I think this is going to be the next big challenge in social tech: Contact: The consequences of growing up amid diversity just discussed bring us to the effects of prolonged contact on Us/Theming. In the 1950s the psychologist Gordon Allport proposed “contact theory.” Inaccurate version: bring Us-es and Thems together (say, teenagers from two hostile nations in a summer camp), animosities disappear, similarities star…
The first thing to always keep in mind is that intentionally attempting to engineer social behaviors has historically been the single most devastatingly destructive motivation. Far more destructive than war, famine, disease, or other means of human suffering and death. It gave us eugenics, concentration camps, political purges, the obesity epidemic, and all manner of other ills. It backfires consistently and almost a…
That's the simple solution?
I have two things to say about it:
First, there are many, many traps to fall into when you develop critical thinking. The way out of those traps is to refine your understanding of critical thinking even more and be more aware of biases. Frankly, this is sustainable only for those who are strongly interested in it - which in my experience is probably less than 10% of the population. Hardly "simple".
Also, having spent time amongst top scientists in academia, and seeing how irrational they can become outside of their field of expertise, I have little faith that critical thinking alone is a solution.
Second, there is a fair amount of research that shows that rational thinking devoid of emotions is infeasible. People with brain injuries where emotions essentially go away (perfectly "logical" creatures) can barely function. Every decision had to be justified. Like why you chose to eat an orange instead of an apple.
This may be an argument from extreme, but the consensus appears to be that a full emotion free approach to problem solving is less than ideal.