Trust

One of my favorite memories from the 1970’s is car shopping with my Dad. As I recall it, we were looking at a 1973 Chrysler Town and Country Station Wagon. The floor model had cruise control. At one point, Dad asked the salesman if he knew how cruise control worked. When the man admitted he didn’t, my Dad, a professional engineer, gave him a brief explanation. “Wow, I didn’t know that,” the salesman said. Afterwards, Dad told me he doubted that the man would ever explain cruise control to another customer. I thought it was worth a try.

It seems to me this little memory is important for two reasons. First, most people have no idea how most of the devices they use actually work. Apparently, is enough that they do. Second, at one time most people respected the expertise of those who knew such things. Those who were underinformed or mostly ignorant about a subject turned to those who were better informed or more experienced for advice or assistance. A person may understand how cruise control systems work, but if their car needs repair, they might be wise to ask a licensed mechanic to fix it. It’s important for people to acknowledge where their expertise ends and where another’s expertise should rightly take over.

We inhabit a world where one person’s opinion is as good as another person’s hard-won expertise. Many people blame the internet, social media, the news media, or politics for this situation. The truth is that human nature probably has a lot more to do with it. Some people can’t wait to take others “down a peg or two.” I learned this in high school. If I missed a question on an exam and scored 98 percent, someone who scored lower was often ready to say, “Ha, ha, you missed one!” How many times has a single incident, or an offhand remark, doomed someone to ridicule or contempt, no matter how much good they might have done otherwise? I’d argue we must curb our desire to take people down.

A conspiracy theory turns out to be a convenient way to take people down. If one believes the moon landing was faked, one must also believe hundreds of thousands of well-intentioned people should be taken down. One must believe the engineers and technicians who worked hard for their education, passed stringent security clearances, and were among the best and brightest of their generation, also perpetrated fraud. One must believe the astronauts who gave their lives somehow deserved their fate. Of course, the “proof” offered for this conspiracy amounts to nothing. However, I’m much more concerned about the underlying motivation.

All conspiracy theories have one thing in common: in order to “prove” the conspiracy, one must also accuse all the people connected with it of intentional misconduct. Are we to believe thousands of credentialled scientists have been faking astronomical observations and photographs? And most of the researchers who risk their lives and spend months in freezing conditions to study glaciers or polar bears just do it for the grant money? And many of those who have earned advanced degrees in biochemistry or virology and have devoted their lives to improve the health of others are just trying to make a buck and don’t care who they hurt? And all those election officials who certified that President Obama and Senator Harris were born in the USA deliberately hid the truth? And most of those who worked at the polls, risking their lives during a pandemic, were just trying to rig the 2020 election? In the end, all of these are mean-spirited attempts to take others down a peg or two.

After all, the accused are our fellow Americans, in some cases our friends and neighbors, trying day-in and day-out to do their best – for the rest of us. If most people truly believe those who have accepted such daunting responsibilities are guilty of “widespread corruption,” it would be game over for humanity. If dedicated, experienced experts cannot be trusted most of the time, I’d argue no one can be trusted. Conspiracy theories depend on people believing that no one does anything without an ulterior motive. If this is true, if all of life is merely transactional – quid pro quo, one-upmanship, taking others down so one might move up – conspiracy theories might be all we have left.

Who can we trust? Certainly, not every professional, experienced or not, credentialed or not, can be trusted. Mistakes happen. Fraud occurs from time-to-time. Thankfully, mistakes and fraud seldom happen on a grand scale. But, if we start to believe that occasional fraud is the same as “widespread” fraud, what does this say about our character? Are we looking for the worst in others, hoping to find it, eager to “take them down?” Does this mean we’ve become so determined to discredit others in order to win that we hope to make minor problems look like rampant corruption? Of course, we should make sure those in positions of authority are doing their jobs with integrity. But we shouldn’t take out our personal or political frustrations on our neighbors. Perhaps we should practice the golden rule instead.

Sometimes we need to admit that actual expertise matters, that we don’t know everything, even if we’ve watched some YouTube videos or read a few unverified “studies” posted on Facebook. And while most of us know a lot about certain things, none of us knows everything about everything. No one has all the answers. It used to be considered prudent or at least respectful to defer to experts when one didn’t know the whole story. Yet, it seems to me the “know-it-alls” among us often try to undermine expertise in the name of their prejudices and preconceptions.

It’s been my experience that those who are the most trustworthy almost never say, “Trust me” or “Believe me” or “I know more than the experts.” They let their competence speak for them. They confess their doubts, biases, and shortcomings. They understand that their knowledge has limits. They defer to those who know more than they do. They gain trust by being honest with themselves and others, not by taking others down.

Not everyone knows how cruise control works, much less how to design a self-driving car. Not everyone understands astronomy, carbon dating, core samples, epidemiology, psychology, statistics, constitutional law, or internet security either. Maybe we should respect those who do and be a little more circumspect about our own limitations before we accuse others of conspiring to harm us.