facts and evidence. Although it is right on, the term "epistemic closure" presents a barrier to popularizing this criticism. Few people are willing to use the word episte-anything at the water cooler.

This needs to be said as clearly as possible: Hostility to facts and evidence should be the new definition of dumb, and thoughtful people need to say so.