Why ambiguity of evidence?

Over the past few years I have been reading many news articles concerning our brave government, well they are brave, Only 28% of the population believe they can operate a toilet correctly let alone run the country. 

Most of the comments I read are along the lines of "can't wait for a federal election" and "time to kick this monster out" (referring to our highly regarded PM*). Every now and then we witness a pro Labor comment that usually insists they can't believe how un-educated the Australian people are for not supporting Labor, how without labor we would all be working in the mines on a third world wage.   This is were I shake my head little.

This leads me to realise that the Internet news reading world is made up of two sorts of people: The angry and fed up, who's repeating comments are about relieving Julia Gillard of her Job, and the idealistic Labor supporters who haven't quite realised that the horse they are flogging died the day the Carbon tax past Parliament and the people were denied there democratic voice. 

It's true we may not be able to govern the country based on news polls but there is a certain accuracy to them and they do give a rather good indication of the opinion most Australians have. When the polling shows a primary vote of 28% this tells us that little they do is supported by the people, yet they argue that  the polls are somehow insignificant or just a passing statistical anomaly. This is what I refer to as the ambiguity of evidence.  We don't like what we see so we will find ways to blur and confuse the facts until it no-longer has any legitimate meaning, then we can continue on our merry way.  

I tried this once in metal work. I was making a figure 8 for a letter box but I could not get the welds looking right. My work looked like it had been made by throwing molten bits of steel at a wall until one seemed to end up the right shape.  My teacher approached me and informed me that my work was inadequate. Contrary to the evidence (In this case a piece of steel barely resembling a figure 8) I told him it was meant to look how it did, it was a country rustic look I was going for and I thought that I had done well after hours of hard work. My teacher did not agree, he was smart enough not to confuse the evidence with an ambiguous reworking of the metal work goal (which thus undermines the current evidence of shonky craftmanship). 

I really wish the general population were just as smart when it came to politics. If the evidence doesn't support our opinion then we either need to change our opinion or wait for the evidence to be found incorrect. Until then, obscuring the meaning of said evidence to support our agenda is nothing short of showing we aren't smart enough or strong enough to deal with the facts.  Just like our friendly news article commentators who are fervently opposed to facts and still wish to flog that horse on the off chance it regains its footing (and comes back from the dead).



*Snigger snigger