Whether it's reactions to Charlie Kirk or the recent uproar over the discussion surrounding acetaminophen (Tylenol) and autism, I'm continuing to observe the same thing: We're all looking at the same observations and data, but we're not comprehending each other.

On the acetaminophen question, I don’t believe that many of the staunchly committed voices on any side are all that confused about “association vs. causation.” I think there are quite a number of people with drastically different viewpoints who demonstrate some understanding of the limits of observational studies — confounding, mediation, collinearity, and so on.

So why do we still continue to talk past each other?

I don’t think the Charlie Kirk discourse is really about politics.

I don’t think the acetaminophen debate is really about politics or even science.

I think the issue is deeper.

I think some of it has to do with our emotional processing during discourse, and the language we use when we respond. But part of it also comes down to something even more basic: whether we share the same epistemology — the way we define what counts as knowledge and truth.

And here’s the problem: most people don’t even know what the word “epistemology” means.

Yet without some shared understanding of it, I don’t see how we’ll ever truly understand each other.

#philosophy #politics #knowledge