“But
you don’t understand. We have seen life.”
The
perennial argument was frustrating to the least. And in an ephemeral tide of
emotions generated by the bluntness of the statement, I experienced what I
presume is a frequent exasperation felt by a million minds in search of logical
annihilation of the more experienced opponent. But what accounts for
experience: is it the length of your stay here, is it the scale of things you
have witnessed that affected your life or is it just an indescribable air of
superiority that is a shield against any attempt to question you. Being set in
beliefs is a frequently used term for the physically older people; but is it
fair? So if I shape my own views based on experience of arguing with the experienced, does it make me more set in my beliefs? There was
always that elusiveness in the answers.
“But
none of the statistical study, if it has been done, suggests any such thing.” I
retorted in a last ditch attempt to salvage my point. But the problem with
statistical arguments is simple: they don’t work, especially with the experienced. It is a license for them to brush off all our conclusions as naïve
attempts to understand life, done with the classic disapproving shaking of the
head and a faint smile.
”You
really think statistics can predict human behaviour.”
“But
apparently you can.” The reply was sharp and knee jerk. There was a flicker of
offense taken on his face, but was quickly replaced by the snub laced smile
that had been subtly displaying itself on his face all evening. Somewhere
stupid I had heard that the young in their fights with the elders are
constantly craving for conflict and aggressive reactions: a thought so
patronizing in its presumption that any sensible person would dismiss it. But
my reaction to his calmness was surprisingly subscribing to this theory, even
though it has its narrow applicability limits to some teenagers. It was somehow
annoying and disappointing to me that no visible offense was taken in my sharp
retort. It was in that strange realisation that I knew the argument was
slipping away as always.
“We
are not contradicting what we taught you. All men are created equal. But what I
am trying to say that there is something called group behaviour that hugely
influences a person’s judgements. You may view these things as stereotypes; we
view them as significant observations.” Classifying one’s natural prejudices as
careful observation was a master-stroke. Can an observation that strengthens a
bias be even considered an observation? Isn’t the notion self-contradictory?
But I knew this battle could not be won on grounds of logic 101 fundamentals,
if this was a battle. I considered this a battle, passionate about it, but
somewhere in the deepest recesses of the neural fibres, there was an ignited
doubt: was this even an argument for them? Do they consider me worthy of a
battle of wits, or all this was playful probing of my ideas? A string of
examples had been regularly laid in front of me to verify their experience. As a student of mathematics, I was tempted to say that
verification by a few examples in close proximity was hardly a sound proof, but
a sane voice in me stopped it.
“You
mean to say that just because in India you know someone’s surname, you are
supposed to know whether he is reliable or not. I have friends who completely
defy your logic.” I was emphatic at the examples, trying to counter a flawed
argument in its own twisted way. There was so much more I could not articulate.
The fundamental flaw in the classification of human beings into groups is the
undervaluation of the inherent diversity in human beings. Human beings have too
less in common to group them into pseudo communities based on the ancestor glory illusion. If in statistics, there is a system with
more than three variables, even if independent, it becomes increasingly
difficult to predict the system’s behaviour. And human beings are complex
adaptive systems, with numerous variables interacting with each other in a
different way in different situations. Thus the idea of predicting human
behaviour based on a flawed group behaviour theory is preposterous by
scientific standards. This would have been a nailing argument anywhere, but not
here.
“I
am not suggesting feeling superior to some lower castes. All I am saying is
that we as a community are just different from some others. This system works
in India.”
“That
suggests you and I ought to be very similar.”
“Yes.”
I
had lost.