What if I’m Wrong?
Excerpt from Arthur Thormann’s book called What if I’m Wrong?
Introduction:
All my life I was, still am, a firm proponent of eliminating prejudice and bias in the world. Many years ago, I accidentally stumbled onto the question “What if I’m wrong?” and I realized immediately that this question could accomplish the difficult task — not just by saying the words, but by sincerely questioning one’s belief even in the face of overwhelming evidence to support it. The same question applies on a wider scale: “What if he/she, we/they are wrong?” Question everything and everybody.
Here is an example of the wider-scale question from a novel by Lawrence Sanders called McNally’s Secret, where his protagonist Archibald McNally contemplates:
“…In my going-on thirty-seven years I have lived through dire warnings of nuclear catastrophe, global warming, ozone depletion, universal extinction via cholesterol, and the invasion of killer bees.
After a while my juices stopped their panicky surge and I realized I was bored with all these screeched predictions of Armageddon due next Tuesday. It hadn’t happened yet, had it? The old world tottered along, and I was content to totter along with it. I am an amiable, sunnily tempered chap (and something of an ass, my father would undoubtedly add), and I see no need to concern myself with disasters that may never happen. The world is filled with kvetchers, and I have no desire to join the club.”
Evidently, what is going through Archibald McNally’s (Lawrence Sanders’s) mind is the question “What if they are wrong?”
Beliefs should be backed up by facts! Otherwise, one could definitely be wrong!
Now take one or more of your beliefs — I’ll give you some examples that may or may not apply to you: whites are better than blacks; blacks are better than whites; women are better than men; men are better than women; juniors are smarter than seniors; people attain wisdom only at old age; I can sin because Jesus died for my sins; God is a gentle, loving old man. who will look after me if I pray hard enough; my body will perish, but my soul will live on; I may leave this planet, but I will return to live another life; if I sin, Satan will inherit my soul; I can walk across the street without watching the traffic, because my guardian angel will protect me — and ask yourself “What if I’m wrong?” Don’t just say the words, but engage in some serious examinations.
Scientists’ beliefs can also come in question. Albert Einstein believed that nothing is faster than light. I’m not a scientist, so I’m not going to trouble you with the theory of tachyons, but let’s take a look at the light that comes from our sun. Earth’s average distance from the sun is 92,960,000 miles, and light travels at 186,282 miles per second; therefore, it takes light 499 seconds to reach Earth from the sun, or almost eight and a third minutes. Can anything travel faster than that? Yes. Take our thoughts: our thoughts can reach the sun in a split-second, and that is much faster than light. Could I be wrong? Well, someone could say that all I see when I look at the sun is the light emitted from it, which took eight and one-third minutes to reach us, and eight and onethird minutes earlier the sun could have looked different (sun spots that might have disappeared in eight and one-third minutes, etc.) which I didn’t see, and, therefore, my thoughts could not travel faster than light. Does that make sense to you? No? Well, it all comes down to the question “Could he be wrong?” does it not?
When our leaders go wrong, we’re in serious trouble.
Adolf Hitler was one of many twentieth century leaders who should have asked himself the question “What if I’m wrong?” He was a mere corporal in the German Army at the end of the First World War, but he considered Germany’s surrender a political rather than a military defeat. Also, he considered the Treaty of Versailles nothing short of treason against the German people, both by the Allies as well as the German officials who signed it. He promised himself that if he was ever given the opportunity he would reverse the severe conditions of this Treaty! What followed was one of the biggest blood baths in human history!
Twenty-first century leaders must ask themselves the question, too. Take David Cameron. When his Conservatives secured an unexpected majority in the 2015 general election, he remained as Prime Minister. To fulfil a manifesto pledge, he introduced a referendum on the UK’s continuing membership of the EU. Cameron supported continued membership, but following the success of the Leave vote, he resigned and was succeeded by Theresa May. Had Cameron asked himself the question he may not have introduced the referendum.
In the following chapters, I intend to explore some of the mistakes our leaders can and do make when they fail to ask themselves “What if I’m wrong?”
