How'zat for psychology?

How should one form one's opinion? I'd refer to my post on how the Scholastics did that in the Middle Ages (so dark!), but because you are a lazy lot (don't take it personally: it's a fine human characteristic which keeps us out of some troubles at times (but alas into others as well), but here's the gist again: 1. pose (formulate) the question, 2. list the arguments from both sides (for and against), 3. weigh both sides for the outcome, 4. are there any possible objections to the outcome which must taken into consideration (or maybe re-think steps 2. and 3.).
So here's how people of Reason do it. But most of us, being (increasingly) unreasonable, sit for the box at night and let things "come over us", as it were. Seeing for example bleeding, crying children and hysterical women we conclude something terrible must have been done to them. We just made an opinion. We skipped however steps 1., 2. and 3. We reacted spontaneously, on basis of the emotions of seeing those women and children. We didn't formulate the question (what is going on here?) and we didn't list or weigh the arguments; it could for example very well be that they were indeed a bunch (or is it a flock) of angels, OR that a day earlier they did the same to another group of people, OR they stoned an innocent woman to death who had the misfortune of having dishonoured her family by getting raped by the Dutch uncle, OR they even might have been plotting to throw a bomb on YOU. Now that would make a difference, wouldn't it?
Let's face it, most of us form our opinions in the latter way and pick up a few arguments here and there when we have to defend our position in the unlikely event we meet someone with an opinion of his own. Let's try do it more like St. Thomas in future, and the world will become a better place. Trust me ...

On quite another note (I'll not even try to pretend there is a bridge), here's for the interior decorators amongst us (twins, pay attention!): aware of the organization 1stdibs.com? They carry a line of lovely antiques which is sold over the Internet, but they do have physical locations allover: Paris, New York, Miami, etc. There's a free monthly (?) newsletter available to keep you updated. Here's the link: http://www.1stdibs.com/search.php

Don't want to let you go without the flour of this morning's news items:
- Cleric 'meat' remarks spark fury ... Gist: if you're not wearing a bag over your head, you're asking for it!): http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/10/26/australia.cleric.ap/index.html

I told you (or didn't I) that the world is in reverse! But in the midst of all that, there are also sparks of hope, of people swimming against the tide of political correctness, that bane of our time (just after relativism, which is an absolute curse):
- Argentine prosecutors: Arrest former Iranian president: http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/10/25/argentina.iran.ap/index.html