[lit-ideas] Re: So, you think teachers have problems

From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sun, 15 Aug 2010 17:50:34 +0000 (GMT)

"Please tell me how much confidence you have in each one..."
 
There are problems being confident in any survey that is premised on such a 
question - in particular, over what domain (or in what respects) is the 
confidence to be projected?
 
The government may not retain my confidence as much as the military in that I 
believe they will 'spin' whatever they do, withhold evidence of their errors if 
they can, may make major errors of judgment on 'policy' - and, relatively 
speaking, I believe the military may spin less, admit mistakes more readily 
and, given their decision-making is at a more operational than policy level, 
make fewer errors of (operational) judgment. But we are not comparing like with 
like and the differences in confidence here reflect this:- they don't 
necessarily reflect a view that the military would do better than the 
government at the government's job so much as less confidence that the 
government job will be well done in comparison to a military task. My relative 
lack of confidence is quite consistent with supporting the present government 
as against the viable alternatives.
 
Nor do the results easily translate into degrees of 'distrust'. I don't 
positively _trust_ that, say, local bureaucracy will get a key decision right - 
but that does not mean I positively distrust local bureaucracy: it may be I 
adopt a 'wait-and-see' attitude and judge things case by case. [The negation of 
'I believe x' is not 'I disbelieve x' but 'It is not the case that I believe 
x'].
 
This kind of 'lack of confidence' might be better described as 'having a 
healthily sceptical or critical outlook'.
 
For these reasons alone, it is unclear how useful an indicator the poll is.
 
Donal
"Scepticism: Always 'extreme', unless 'healthy'."
London

[lit-ideas] Re: So, you think teachers have problems

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