Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Good one, linear thinking, confirmation bias wired in, seduces our lazy brains .. from yours which i had replied to ..

Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds .. bit ..

One way to look at science is as a system that corrects for people’s natural inclinations. In a well-run laboratory, there’s no room for myside bias; the results have to be reproducible in other laboratories, by researchers who have no motive to confirm them. And this, it could be argued, is why the system has proved so successful. At any given moment, a field may be dominated by squabbles, but, in the end, the methodology prevails. Science moves forward, even as we remain stuck in place.

In “Denying to the Grave: Why We Ignore the Facts That Will Save Us [ https://www.amazon.com/Denying-Grave-Ignore-Facts-That/dp/0199396604 ]” (Oxford), Jack Gorman, a psychiatrist, and his daughter, Sara Gorman, a public-health specialist, probe the gap between what science tells us and what we tell ourselves. Their concern is with those persistent beliefs which are not just demonstrably false but also potentially deadly, like the conviction that vaccines are hazardous. Of course, what’s hazardous is not being vaccinated; that’s why vaccines were created in the first place. “Immunization is one of the triumphs of modern medicine,” the Gormans note. But no matter how many scientific studies conclude that vaccines are safe, and that there’s no link between immunizations and autism, anti-vaxxers remain unmoved. (They can now count on their side—sort of—Donald Trump, who has said that, although he and his wife had their son, Barron, vaccinated, they refused to do so on the timetable recommended by pediatricians.)

The Gormans, too, argue that ways of thinking that now seem self-destructive must at some point have been adaptive. And they, too, dedicate many pages to confirmation bias, which, they claim, has a physiological component. They cite research suggesting that people experience genuine pleasure—a rush of dopamine—when processing information that supports their beliefs. “It feels good to ‘stick to our guns’ even if we are wrong,” they observe.

The Gormans don’t just want to catalogue the ways we go wrong; they want to correct for them. There must be some way, they maintain, to convince people that vaccines are good for kids, and handguns are dangerous. (Another widespread but statistically insupportable belief they’d like to discredit is that owning a gun makes you safer.) But here they encounter the very problems they have enumerated. Providing people with accurate information doesn’t seem to help; they simply discount it. Appealing to their emotions may work better, but doing so is obviously antithetical to the goal of promoting sound science. “The challenge that remains,” they write toward the end of their book, “is to figure out how to address the tendencies that lead to false scientific belief.”

“The Enigma of Reason,” “The Knowledge Illusion,” and “Denying to the Grave” were all written before the November election. And yet they anticipate Kellyanne Conway and the rise of “alternative facts.” These days, it can feel as if the entire country has been given over to a vast psychological experiment being run either by no one or by Steve Bannon. Rational agents would be able to think their way to a solution. But, on this matter, the literature is not reassuring. .. http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=129013333

and from the one you just brought back

The Biological Roots of Conspiracy Theories .. bit ..

So how could educated college students be so dumb? It is because all of us, educated and less so, have lazy brains. No, this is not an indictment of the human brain; it was wired so for a good reason. We think on two tracks: a fast, intuitive one (system 1 according to Daniel Kahneman) and a slow, analytical one (system 2). We form our first judgement almost instantaneously (measured in milliseconds), based on impressions, familiar patterns, biases. If this system “feels” satisfied -no more action needed. If it needs some confirmation from system 2, it will present its case in a form that minimizes the need for deep analysis -purely an energy and cost saving gambit. Only when the case clashes violently with reality (“Rush Limbaugh said that the Democrats will make the sun plunge into the ocean and never come up again”) does system 2 take charge and overrules Rush. You don’t have to be an ignoramus to fall into the trap of linear reasoning (“Obama is black, his father is a Kenyan Moslem, so he is a black, Kenyan-born Moslem”). Many a brilliant scientist succumb to the temptation of “it makes sense” with not a shred of empirical evidence to back up their belief. Vitamin C is an antioxidant, inflammation causes release of oxygen radicals, hence mega doses of vitamin C should suppress common cold symptoms. Remember that? Clinical evidence showed later that high-dose vitamin C, if anything exacerbates the symptoms. Did Linus Pauling, a Nobel prize winner, change his mind? Not to his last day.

Why should natural selection tolerate such a manifestly dysfunctional system? Because it is useful for survival. If you perceived a movement in the grass and stopped to analyze it -you wouldn’t survive the day. You react to pattern recognition (movement in the grass), biases (“every time I got away whether or not there was a snake, I stayed alive”) and stored memories (“papa was screaming in agony because he didn’t get away in time”). This is your system 1 in action, keeping you alive. It was not designed to vet demagogues, to analyze claims, to think statistically; that would simply take too much time and consume too much neuronal energy.

Herein lies the problem of modern society. Charlatans, demagogues, politicians, and conspiracy theorists exploit this biological vulnerability to hoodwink the populace. Is it a mere coincidence that the same politicians who peddle falsehoods also cut the funds for education? Is it just a random occurrence that the same people who purport to commune with God before making a “Christian” decision also prohibit the inclusion of critical-thinking courses in schools?

But now I am straying into conspiracy theory territory myself. And yet… paranoids do have enemies, don’t they?
.. the link you brought back .. http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=104923647

Good one.