Even those who deny using models act on hidden assumptions and biases

Evidence

Simplified paradigms or maps are indispensable for human thought and action. On the one hand, we may explicitly formulate theories or models and consciously use them to guide our behavior. Alternatively, we may deny the need for such guides and assume that we will act only in terms of specific “objective” facts, dealing with each case “on its merits.” If we assume this, however, we delude ourselves. For in the back of our minds are hidden assumptions, biases, and prejudices that determine how we perceive reality, what facts we look at, and how we judge their importance and merits. — Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the…, 50

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the point from Deep Listening and my noise/silence reading about how perception is never neutral; also resonates with standpoint theory rejections of neutral objectivity. — connects to: The economists’ classless models concealed openly classist beliefs — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 1306
• DEEPTHINKING: A compressed statement of the anti-positivist insight that ‘just the facts’ is itself a theory — subtle and worth sitting with.