5 thoughts on “SHARED: “The Most Depressing Discovery About the Brain, Ever” – Marty Kaplan.”
“Media literacy” is bullshit since the media is one of the primary source of misinformation and trite nowadays. Though I agree that politics has an adverse effect to people’s rationality which was proven time and time again by elections. So, it’s not really necessary to have that research to prove that point.
Likewise, his is actually pretty similar of Einstein said that chauvinism (too much patriotism) is the root of many great conflicts.
The results are quite interesting, but I wonder what it really means. First, the idea that people shown stories of WMD’s in Iraq being less willing to accept the “correct” story when the opposite was reported is an example of a case where, if one accepts the media is promulgating falsehoods, then neither statement is necessarily correct. So, it leaves an ambiguous state, and many people will simply resist the notion they were lied to or tricked to preserve their sense of being right, or will view the correction as an effort to trick them. The background for this is the experience many people have had of being deceived at some point in their lives, and the way this results in our applying this distrust preferentially when there is otherwise no basis for decision-making.
I’m not sure about the math example with the skin care and the gun control, but here again I think people are smart enough to see that the numbers are stacking up against their values, and will resist drawing those conclusions. I agree with that. I don’t think it is exclusively an irrational reaction, however. Most of us have had the experience that simple graphs and tables are quite often “cherry-picked” constructions that ignore all sorts of underlying trends and realizations. We’ve all been duped at one point or another. When one has had a direct experience on a personal level that conflicts with some data set, it is natural to question the data and in fact I daresay a great many scientific advances have hinged upon questioning the validity of data sets. Questioning the data is as rational as it is irrational… Not to dismiss the comparison between skin care and gun control, and the emotional interception of reason that was noted to occur…
We are definitely irrational beings. This is obvious. I think we must accept this at some level… We are not merely computers, but beings with hearts, minds, opinions and emotions. I think a significant factor not reviewed is the manner in which the overlay of fear and prejudice upon our heart and mind result in all sorts of aberrations!
Yes. Funny, too, that those who claim to be exclusively rational often “let slip” their brains’ (heart/mind) attempts to rationalize (which is, perhaps you’ll agree, very different from behaving rationally), by arguing to defend the positions they allegedly uphold, only to clam up in other ways, unable to express what I like to call “authentic” personality. They don’t seem to allow their bodies certain natural reactions, like crying, whereas they do allow laughter merely because they cannot suppress laughter. Maybe I’m off the path, here, but perhaps not; in short, the key word is your final one: aberrations. These manifest, because the individual cannot prevent them from doing so – and, they are the evidence.
p.s. to the above comment: Fear; Desire; Greed; Compulsion; every emotion known to humankind has the capacity to override predetermined intent. Any one of these emotions can overtake a person. I see it in myself every day, and in others much of the time. Some HIDE the emotional reaction, but this doesn’t mean that the emotion is not present and affecting. I’d love to see a follow up study factoring in emotional response to alleged beliefs, whether political or religious/moral-ethical.
littlebarefeetblog 
“Media literacy” is bullshit since the media is one of the primary source of misinformation and trite nowadays. Though I agree that politics has an adverse effect to people’s rationality which was proven time and time again by elections. So, it’s not really necessary to have that research to prove that point.
Likewise, his is actually pretty similar of Einstein said that chauvinism (too much patriotism) is the root of many great conflicts.
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Sorry about those typos, my tablet seems to go crazy again…
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The results are quite interesting, but I wonder what it really means. First, the idea that people shown stories of WMD’s in Iraq being less willing to accept the “correct” story when the opposite was reported is an example of a case where, if one accepts the media is promulgating falsehoods, then neither statement is necessarily correct. So, it leaves an ambiguous state, and many people will simply resist the notion they were lied to or tricked to preserve their sense of being right, or will view the correction as an effort to trick them. The background for this is the experience many people have had of being deceived at some point in their lives, and the way this results in our applying this distrust preferentially when there is otherwise no basis for decision-making.
I’m not sure about the math example with the skin care and the gun control, but here again I think people are smart enough to see that the numbers are stacking up against their values, and will resist drawing those conclusions. I agree with that. I don’t think it is exclusively an irrational reaction, however. Most of us have had the experience that simple graphs and tables are quite often “cherry-picked” constructions that ignore all sorts of underlying trends and realizations. We’ve all been duped at one point or another. When one has had a direct experience on a personal level that conflicts with some data set, it is natural to question the data and in fact I daresay a great many scientific advances have hinged upon questioning the validity of data sets. Questioning the data is as rational as it is irrational… Not to dismiss the comparison between skin care and gun control, and the emotional interception of reason that was noted to occur…
We are definitely irrational beings. This is obvious. I think we must accept this at some level… We are not merely computers, but beings with hearts, minds, opinions and emotions. I think a significant factor not reviewed is the manner in which the overlay of fear and prejudice upon our heart and mind result in all sorts of aberrations!
Michael
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Yes. Funny, too, that those who claim to be exclusively rational often “let slip” their brains’ (heart/mind) attempts to rationalize (which is, perhaps you’ll agree, very different from behaving rationally), by arguing to defend the positions they allegedly uphold, only to clam up in other ways, unable to express what I like to call “authentic” personality. They don’t seem to allow their bodies certain natural reactions, like crying, whereas they do allow laughter merely because they cannot suppress laughter. Maybe I’m off the path, here, but perhaps not; in short, the key word is your final one: aberrations. These manifest, because the individual cannot prevent them from doing so – and, they are the evidence.
LikeLiked by 1 person
p.s. to the above comment: Fear; Desire; Greed; Compulsion; every emotion known to humankind has the capacity to override predetermined intent. Any one of these emotions can overtake a person. I see it in myself every day, and in others much of the time. Some HIDE the emotional reaction, but this doesn’t mean that the emotion is not present and affecting. I’d love to see a follow up study factoring in emotional response to alleged beliefs, whether political or religious/moral-ethical.
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