The older I get, the more apparent it becomes to me that nobody, apart from the parties involved, can actually know all the facts in a given situation. To be really honest, this is one of those things I am actually wondering whether I knew all along, or whether it is just dawning on me, and if this is the case, why it is so. Even supposedly simple issues such as everyday fights between friends or coworkers seem to be so loaded with controversy and history that one wonders whether things have always been this way, or whether it is another product of the lifestyle of our day.

In any case, it is an important observation, at least for me, because it provides some sort of brake pedal for those people who, for some reasons totally unknown to me, find satisfaction in solving other people’s personal problems.

There are just too many things you don’t, and maybe can’t, know. Too much history. Too many unknown motivations. Even the emotions of the moment, you do not feel them. The only people who actually have that information are those actually involved in the situation, and now I am even wondering whether many of them know what it is they are arguing about…

On a small scale, this kind of thinking may be useful for people involved in interpersonal conflict. But even on a large scale, it is actually quite useful for those of us just trying to make sense of the world around us.

There are all sorts of groups in our world today. Every conceivable facet of life today is the subject of considerable debate. People are rallying around all sorts of causes, and all of them are vying for our attention and sympathy. The tactics differ from group to group: Some ask for our sympathy based on their supposed moral superiority, others argue on the grounds of intellectual rectitude, still others claim they are the underdogs, and should be treated preferentially…

Like every other issue, there is conventional wisdom on this too: listen to both sides of any story before coming to any conclusion, the truth is usually somewhere in the middle… However, there are some claims that are mutually exclusive: there is no middle ground, and they can’t all be true at the same time. Interestingly, there is usually some evidence for all sides of these claims, which probably explains why they have ardent followers. To make matters worse, many of those arguments usually involve a great deal of finger-pointing: everybody tries to point to what their opponents did wrong, and how malevolent they are. As such, even after hearing both sides, it becomes even more difficult to identify the biases they are operating with, and what it is that actually makes their claims valid, or invalid.

This should come as no surprise. One of the consequences of the abundance of information available in our day is that evidence can be found to support just about any argument. It’s actually quite scary, because there is a very strong likelihood that most of the opinions we hold are based on faulty assumptions, and/or borrowed thinking.

What is the average person supposed to do then?

The easy way out may be to purposefully not have an opinion, which makes sense, given that the average one of us cannot possibly have an informed opinion on every issue known to mankind. However, it is impossible to go through life without any opinion on anything whatsoever, as there are some issues that are important to us, and for which well-reasoned opinions are important to our proper functioning.

It would be much simpler if we could know everything there was to know about any given situation, or topic. We probably would be better decision makers, and, maybe the world would be a better place. But the reality is, we don’t. We have just fragments of information about a few things, which, unfortunately, we don’t refrain from trumpeting whenever we get the slightest chance.

However, the fact that we cannot know everything there is to know does not imply that we cannot know anything about issues (we deem) important. The key, I think, is to do one’s best to form opinions where we see fit, and based on whatever evidence we have, but at the same time make provision for the possibility that we could be wrong, or, at least, inaccurate. And… be prepared to modify those opinions when necessary.