Furthermore, all of the world's most intractable problems are basically marketing problems. For global warming, world hunger, malaria, water shortages, fisheries depletion, etc., we already have the solutions.
I agree, those are basically marketing problems — they are created by marketing. The problem is that marketing, which is where you try to persuade someone of something because it will benefit you personally, regardless of its truth, is fundamentally corrosive to the kind of disinterested investigation of the truth that we need in order to collectively solve these problems.
You could as easily say that these are violence problems: it's just a matter of getting really talented soldiers to kill the people who are opposing the solutions. The trouble is that there's no correlation between the correctness of a person's point of view on how to solve world hunger and their skill at violence, so generally speaking, increasing the level of violence doesn't improve the level of competence in social, economic, and agricultural policy. (I guess it might solve the water shortage problem in a different way, though, sort of like you can lower the rate of heart disease by administering carcinogens.)
Similarly, there's no positive correlation between the correctness of one's opinion and one's skill at marketing. I think you can make the argument that there's a negative correlation: people whose opinions are tentative and based on evidence are not nearly as confident as a good marketer needs to be.
I agree, those are basically marketing problems — they are created by marketing. The problem is that marketing, which is where you try to persuade someone of something because it will benefit you personally, regardless of its truth, is fundamentally corrosive to the kind of disinterested investigation of the truth that we need in order to collectively solve these problems.
You could as easily say that these are violence problems: it's just a matter of getting really talented soldiers to kill the people who are opposing the solutions. The trouble is that there's no correlation between the correctness of a person's point of view on how to solve world hunger and their skill at violence, so generally speaking, increasing the level of violence doesn't improve the level of competence in social, economic, and agricultural policy. (I guess it might solve the water shortage problem in a different way, though, sort of like you can lower the rate of heart disease by administering carcinogens.)
Similarly, there's no positive correlation between the correctness of one's opinion and one's skill at marketing. I think you can make the argument that there's a negative correlation: people whose opinions are tentative and based on evidence are not nearly as confident as a good marketer needs to be.