Denial of Science

"Given the power of our prior beliefs to skew how we respond to new information, one thing is becoming clear: If you want someone to accept new evidence, make sure to present it to them in a context that doesn't trigger a defensive, emotional reaction."

This was a fascinating read. I've snipped out what I consider the bonus quote above because I run into it so often. If someone is engaged in an issue emotionally then having a rational discussion with them becomes problematic at best.

Here on HN we've seen the nuclear power and currency discussions which both clearly have an emotional component.

I was a bit annoyed that the article focused a bit much on the climate discussion, clearly it is the one the author has the most emotion invested in :-) I think my views on it are pretty well known so I won't bother going into that.

But that brings us to the subtext, which is that emotions interfere with reasoning. You react emotionally before you react rationally (purportedly because it made evolutionary sense to do so). On the show 'Big Bang Theory' the character Sheldon Cooper is a stereotype of a brilliant, OCD, Asberger's Syndrome scientist. That stereotype works because it seems fairly common that technologists, as a population, have a higher incidence of folks who have a difficulty emotionally interacting with other humans. It makes me wonder if this could be the mechanism by which breakthrough science and/or technology gets done.

I'm mostly going to side-step criticisms of the article (I enjoyed it), because, ironically, it will present itself as emotionally-charged to most people that read it.

Instead, if anybody's interested in trying to limit the effects of this kind of psychology in themselves, I think there's a way to do it that involves a subtle but persistent shift in your state of mind. I think I first read about it in, of all things, "How to think like Leonardo da Vinci" many years ago. The trick is to drop all of your personal desire in being right, and instead adopt a sort of state of constant curiosity. Put less effort into defending your views, and more effort into trying to learn something from everyone and everything around you.

I was a conservative Republican. Now I'm closer to a liberal (I prefer "progressive") Democrat. I used to be a climate "skeptic"; now I think the majority of the science behind the theories is solid, although there's certainly a lot of room for more research. I've flipped on some things several times; the important thing, to me, is not my opinion on them, but whether I'm still open to new information in the field. For example: I used to believe that wind farms were a subsidized waste because all of the energy costs of production and maintenance must eclipse the energy they produce, especially when half of them don't seem to be turning ever. Then I got curious at how the numbers actually worked out, and found that, in terms of EROI, they seem to be one of the most efficient sources of energy we've got. If something else comes along that presents new information, I like to think that I'll be open to re-considering my opinion on it, because mostly, I'm intensely curious about what the truth of the issue really is -- even if I never discover the "truth" about it.

It's taken me a while to change my thinking this way, and I still haven't gotten it 100%. I still can get charged-up about some things, but, much less so than I used to.

I wonder why he kept bringing up abortion. Is that a question in any sense solvable by observation, testing, etc? No more than the question of, say, legally requiring the use of child safety seats, though in an extremely opposite sense. Just pandering to his audience, I suppose. There are definitely a few beliefs liberals tend to hold dearly against all evidence, to the point that they would be unthinkable to the author and his audience.

Anyway, political questions are a subject of politics, which is a matter of power and practicality, not all-too academic truth seeking. If imposing carbon credits cuts GDP growth in half, gives vast power to international regulators, and provides Goldman Sachs with another 50 billion dollar-worth trading desk, I can put up with two extra weeks of summer.

I like how the comments (on mj.com) go off on crazy ideological tangents as if only to prove the article's point.

This article does apply greatly to HN, being a discussion board. Like the author states, I often tend to find myself reacting emotionally to arguments made. But one thing I do find that I also do is synthesize the arguments over time.

It has happened several times where I've completely flip flopped my position over the span of a week or two. It's rarely apparent in the context of a given thread, but I do try to really consider the arguments when "offline".

In politics this rarely happens as the ideology underlying the politics is usually more important than the political issue at hand. In tech though, there is a greater chance of discussion actually having real change.

I think it's interesting how many people react to the article as if it's saying "those other people use emotion rather than rational thought, we're not like them", when it actually says that reasoning and emotion are inseperable. For all of us.

Extremely well written article, though I'm not convinced it really tells anything new to someone who has had experience dealing with these sorts of people.