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Comment by huijzer | Hacker News Reader

Also related to the ending, I‘ve come to realise more and more that most people reason out of belief first and arguments second on a lot of things (maybe most things?) Climate change deniers are an obvious example. But also more nuanced views such as "the software I make makes the world a better place" (I belief this myself), "me being a healthcare worker is a great thing for humanity", or "I need to game at least once a week to relax." And it makes sense. Many things are extremely complex and so picking one side and going for that will make sense in many cases. It’s often necessary to be able to make decisions. However, the risk is getting too stuck in certain ideas. It’s easier to accept a long held belief and reject opposing information than to re-evaluate.

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Professional deniers are propagandists, not good-faith debaters. Lack of nuance is one problem, but there's a far bigger problem with groups of people knowingly trying to poison and undermine anything that resembles reality-based consensus.

Absolutely - PR firms, lobbyists, astroturfers, troll farms - I'm in full agreement, and there's a lot of them around.

Also a problem are those who label the undecided or free thinking among us as not being good faith actors. And unfortunately it's a tough position to be in, as you get attacked from all sides for not choosing a side.

"reality-based" and "consensus" is an interesting combo, in general but particularly if one considers the history of consensus of "reality".

For some reason this really speaks to me.

I think it's because we create a story about every part of us and our life. Every thing we do (sometimes we even do it after the fact).

I feel like those beliefs are what's keeping us grounded in the sense of understanding the world, of being in control. so it makes sense that we would start with them even if we are not aware of it.

And it makes sense that it's hard to let them go because without them you get a sense that you are just floating away and don't have any to "hang" your assumptions on.

You can reason a lot but there comes a point when things get bigger than you and you have to trust some other authority or just trust your gut.

There's not many people that could comfortably reason from first principles and be satisfied with where they end up. (I don't think I could do that)

> Also related to the ending, I‘ve come to realise more and more that most people reason out of belief first and arguments second on a lot of things (maybe most things?)

This is the thesis to the introduction to Jonathan Haidt's The Righteous Mind. Boiling it down, he argues that self-justification is the most fundamental human reaction. We reason after, not before, and our reasoning flows to align with our own justification.

(Luther would be proud.)

> I‘ve come to realise more and more that most people reason out of belief first and arguments second on a lot of things (maybe most things?) Climate change deniers are an obvious example

Do you think most climate change believers reasoned themselves into that position? I think for >95% of people, belief in climate change is a purely social phenomenon. The overwhelming majority of people don't understand enough about physical phenomena like blackbody radiation to have any intelligent opinion about climate change one way or the other.

I do not think that. This similarly applies to both sides of some other contentious scientific/medical topics which can easily get someone labeled an “antivaxxer” as an ad-hominem directed without solid reasoning. One imagines what labels were given to those who did not support widespread leech therapy at its peak…

The untrue explanations are often the simpler ones. They are easier for people to "understand" even if they are wrong. And people don't like to be perceived as dumb, therefore they keep on arguing that they are right.

Example: Flat Earth. The horizon looks flat, therefore the Earth must be flat.

This book touches on similar ideas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scout_Mindset

> belief first and arguments second on a lot of things

"support rather than illumination"

Lossy compression.

Actually correct take: You cannot slow down climate change without mass depopulation, and most climate change alarmism is overhyped. It will impose a cost to civilization and it will have to be dealt with by adapting to it, rather than some inane scheme to create carbon tax credits to justify more ways for the hyper-wealthy to stay wealthy.

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