Oh how I wish many millions of people would read this and take it to heart. It would be a good thing. And that's more than just my opinion.
The people who you want to read this and take it to heart will use it against you. Because you don't know about study X and have never heard of it before, they have one more study than you under their belt, therefore they are basing their information on "fact" and not opinion. The fact that study Y exists and neither of you know about it because it's not either of your fields of study means that they win the debate due to ignorance on both sides of your small subset of the argument. I think the big thing is there is a rising culture of people who see something completely outrageous in story form and immediately believe it, instead of carefully examining the story's facts or even attempting to challenge it in their own mind. Perhaps they aren't capable of the critical thinking required or do not have the correct background in the field, but regardless, they just believe only the things they see that are the most outrageous. Subconsciously it's probably because of the desire for controversy and the desire for entertaining discussion.
I always thought that it's the desire to not have their egos' perfect image of self shattered. People get used to defend themselves when something arises that puts their knowledge at less than perfect position of "I don't yet know something and haven't yet chosen to ignore or study it".Subconsciously it's probably because of the desire for controversy and the desire for entertaining discussion.
Critical thinking skills would be great. I ran into them in high-school - but speech and debate is elective, and about as popular as Chess Club.