Why be right?

I recently had a discussion with my roommate about what truth means. It was an interesting conversation. We disagree, but we understand what each other thinks, and we both think the other is wrong. That's fine.

While I was at work, I was interested in hearing a coworker's perspective on it. He started out by defining truth the same way I would. But then when asked probing questions, he used it the way my roommate did. I explained my thoughts, and also mentioned that his thoughts echoed those of my roommates. I also showed how he seemed to contradict himself. 

So that turns into "I just want everybody to believe what I believe." I got asked the question "Why is it so important for you for people to be right? Why can't you just let people be wrong?" Before I could completely answer, I had apparently deeply frustrated both of my coworkers, even though I was only talking to one. I was laying the groundwork for my explanation, when I was asked to drop the conversation. That was incredibly frustrating.

Somebody asks why what you believe is important to you, then doesn't let you answer. I asked the person I was talking to if he actually wanted to know. His response was "Well, I did ask you. And you answered it." I replied that I was getting there, but I hadn't answered it yet. 

That made me think two things. First, what did he think my answer was? Second, given that I told him I didn't answer it, and he didn't ask for clarification or what my answer really was, he really didn't want to know.

I'm going to write it here, because I need to get it out.

Why do I believe it's important to be right? First, opinions aren't facts, and you can have whatever opinion you like, and I might not agree with it, but whatever. Opinions can't be right or wrong anyway. When it comes to actually data, facts, information, etc, it does matter. We don't live in isolated bubbles. We interact with others constantly. When we interact with people we communicate with them, and share.  So if we have our factual information wrong, we will spread that wrongness to the people we interact with. I can't think of anything positive gained by sharing of erroneous information. 

We also formulate our opinions based on what we believe to be true. If you think I'm a mass murderer, or serial rapist, you'd think differently than if you think I'm an upstanding law abiding citizen. You can think what you want about either group, but at least be right about which group I'm in. 

Society has achieved it's greatest advancements when we seek out knowledge and spread it.