Showing Correctness is A Thorny Issue

In my experience, regardless of the level of reasoning a person is capable of, that reasoning is never equally applied to all things.  There's nothing really strange about this, though, because reasoning takes time and energy.  And there's generally no way someone can apply their highest level of reasoning, or even a moderate level, to every question. 

Instead, many questions, important ones even, are answered by very simple methods, like 'this is what I've seen in my experience so I will generalize it to be universally applicable', 'what does this make me feel', 'what do my friends believe', 'what beliefs best validate my current behavior', 'what does an authority figure believe', or other methods that do not robustly show correctness but allow for a quick answer.  Because otherwise we'd never be able to make a decision to do or say anything.

This is one thing I think is good to keep in mind when seeing that someone hasn't given a good argument for something.  I think it's best to realize that good arguments are always going to be much rarer than bad ones, and that if that doesn't seem to be the case, it's much more likely that the criteria of the argument being good or bad is itself being made by some simple method.  Also, the same factors can cause a person to judge a good argument to be bad.

This is also one thing that gives me pause whenever I think about asserting something.  I hate being wrong, or even being right but not having a good argument for it.  But it's inevitable that will happen frequently, because there are many, many questions that cannot be answered well quickly.

A Difficult Person

Just thinking about how I always have to nudge myself to act outside my inclinations if I don't want all my social interactions to be utterly disastrous.  I think that at my core, I'm just kind of a difficult person.  I am stubborn and inclined to a sort of general dissatifaction with the world as it is.  I disagree with a great deal of things I see.  If it weren't for my immense dislike of confrontation I'd argue with people incessantly.  But oh, if I disagree with this idea, surely I agree with this opposing idea? Wrong!  Such dichotomies are illusion!  There is an infinitely multidimensional space of Idea, and unfortunately it seems I'm off floating by myself in some abandoned locale of it.

Side Character Annoyingly Focuses on Mundane Details

Had an especially vivid dream last night that I don't remember very well because I didn't write it all down as soon as I woke up, but here's what I recall:

I was on a bus and trying to get somehere.  I got off somewhere partway there due to some uncertainty about my destination, and went into a building.  Then I realized I wasn't wearing a mask and neither was anyone else, so this suddenly became a Covid anxiety dream lol.  But there was also a story to the dream I don't remember that was a lot more important than all this.  And the main character was a woman who I can't recall very much about except remembering that the important plot centered around her and that she was very worried about what was going on. 

I think maybe some sort of magic was involved?  I don't remember for sure, though.  And I was basically an unimportant side character that just happened to be around to observe all this going on.  I wish I remembered more of this dream.  The most visually memorable and comprehensible parts were also some of the most mundane: me trying to ask the bus driver if I should get off at a certain stop,  the street I got off at, the escalator in the building, the distressingly unmasked faces inside the building.  But who knows about the actual important stuff that was happening?

I am such an annoying side character to not pay enough attention to the actual momentous occurrences in my dream.  What was that story about?  Can I have some dreams where my dream-self isn't focused on getting dream-Covid?  I don't think dream people can give me real plague, and I'd like to remember whatever story my dream was trying to tell.