Respect for Opinions.

In the country where I live there is a pervasive idea that everyone has a right to their opinion on any topic, that as a result opinions are essentially equal, that there must be equal time and respect for differing opinions.  This is most noticeable on news programs in which the most common method for the discussion of a topic is to get two people with different views and then give them equal time to give their opinion.  However, this idea has spread throughout society so that I frequently hear people with no qualifications in a subject knowingly declaim positions that are flatly at adds with the opinion of experts in the field.  Examples are:  support for protectionism (rejected by economists throughout the entire spectrum of political beliefs), rejection of global warming (supported by every national scientific body in the world), rejection of evolution (the scientific theory with the largest amount of supportive data).

To argue against these positions, particularly if you bring forth the problem of ignorance, that the person doesn't even understand the thing which they say is wrong, is considered rude.  However, to state your own opinion is fine, you are entitled to your own opinion.  This doesn't make any sense.  If you state an opinion that differs from another person's opinion you are stating the opinion that they are wrong.  In all the specifics that differ between two opinions each opinion is saying the other opinion is wrong on specifics.  If you say that you have your opinion based on what experts say, you are saying the other opinion is ignorant.  It makes no sense, but the framing of a position can change how it is perceived from harmless to deeply insulting without changing the position.

I suspect that this position is rooted in the concept of universal human rights.  Human rights are about treating everybody equally and I think you have to be a pretty awful person to be against the basic concept.  However, extending the concept of rights to everything can become ludicrous.  Does everyone have the right to be thought of as equally attractive?  Does everyone have the same right to win the 110 metre Olympic hurdles?  There is a difference between everyone having the right to think what they want and thinking that all thoughts are equally right.  The advent of modern communications has now vastly increased the validation for any idea.  On the internet you can find numbers of people who agree with you, regardless of how idiotic your opinion might be.

The scientific method has produced a greater number of truths, at a greater precision, than all the rest of humanity's intellectual efforts put together.  Essentially how the scientific method works is that someone produces an opinion about something and then a large group of other people try to find anything in that opinion that they can demonstrate is false.  Only once those efforts have failed is the opinion considered to be valid.  This stringency with regard to valid opinions is such that only people who have demonstrated through extensive work that they actually understand such opinions are allowed to comment on the subject.  In order to even rise to the level where an opinion can be considered for discussion it must be formulated in such a manner that it is supported by other valid opinions and a very large amount of data precisely quantified.  The scientific method is as far away from the concept that opinions are of equal merit as you can get, and it produces the largest amount of truth.

Opinions are not of equal merit.  This very post is not as valid an opinion as a published paper in a social science on beliefs about opinions.  Some people are more informed, more intelligent, and produce opinions that are actually closer to the truth.  This is so self-evident that the only way that I can understand this phenomenon, that "My opinion is as valid as yours", or "He's entitled to his opinion", is by thinking that it is more important to people to feel right than to be right.

If it hurts you to be wrong (and I think that is probably universal, it hurts me) then the idea of the right to an opinion is a way of lying to yourself to stop feeling bad.  It is self-protection through self-deception.  The anger and perceived insult of being told you are wrong is a reaction to the perception of being attacked.  Someone is making you feel bad.

So, it comes down to whether you care about the truth, or feelings.  Or does it?  We all have ways that we know we can improve ourselves.  One of those methods can be to try to be honest with ourselves, to admit when we are wrong, to realize that criticism is educational.  The method that I try to employ, with admittedly mixed results, is to realize that the greatest intellectual achievement a person can have is to change one's opinion.  It means that you have not respected your own opinion, have internally subjected it to testing and criticism, and found that it is wrong.  It is quite possible to feel a great sense of pride in having been wrong, as long as you acknowledge it.

Opinions should not be respected.  They should be treated with suspicion and assaulted with every honest thought available.  The ones that survive are almost always good opinions.  The opinions that are respected simply for being opinions are usually bad opinions.  I'm sorry, but some opinions are stupid, and if the truth matters it should be alright to tell people so, even if it is someone telling you.