Celebrate diversity

I thought, at first, that this story about the lack of Americans' ability to understand others was promising inthat it might induce some people to open their minds to the idea that different people come at principles in a different manner.

But reading more than a couple of references to "rugged individualism" inclines me to think that the bigots who could most use a more open mind will view their individualism as superior and regard the differences of "collectivist" societies as deserving of their contempt.

As one of the professors involved in the study suggests, "If we are aware of how we think differently, this can go a long way toward not allowing these differences to get in the way of reaching mutual understanding."

What he should have noted was that understanding the differences is not the same as appreciating them.