Never assume; keep an open mind

Way back when in journalism school, students were taught, never assume. You never go into a story with a preconceived notion, because sometime the facts are not what they seem.
While that is a pretty simple concept to grasp and understand as a student, over the years it becomes more and more difficult to break away from the habit of assuming you know the outcome before you have all the facts. Some might call it experience; others might call it arrogance. Placing yourself in the story is not the way to go.
There is an author that is saying our own pre-conceived ideas about how things should work is actually preventing us from fixing problems such as climate change and world hunger.
In a speech at Ottawa's Carleton University as part of the 78th Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Frances Moore Lappé called for a wholesale revamping of the way we view government, the economy and democracy. If we manage to do it, she said, we can save ourselves from our own demise.
Lappé, made famous in the 1970s by her bestselling vegetarian cookbook Diet for a Small Planet, is an activist, author and co-founder with her daughter Anna Lappé of The Small Planet Institute. She said people today fear the potential for disaster, ecological and otherwise, and remain stymied thinking there is no cure.
Of course that thinking is incorrect and Lappé said we can do something, if we challenge five assumptions about the way the world works.
The first is that going green means "powering down," or reducing our consumption of energy. Lappé said all we have to do is stop getting energy from fossil fuels and start getting it from renewable sources like the sun.
The second idea to dispense with the idea that going green means an end to economic growth. What we have to do is change our idea of what growth is, she said.
The third idea she wants to challenge is the notion humans are by nature greedy, self-centered and materialistic. Under certain conditions, humans can be monsters, she said. But there wouldn't be 6.8 billion of us on the planet today if we didn't also have positive qualities such as empathy, cooperation and fairness.
The fourth idea she disputes is that we dislike rules. She says humans crave structure, particularly rules that make sense to us as individuals and which foster a sense of inclusion.
The final concept she wants to challenge is the idea our problems are so pressing there's no time for democracy, and only an authoritarian regime can save us. She believes the only hope for the planet is to trust in people and set rules that bring out the best in us.
Hmm, trust people that bring out the best in us. Sounds like a leadership issue.
Keeping an open mind and challenging authority to ensure everyone is on the correct path. Is that doable?
Talk to me.