Don’t hold strong opinions loosely

I often hear people claim to have “strong opinions, loosely held,” as if it’s a good thing. But this is actually a toxic stance that undermines exactly what the speaker is trying to imply.

When people use the phrase they want to imply they are decisive but not headstrong to the point of being unreasonable. That they’re willing to change their mind when presented with enough counter-evidence. Which sounds reasonable. But it’s actually an idiotic stance.

This piece from David Perell’s post on ‘How Philosophers think’ highlights a core issue with how our brains work on this.

The less time you give yourself to think, the more you’ll settle on socially rewarded points of view. The early research on this idea goes back to a psychologist named Robert Trivers, who did most of his work in the 1970s. He argued that the human brain was designed to deceive itself. We distort information to make ourselves appear better than we actually are.

In his book The Folly of Fools, Trivers argues that a contradiction lies at the heart of human intelligence. Our brains are simultaneously designed to seek out information and destroy that information after we acquire it. Specifically, our minds evolved to make sense of the world not in ways that are true, but in ways that help us survive. But once all that information enters our minds, we ignore critical information and believe self-serving falsehoods. Often, the more we distort information, the more rational we think we are. And so, we applaud ourselves for clear thinking even though we see the world through a tainted prism of self-serving beliefs. Summarizing his work, Trivers once said: “We deceive ourselves the better to deceive others.”

Strong opinions

Having strong opinions implies that you believe that this opinion is most often correct. It’s formed through a lot of experience and reinforcement of facts that it is true. They’re incredibly useful because once we have them they can shortcut decision-making. You can rely on it instead of having to re-test a theory from the ground up. It helps to minimise the problem space by relying on a strong opinion to remove a lot of uncertainty.

The darker side of a strongly held opinion is that we’re more likely to defend it if challenged. If it was correctly formed, there should be enough evidence for us to know it’s most likely right. And hence, worth defending.

Here’s a quote by Nic Harry that I ‘strongly’ disagree with:

Sometimes it’s good to hold strong opinions in the face of doubt and relentlessly defend them. Other times it pays to be nimble with your movements as well as the decisions you make when the facts around you change.

Hold strong opinions weakly or they might sink you.

Maybe, the better strategy is to not hold them strongly in the first place.

Loosely held.

It’s not unusual for a person who says this to be comfortable with and embrace conflict. But not everyone is like that. Not everyone wants a conversation to be a robust debate. There are many forms of collaboration that don’t need conflict.

Holding strong opinions results in others tending to shy away from that area. People are actually less likely to challenge you on it. If you are holding it lightly and change your mind when they do, they’re going to see the conflict as even more pointless.

This makes it less likely to put yourself in situations that give you the information to correct a poorly formed opinion. Meaning you’re even more likely to stay wrong. It’s silly to hold an opinion strongly if by doing so you’ll prevent the necessary engagement to improve it.

Strong opinions, strongly held.

The best thing to do if you’re open to having your mind changed on something is to approach it with curiosity. To be humble about your knowledge and engage from a point of learning. It’s hard to do that with strongly held opinions.

If you need to be able to rely on an opinion, you should hold it strongly. But you should also ensure that it’s robustly formed. This likely means that you should hold fewer opinions strongly — and that’s a good thing. You shouldn’t be building sturdy houses on sand.

Stop holding strong opinions lightly. Either hold strong opinions (that you ensure are actually robust and where understand their limitations) or don’t hold them as strong opinions.

Strong opinions should be strongly held. If you can’t do that, the answer is not to hold them lightly, but to not have the strong opinion in the first place.