Health is Good

Many people seem unable or unwilling to distinguish between true or false on the one hand and good or bad on the other. In many complex situations and for many people, good is true and bad is false. If necessary, true and false simply disappear from the picture.

It appears to be a fundamental political difference, even more fundamental than left and right. Not a line in the sand difference, but a real difference for all the diffuse nature of it. As if our interoceptive signals intervene where any debate is important to us because that is what makes debates feel important in the first place. This is a key point - if a debate is important it must feel important.

Interoceptive signals are projected to the brain via a diversity of neural pathways that allow for the sensory processing and prediction of internal bodily states. Misrepresentations of internal states, or a disconnect between the body's signals and the brain's interpretation and prediction of those signals, have been suggested to underlie some mental disorders...

It seems likely enough that interoceptive signals may be incorrectly interpreted as signals for true or false. Or as far as the interoceptive system goes – correctly interpreted. Giving us the other key point – false can feel true, true can feel bad. Arguments across this particular divide never go anywhere. If the problem is significantly biological then this is hardly surprising.

We see it clearly enough in the passion, vituperation, relentless attempts to silence dissent, the inability to agree to disagree, the rage, placards, violence and even insanity. We see it all the time. Simple observation tells that this problem is real, widespread and intractable. Not only that, but it seems to flare up with particular virulence every generation or so.

The whole area is of course fraught with shades of meaning, but in the main the good/true bad/false idea appears to work. Or at least it goes some way to account for the extraordinary grip false ideas have on huge numbers of people. Much of the interoceptive power of false ideas presumably derives from consensus. Going against a consensus can feel wrong to all of us at one time or another, but sometimes things just get worse and worse until thugs gather on the streets.

Political activists use good and bad but have little use for true and false wherever there is a conflict. In these cases it often seems likely that political elites know what is being done whereas the activists do not. Which is what makes them useful idiots.

For example, the climate change narrative is widely deemed to be good but it is highly likely that some at least of its senior protagonists know it to false. However they still deem it to be good for reasons largely hidden from public view. It is also likely that some enemies of the developed world deem the climate narrative to be good in the sense that it is bad for us.

Another example is the dubious nature of Joe Biden’s elevation to the US presidency in that the legitimacy of the election is open to legitimate questions. Here we saw the whole spectrum from hysterical joy, passion and rage to cold political calculation mingled in a way which only disinterested outsiders have a chance of disentangling.

We now see another example. Health is good…