Scientists Make Rotten Salesmen

I was explaining to my husband how I just can't sell squat to anyone, even when I believe in the product. We were discussing good books and what people wanted to buy, and musing that epic type fantasy and science fiction were considered less than hot commodities despite clear examples of their popularity at the movie theater, how it seemed that what was hot just now, the trappings, seemed more important that the caliber of the story. When, in my opinion, movies/stories like Avatar and the Ring Series were great stories with the setting/genre almost immaterial.

Now, that's plenty of fodder for the peanut gallery, so feel free to have at, but we moved on because my husband understood exactly what I meant. His reaction: "Marketing is about selling crap, no offense to anyone. The product might be good or not, but it makes no difference to marketing."

Now, Lee could sell anything to anyone, up close and personal. Me, I never could sell anything, even though I never tried to sell anything that I didn't believe in 100%.

Then it hit me. And I said it. "Scientists make lousy salesmen." See, things are black and white for scientists. Things aren't this or that. They're likely this and data indicates that. We use words like theoretically to describe our best explanation of things. A doctor knows even the best treatments have side effects or don't work on everyone. A scientists knows that long term effects may not be clearly indicated by any single data point (in fact, quite the opposite). A good scientist is ready and willing (or should be) to throw away his most precious pet theories if the data comes in to say something different.

But conviction requires ignorance. To say something is absolutely right or absolutely wrong requires, well, either a lack of understanding on subtleties or a lack of morals. Possibly both. Unfortunately, the public wants conviction; they take it as a sign of honesty (and if they didn't televangelists would be out of business in seconds). They figure the guy who's most convincing must be the one that's right.

But is it true? The oil companies have told us that anything that distracts us from drilling no matter how dangerous or expensive that drilling might be (or who owns the land) hurts us all. The big bankers told us to trust that they knew what they were doing. After all, they were the brightest of the bright and we just wouldn't understand what they doing. It's complicated and takes experts. Surely, the clear recent examples of all the slick talkers that took investors for millions (and their stockholders and their employees) should be reason enough not to equate conviction with actual sincerity.

*Sigh* But we don't.

I love the stuff I write. I do. I believe in it and think it's good stuff. But I can't tell someone it's like X's book, because it isn't. I can't tell anyone that it's a given best seller. Who knows? I can't even say it's the "best" novel ever written. I don't even think so, but, if I did, I know there are too many different definitions of "best" for me to be able to speak for everyone else. Heck, I have more than one myself.

I believe in the book, but I'm not ignorant enough to be a good salesman.

Stinks, don't it?

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Honesty Should Be the Best Policy

The answers I received to yesterday's questions didn't surprise me sadly, all the more reason to be unhappy about them.

I was tickled, of course, that Beth Beck stopped by, which was gratifying and unexpected. But I was hoping I was wrong about the prevalence of dishonesty, laying low, keeping a low profile, not rocking the boat. Why?

In the real world, where physics and chemistry and biology rule reality, the head in the sand techniques, looking the other way, lies and self-deception get people killed, whether the lie is that you haven't had too many drinks to get behind the wheel, vaccines cause autism and should be avoided, or that unexplained, uncontrolled and recurrent damage isn't a safety of flight issue.

But those are just the lies that will kill you (or someone else) quick. There are other lies like words can't hurt people. There's the hatred we hide behind our right to have our own opinions, the professed belief that poor people can never amount to anything, that minorities can never be anybody, that what you are determined who you could become. Each of those lies can discourage a child from pursuing his/her potential - to all of our detriment. And, as sad as it when an outside group promotes that notion, it's even sadder when the minority itself does so.

Lies such as the ones that said real estate prices could only go up, or that taking out three mortgages well beyond one's salary was workable have devastated families across the nation - some losing homes, some losing retirement funds and some losing jobs. Lies about the future of oil and the innocence of carbon may cost people around the world.

Lies can buy people short term gain, but, in the long run, they always lose, they always cause pain (if not more). Lies cost lives and money, reputation and trust. We've gotten blase about honesty, we've maligned it and told ourselves it has to be sacrificed in order to be successful. And, even if we aren't lying personally, we sit quietly by and let the lie live. And that's the just part of the same deception.

I disagree. And I will continue to do so because our future needs honesty more than it needs almost anything else. We won't be able to solve the problems we've caused today without addressing them honestly. Hatred, fear and paranoia are harder to incite (as well as the violence that readily follows) among people who don't deceive themselves.

In the end, it was the Mother who summed it up perfectly: "If no one speaks up, things never change. Kudos to those who at least TRY."

Even if I'm wrong, I want to live honestly. That is part of what I want to give to the future. And, if we, as a nation, can't go down this path, we will be our own destruction.

Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.
-Mahatma Gandhi

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Is Honesty Bad Business?

I've mentioned NASAWatch before and, though I often find it self-serving and focused on the aspects of NASA that interest me least, it's leader, Keith Cowling, pulls up enough interesting stuff (and key information) to make it a worthwhile daily stop for me. I'm not badmouthing the blog; it's just not focused (generally) on the same things I focus on.

However, NASAWatch often finds things I might not readily find on my own and, for that, I'm grateful. Yesterday, it mentioned a blog I've seen before (thanks also to NASAWatch) that I wanted to bloglist but had forgotten (I have it now). Not a rocket scientist, but someone working with NASA on those same topics I don't find interesting, politics and the like, that are part and parcel of the job anyway. In this case, the topic was "speaking out at NASA."

Beth Beck (and I can't begin to describe how ironic I find it that that's her name) stood up and asked a question at a "town meeting" and her interpretation of the reaction after the fact from other NASA folks was off-putting - disbelief, even resentment from others that she had the nerve to ask the question and hasn't yet been punished for it. That anyone expects that reaction is disheartening (and I think that's the point of the blog post).

What rather surprised me was the first comment on NASAWatch which was an attack on Beth Beck and her questions as well as her characterization of other NASA folks - apparently out of sync with business etiquette. Say what?

First of all, NASA isn't a business. It's a public organization for the good of all America, to spend taxpayer money to further our nation's interests. If middle management can't take tough questions, maybe they should be doing something else (and if that IS the case in the real world, perhaps our business model is even more screwed up than I imagined. As I've never worked in the "real world" so the rest of you will have to tell me, is honesty punished? Good heavens, why?).

Now, I'll have to raise my hand with my own reputation as a troublemaker, of asking tough questions at times some thought were awkward. But, unlike Ms. Beck, in the technical world of NASA, the reaction (among coworkers) has always been admiration that I asked it and support if/when there have been repercussions. The managers I've questioned in the past have generally professed gratitude, but I think I'm right to take that with a grain of salt. That technical folks at NASA aren't comfortable asking challenging questions is a sad fact that desperately needs change. But that anyone thinks that's not the way to do business for an organization that is bound by physical (and pitiless) laws is a travesty.

I'm fortunate that I work in an environment where my honest and forthrightness have not cost me much (if anything) and have, over time, worked to my benefit. However, the perception that honesty is not acceptable is still pervasive in many areas, and it's impossible to tell where the perception might be true and where it isn't. In either case, though, it's possible that things that need to be said/asked are not voiced because of the perception. And that's frightening. The fact that these two views can both come forward at the same time, right here and now, shows we aren't where we need to be at NASA and, perhaps, elsewhere as well.

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Saturday Quotathon: Chivalry

In honor of what I and Merriam Webster think chivalry ought to be, I'm looking for quotes that involve honor, generosity and courtesy.

Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love. This is the eternal rule.
-Gautama Buddha

I am disinclined to aquiesce to your request. Means no.
-Barbossa from Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl

For the sake of the flowers, the weeds are watered.
-Arabic Proverb

What a man believes may be ascertained, not from his creed, but from the assumptions on which he habitually acts.
- George Bernard Shaw

The greatest friend of Truth is time, her greatest enemy is Prejudice, and her constant companion Humility.
- Charles Caleb Colton

Where there is great love there are always miracles.
- Willa Cather

Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.
- Friedrich Nietzsche

In the end it is how you fight, as much as why you fight, that makes your cause good or bad.
- Freeman Dyson

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
- Mahatma Gandhi

It is better for a leader to make a mistake in forgiving than to make a mistake in punishing.
- Muhammad

An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.
- Thomas Paine

We are here to add what we can to, not to get what we can from, Life.
-William Osler, M.D.

Tact is the art of making guests feel at home when that’s really where you wish they were.
-George E. Bergman

Treat a child as though he already is the person he’s capable of becoming.
-Haim Ginott

Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.
-Steve Jobs

You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.
-Mahatma Gandhi

We are on the cusp of this time where I can say, "I speak as a citizen of the world" without others saying, "God, what a nut."
- Lawrence Lessig

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy's point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.

I believe that in India "cold weather" is merely a conventional phrase and has come into use through the necessity of having some way to distinguish between weather which will melt a brass doorknob and weather which will only make it mushy.
-Mark Twain [not mean, but funny]

Be kind - Remember every one you meet is fighting a battle - everybody's lonesome.
--Marion Parker

Be civil to all; sociable to many; familiar with few; friend to one; enemy to none.
-- Benjamin Franklin

Be honorable yourself if you wish to associate with honorable people.
--Welsh Proverb

It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust.
--Samuel Johnson

Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.
-Aristotle

'But we should kill him!'
'No. You've been listen to Brocando too often,' said Bane.
Brocando bristled. 'You know what he is! Why not kill--' he began, but he was interrupted.
'Because it doesn't matter what he is. It matters what we are.'
-Terry Pratchett

I learned the lesson that great men cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of hatred. I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.
-Booker T. Washington

Do not confuse "duty" with what other people expect of you; they are utterly different. Duty is a debt you owe to yourself to fulfill obligations you have assumed voluntarily. Paying that debt can entail anything from years of patient work to instant willingness to die. Difficult it may be, but the reward is self-respect.
- Robert A. Heinlein

I do believe that man is a rope between animal and superman. But the superman I'm thinking of isn't Nietzsche's. The real superhuman, man or woman, is the person who's rid himself of all prejudices, neuroses, and psychoses, who realizes his full potential as a human being, who acts naturally on the basis of gentleness, compassion, and love, who thinks for himself and refuses to follow the herd. That's the genuine dyed-in-the-wool superman.
- Philip José Farmer

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Saturday Quotations: Character

Somehow, this seemed appropriate given the my recent posts. Note that I'm a believer that actions speak louder than words. You'll see that in my characters. To me, someone of character can't be apathetic.

Happiness is not a reward -- it is a consequence. Suffering is not a punishment -- it is a result.
--Robert Green Ingersol

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; be honest and frank anyway.
--Mother Theresa

If you have no enemies, you are apt to be in the same predicament in regard to friends.
--Elbert Hubbard

When you have to make a choice and don't make it, that in itself is a choice.
--William James

If you are not honest at all, everybody hates you, and if you are absolutely honest you get martyred.
--Don Marquis

The great advantage about telling the truth is that nobody ever believes it.
--Dorothy L. Sayers

Every man is guilty of all the good he didn't do.
--Voltaire

A commentary on the times is that the word 'honesty' is now preceded by 'old-fashioned.'
-- Larry Wolters

An infallible method of conciliating a tiger is to allow oneself to be devoured.
-- Konrad Adenauer

Apathy is the glove into which evil slips its hand.
-- Bodie Thoene

As a rule, there is no surer way to the dislike of men than to behave well where they have behaved badly.
-- Lew Wallace

Character does count. For too long we have gotten along in a society that says the only thing right is to get by and the only thing wrong is to get caught. For me character is simple. Character is doing what's right when nobody is looking.
-- J.C. Watts

Character is made by what you stand for; reputation by what you fall for.
-- Alexander Woollcott

Character is not made in a crisis -- it is only exhibited.
-- Robert Freeman

Conceal a flaw, and the world will imagine the worst.
-- Martial

Don't ask the barber whether you need a haircut.
-- Daniel Greenberg

Don't just learn the tricks of the trade. Learn the trade.
-- James Bennis

Every difficulty slurred over will be a ghost to disturb your repose later on.
-- Frederic Chopin

Excuses are the nails used to build a house of failure.
-- Don Wilder

Half the work that is done in this world is to make things appear what they are not.
-- Elias Root Beadle

Have patience awhile; slanders are not long-lived. Truth is the child of time; ere long she shall appear to vindicate thee.
-- Immanuel Kant

He who does not bellow out the truth when he knows the truth makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers.
-- Charles Pierre Péguy

He who sacrifices his conscience to ambition burns a picture to obtain the ashes.
-- Chinese Proverb

He who speaks the truth should have one foot in the stirrup.
-- Hindu Proverb

If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don't have integrity, nothing else matters.
-- Alan Simpson

I think the reward for conformity is everyone likes you but yourself.
-- Rita Mae Brown

It may be true there are 2 sides to every question, but it is also true there are 2 sides to a sheet of flypaper and it makes a big difference to the fly which side he chooses.
-- Benjamin So

Man has no nobler function than to defend the truth.
-- Ruth McKenney

Men must not only know, they must act.
-- W.E.B. Du Bois

Most of the harm in the world is done by good people, and not by accident, lapse or omission.
-- Isabel Paterson

My doctrine is this: if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and we do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in that guilt.
-- Anna Sewall

Of course, I have more, but that should do 'er.

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Dishonest Opinions

I read an interesting bit of opinion today (yes, in the New York Times). Ostensibly, it's about health care, but I felt like it was more about intellectual integrity and arguments that are so disingenuous as to go beyond honest political discourse.

What do I mean? Well, I've spoken before about using critical thinking, using one's logic and native intelligence to sniff out the BS instead of buying just anything you hear.

But there's another side of the coin. I'm all for uppin' the general level of intelligence for the populace and reducing the overall gullibility. But what about holding those telling those tall tales responsible for the fertilizer they spread?

We make a big deal out of freedom of speech and we should. The ability to express ourselves without fear of reprisal for being unpopular is key to any society that claims to be free. But with any freedom, there is another side to it, responsibility, especially when one is speaking as the voice of authority.

And I don't think we hold people responsible for abusing that authority quite enough. We get so used to being lied to, no matter how extreme the story, no matter how foolish the argument, no matter how skewed the logic, that those of us who routinely think skeptically pay little to no attention. Nor do we tend to do more than shrug when the less critical of us swallow the most ridiculous nonsense, figuring, eh, live and let live.

But knowingly spreading misinformation isn't harmless, especially when its emotionally charged and designed to touch the public emotionally instead of rationally. Doctors who trumpet the risks of vaccines cost children's lives and stand to reverse much of the progress against childhood disease of the last century (and are likely in a position to profit from some vaccine alternative that has no scientific backing). Scientists and doctors on the payroll of tobacco companies that told us, straight-faced, there was no risk from secondary smoke and addiction have cost untold lives and health care dollars to treat preventable lung conditions in smokers and their children. "Scientists" spreading doubt (on Big Oil's payroll under cover of "think tanks") about climate change and CO2 in the atmosphere despite all the evidence to the contrary - the bill for that feet-dragging hasn't come up yet, but I wouldn't expect the price to be small.

And politicians. Yes, we expect them to lie to us, to support the interests of special interest, to say bad things about the people of the "other" party even if they're doing the right thing (like that happens often if ever). But why do we let them get away with it?

Politicians are almost always paid by us to represent our interests - why are we complacent about them throwing our interests over for health insurance companies or bankers (the latter, of course, who aren't reticent about requesting money from us but not so happy about sharing it back)? Why do we shrug and move on when they provide mindless arguments about why Americans should continue to be screwed over for our own good? Why do we accept the lies as part of doing business?

It's not about ideology. It's about telling the falsehoods because one has an agenda, a self-serving motive. Bad enough being told that by advertisers who are being paid by those they work for but particularly unpleasant being lied to by those who work for us.

It's not harmless. Hitler told a self-serving set of lies, emotionally laden, that caused good people to do some truly heinous things. We're lying to ourselves if we think it can't happen here, though hopefully never to that degree. Never again.

But I'm not sure prosecution is effective. Perhaps that just legitimizes the bullshit. Maybe we need to respond the the crapola with laughter, long and hard, and not relent. Maybe, if we start treating being patronized with emotionally charged manipulative garbage with amused contempt, we can entice a new breed of authority who won't speak unless they have something to say they can justify with facts or data, with logic or history.

God, I am such a dreamer.

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