Rushing to Judgment

Once I began using a desk top computer on a regular basis in my practice in the early 1980′s, I quickly realized that my ability to deliberate over pending decisions was being impaired. As the speed and capacity of computers increased exponentially, the ability to deliberate over decisions became increasingly difficult. In fact, at one point I found myself arguing, due to the incredibly increased pace at which we were being asked to turn around transactional documents, that in making hiring decisions our law firm should carefully consider a prospective lawyer’s ability to make snap judgments in conjunction with the more customary criteria of law school grades, common sense, character and legal ability in general.

In reaching this conclusion, I was not becoming enamored of the lack of time for deliberation, but simply recognizing that the manner and means of practice had changed so extensively that one simply had to recognize that the facility to make snap judgments was increasingly important in a tech-dominated working environment. In fact, I have long decried the lack of time to deliberate carefully, especially in complex matters, and have long sought substitute methodology which would build in necessary document review and consideration of basic legal issues involved in the matter at hand.

Snap judgments are just that – judgments made on the spot, often without full information about the circumstances with which one is faced. I long ago learned that while the clients want a quick product turn around and are unwilling to pay for time to deliberate, they also want informed decisions taking into account everything that adequate deliberation would demand. After all, in the purest sense lawyers are counselors, and counselors are supposed to provide thoughtful, considered advice. The resulting stresses between the speed of service allowable due to technological expertise and the need for informed – rather than snap – decisions, can be incredibly debilitating over time to a service provider.

This is not, however, a piece about this type of stress. I am hardly the first one to mention it in print, as articles on the subject have become prevalent since at least the mid-1980′s when people began to notice and comment upon the phenomenon. I can no longer effectively argue against this reality of our world; I can only seek ways to insert reflection and deliberation into a process which is basically inhospitable to their involvement.

Instead, this piece is about something else that I have begun to notice which may well be one of the inevitable outcomes of a generation of technology-enabled, snap judgments employed on a society-wide basis. I offer these comments with some hesitation since I don’t have anything more than a feeling that my comments are correct. I leave it to others who may agree with the premise to perform the necessary research to substantiate these propositions.

What I have begun to focus upon is the inevitable, public commentary that immediately accompanies every published, on-line news article. While I do not generally read such commentary, I have begun to notice three things about it: its prevalence, the speed with which it is produced (it arises almost simultaneously with the news story publication), and the virulence and vehemence of its content. I am truly amazed at the speed with which the general public arrives at an unshakable opinion about the truth or untruth of a given news story, and the absolute ferocity with which these opinions are defended or advanced.

I start with the proposition that no one who reacts so quickly to a matter about which he or she cannot have any first hand information can possibly have deliberated over the facts presented before publishing a post. It simply isn’t possible that someone posting an opinionated response within minutes of a news story’s first publication can have spent any significant time in reflection about the story’s accuracy or meaning. Clearly, those posting in this time frame are simply making the story fit within the framework of their preconceived viewpoint, rather than offering a considered judgment about the facts – in other words, they are responding to the story using their basic prejudices, rather than taking any time to think. And then the “fun” begins.

The “fun” often consists of pages upon pages of postings, all arguing with one another over the worth of their respective opinions – or, to be more correct, over the lack of worth of everyone’s opinion but one’s own. The actual subject matter of the news story frequently becomes lost in the discussion and, in many cases, becomes irrelevant to the discussion itself. Name calling abounds, often in the rudest imaginable language with peculiarly personal attacks against people the author has never met.

The media encourages this behavior, both by making the postings possible and actively encouraging the resulting commentary, and by posting instant polls asking people to “vote” on some subject they believe will catch the general interest. It should be noted that this form of “voting” is simply a shorthand way of posting one’s opinion – it removes the need to use words in the posted commentary sections by letting people simply push a yes or no button. In other words, the resulting “voting” is nothing more than a compact version of the wordy commentary – opinion reduced to a single word generated by the click of a mouse. The practice seems even more pernicious in prospect from the standpoint of deliberational thinking, since the question’s framer defines the issues to be voted on (i.e., discussed) rather than leaving the subject for discussion to the imagination (or prejudices) of the posters.

What is more significant from my viewpoint is that this behavior is becoming increasingly viewed as appropriate. It may, in fact, have already become the norm. I arrive at this conclusion by noting the lack of published argument or commentary about the extent of its usage. As societies change, it is usually true that behavior which is gaining ground from the standpoint of respectability is at first decried early on its way to becoming the societal norm. At some point in its evolution, people stop arguing against its rise and it becomes, with time, acceptable behavior and, finally, the only appropriate behavior. While we still seem to be at the stage where there is some argument over instant commentary, the argument focuses more and more upon the ethics and manners of the practice rather than on the efficacy or utility of the practice itself.

What does this mean for human society? The so-called “commentary” posted with respect to on-line news stories is not my real concern, but is, rather, the most evident, measurable manifestation of that concern. What I worry about is the ability of upcoming generations to make informed, considered, thoughtful decisions about complex social matters in an environment where snap judgments are the norm. As the speed of decision making increases, will society respect and appreciate, or even accept, the ruminations of those who retain the art of pondering the meaning of those decisions? And even if they are accorded such respect, will the results of their deliberations be useless in an environment where irrevocable decisions are made in a matter of moments in accordance with prevailing custom?

Take the recent public squabble over the time it took President Obama to arrive at a “new” Afghanistan policy. He took the time to arrive at strategy and the public and his rival politicians could not understand his methods or the accompanying delay. The public complaints over the time it took (a matter of two to three months on the whole) were news in and of themselves, since, to his critics, the decision was obvious and thinking about it was simply a complete waste of time and denigrating to our troops.

Admittedly, this may not be the best example I could use, since the resultant decision could well have been made in moments given the staleness of the thought it represents – it was nothing more than recycled Bush era thinking that left us with nothing new or useful. Nonetheless, I give the President credit for resisting the public demand for instantaneous decision making, even if his decision, in the end, was, to me, profoundly disappointing and lacking in perception.

My overriding fear is that we may well be headed for an era of generally poor decision making brought on by popular impatience with the art of deliberation and reflection. We could easily arrive at what I might term “pachinko ball decision making” – decision making by reaction to a chain of choices where each single opportunity of choice is defined solely by the decision made with respect to the previous choice. Contrast this notion with choices taken in accordance with an overall, pre-existing strategic plan with established goals – decisions made with the use of an existing measuring stick.

In order to avoid decisional disasters arising out of our increasing need for immediate results, governments can do two things – learn to anticipate and contemplate issues before they come to prominence and hire folks of common sense to make decisions as such issues come to public prominence. I can foresee the use of governmental think tanks charged with anticipating issues and providing advance analysis and deliberation for the subsequent use by politicians who must react immediately when such issues finally achieve prominence. While it is highly unlikely that governmental budgets will stretch to think tanks whose product might or might not be used at some future time, I see no other way to provide needed deliberation in the face of increasing impatience over “delayed” decisions.

As for hiring – or electing – folks with common sense to make decisions, I have probably come full circle to my hiring suggestion to my colleagues at my law firm. I can imagine only one, real-time antidote to poor decision making made in the context of needed immediacy, and that is to have the decisions made by persons possessing abundant common sense. Mind you, I am not hopeful for this solution, since my belief is that only a very small percentage of people have any significant amount of common sense, and those that possess significant amounts of this commodity will likely realize that putting themselves in a position where they are forced to make hurried decisions without adequate reflection is a losing, long-term proposition.

I anticipate charges of elitism being levelled against me as a result of this proposition, but I am not concerned about such charges. Perhaps I am an elitist at heart, since I fully believe that some few are far better at decision making than the bulk of the population and that those few should be given the burden of doing so. This is hardly a new belief, since this notion can be traced to the ancient Greeks and beyond, but the need for such an elite group may well be more important now than at any previous time in recorded human history.

As has always been the case, the problem remains the methodology by which we are to select those that should govern. Can western notions of democracy prevail in a coming age where the voting public is trained by, and inured to, snap judgment-making by the very technology generally employed in our educational institutions and in the work place? I predict that this will be the primary challenge faced by future generations of Americans. If future generations are going to solve this challenge, the present generation must first acknowledge its existence, define the scope of the challenge and offer it up on the alter of public commentary.

And so it seems that there is really nothing terribly new under the sun, except, perhaps, for the present speed at which humanity is careening from significant choice to significant choice. I can only hope that we have not yet exceeded the capacity of our restraining rails to hold in check the resulting centrifugal force.