By Paul Monk, in The Australian
Today is federal election day. I assume almost everyone reading this piece will be voting. In Australia, such voting is compulsory. In the US its voluntary. Opinions differ about which system is better. But suppose someone were to say to you, You have a moral obligation to not vote. How would you respond I suspect with puzzlement, perhaps cynical amusement. You might assume they meant that not voting would be a form of protest of some kind.
Suppose, however, that you were told in addition, “You shouldn’t vote because you are not competent to vote.” I suspect your puzzlement would turn to indignation. Such indignation might be warranted. But it also might be due to the Dunning-Kruger effect: a cognitive bias in which we mistakenly assess our cognitive ability as greater than it is. It comes from a common inability to recognise our actual lack of ability.
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