How to tell if someone's politics are evidence-based, in two simple questions. [View all]

[Donald Ian Rankin]

Question 1: ask them what policies they think would be best for America (or whatever country they live in) if implemented by the government (don't worry about the electoral impact).

Question 2: ask them what policies they think would be most likely to get the party they support the most votes - set principles aside, and just come up with a platform to win.

If their answers to the two questions are the same, or indeed not significantly difference then either that's a coincidence so striking as to border on the miraculous, or they're not thinking clearly about the second question, and allowing their wishes and the answer to the first to cloud their judgement.

And it seems an awful lot of people do make that mistake.

(As a shorter way of doing this, you could just ask them to list some good but unpopular polices and some bad but popular ones; again, if they struggle, they're probably not thinking clearly).