The Science of Why We Don't Believe Science

[marmar]

from Mother Jones:




The Science of Why We Don't Believe Science
How our brains fool us on climate, creationism, and the vaccine-autism link.

— By Chris Mooney


"A MAN WITH A CONVICTION is a hard man to change. Tell him you disagree and he turns away. Show him facts or figures and he questions your sources. Appeal to logic and he fails to see your point." So wrote the celebrated Stanford University psychologist Leon Festinger (PDF), in a passage that might have been referring to climate change denial—the persistent rejection, on the part of so many Americans today, of what we know about global warming and its human causes. But it was too early for that—this was the 1950s—and Festinger was actually describing a famous case study in psychology.

Festinger and several of his colleagues had infiltrated the Seekers, a small Chicago-area cult whose members thought they were communicating with aliens—including one, "Sananda," who they believed was the astral incarnation of Jesus Christ. The group was led by Dorothy Martin, a Dianetics devotee who transcribed the interstellar messages through automatic writing.

Through her, the aliens had given the precise date of an Earth-rending cataclysm: December 21, 1954. Some of Martin's followers quit their jobs and sold their property, expecting to be rescued by a flying saucer when the continent split asunder and a new sea swallowed much of the United States. The disciples even went so far as to remove brassieres and rip zippers out of their trousers—the metal, they believed, would pose a danger on the spacecraft.

Festinger and his team were with the cult when the prophecy failed. First, the "boys upstairs" (as the aliens were sometimes called) did not show up and rescue the Seekers. Then December 21 arrived without incident. It was the moment Festinger had been waiting for: How would people so emotionally invested in a belief system react, now that it had been soundly refuted? ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/03/denial-science-chris-mooney

[Kurmudgeon]

1. Of course you've got to believe Science!

How else are we to understand God's Creation! ;)

[baldguy]

2. Could be about climate-change denial - or about the supply-side cult

Or about any of the RW's Big Ideas.

[shraby]

3. Plus quite about 15 years or more of fake studies and bogus

drug testing by the pharmaceuticals tend to make one leery of any results. Now the bad science is taking its toll on truth in medicines especially.

[sendero]

4. Exactly.

... just because I believe in science doesn't mean I believe in biased "studies" with a pre-arranged conclusion. And it's getting to be impossible to tell those from everything else.

[Confusious]

5. The thing is

what if there' a study with no pre-arranged conclusion that you disagree with?

[sendero]

17. It depends...

.. on whether I know anything about the subject or not.

For instance, I can't tell you how many time "medical science" is just plain wrong, and they've reversed themselves so many times on so many issues I'm skeptical of anything I read in that field at this time. TOO MUCH MONEY - THE MORE MONEY THE MORE LIKELY SKEWED RESULTS.

There was a time when drugs released to the market were safe. Not any more. THAT is junk science in action.

There is less of these shenanigans going on in the "hard" sciences.

[AlbertCat]

22. There was a time when drugs released to the market were safe.

WHEN was that?

When they decided in 1906 that cocaine shouldn't be given to children?

Or 1961, when they got rid of Thalidomide?

or...?

or...?



Still, I know what you mean. Things were tested like crazy and they didn't make up diseases (Restless Leg Syndrome, anyone) so they could cure it with a pill. Anna Nicole and Heath didn't dies from illegal drugs, y'know.

[Confusious]

23. Anna Nicole and Heath

So you're blaming the pharma companies for their deaths? Every time I get a pain killer it comes with a warning. It's not their fault if you ignore it. Safe is always relative.

Water is "safe" unless you drink to much of it. Or try to breathe it.

Car manufacturers don't explicitly say "Don't drive your care into a pole" we all have to take a little responsibility for our choices.

Oh, and I have Restless Leg Syndrome, even though I think taking drugs for it is bull. Wacking off fixes it.

[Buzz Clik]

7. We get it at DU, too.

Example: the repeated hysterical claim that all radioactivity is deadly. It starts with an excellent scientist saying that all radiation has the potential to induce cancer. However, he either doesn't say or he's ignored when he says that the probability of getting cancer from a single radioactive atom (exposure to a single particle or one photon of EM radiation) is very, very small. It is generally ignored that we are bombarded by natural radioactivity every day and that one must be exposed many many orders of magnitude more radiation than that to have a 1 in a million chance of suffering any ill effects.

It's frustrating no matter who is spouting bad science.

[Posteritatis]

9. It's a politically agnostic thing; there's some fanatically anti-science people here, too. (nt)

[baldguy]

11. Most progressives don't consciously use anti-science rhetoric to support their political positions.

And science denial doesn't form any part of the Democratic Party platform.

[Posteritatis]

12. You must be new here. (nt)

[Odin2005]

20. Check the woo-shit in the Health forum.

[Confusious]

24. Ha!

You forgot the sarcasm tag. Good one!

[Odin2005]

19. Or alternative "medicine"

[Confusious]

6. Interesting

I've met more then one of those people on this board.

[Turbineguy]

8. Very Interesting.

Maybe this should be cross posted to the Environment/Energy section.

[MineralMan]

10. Woo is easier than science. You don't even have to think about it.

That's why folks like woo.

Here...look at this...Don't pay for expensive drugs with all those side effects! Try this all-natural dietary supplement instead. It's better. ONLY $19.95, plus 12.57 shipping and handling. It'll cure whatever ails you and save you tons of money besides. Avoid doctors and their ties to the horrible pharmaceutical industry. They're bad. We're good, and we're natural.


See. It's a no-brainer...literally. No complicated labels to understand. No trip to that expensive doctor. It just has to be the right thing, right?

[QED]

13. Exactly.

My neighbors, dear sweet people, fall for this all the time. I just cringe when I see them spending hundreds of $$$ at the vitamin store for questionable cure-alls.

[Posteritatis]

14. It's less "not have to think about it" and more "have to not think about it." (nt)

[MineralMan]

15. Sure. A corollary statement.

Either way, little thought is involved, and none is expected by the purveyors of woo of all types.

[CanSocDem]

26. "Our beliefs"...

from the link:

They include "confirmation bias," in which we give greater heed to evidence and arguments that bolster our beliefs, and "disconfirmation bias," in which we expend disproportionate energy trying to debunk or refute views and arguments that we find uncongenial.


.

[Kurovski]

16. This is nonsense.

I have a lucky penny that makes everything happen.

[Puzzler]

18. Maybe anti science people would like to dump their laptops, cellphones, TVs etc....

It seems more than a bit hypocritical when many anti-science people actually use the internet to post their beliefs... when, in fact, a huge amount of science/research/development was needed to develop the technology that they use daily.

[Confusious]

25. it's only specific science

medical, for the most part. If pine cones make them feel good, then that's the cure.

Medical science = every other science (If one science is false, they are all false, since they all use the same methods) doesn't translate

[dembotoz]

21. interesting article

when i was in school--long time ago
alot of what this article was about could have been explained by the theory of cognitve dissonance.
i printed the article.