Beliefs Conform To Cultural Identities

DallasMay writes "This article describes an experiment that demonstrates that people don't put as much weight on facts as they do their own belief about how the world is supposed to work. From the article: 'In one experiment, Braman queried subjects about something unfamiliar to them: nanotechnology — new research into tiny, molecule-sized objects that could lead to novel products. "These two groups start to polarize as soon as you start to describe some of the potential benefits and harms," Braman says. The individualists tended to like nanotechnology. The communitarians generally viewed it as dangerous. Both groups made their decisions based on the same information. "It doesn't matter whether you show them negative or positive information, they reject the information that is contrary to what they would like to believe, and they glom onto the positive information," Braman says.'"

Comments

Re:One needs to look no further than religion

[Anonymous Coward]

ur a moron. who tha fuck can read latin in this day and age besides fucking bible thumpers. go fuck a nun, dooshbag.

Re:A partial solution:

[Anonymous Coward]

i ismed on your girlfriends fringe.

Re:A partial solution:

[Eli Gottlieb]

Funny, because to me those don't sound like the trappings of a religion at all -- just like the trappings of an angry atheist's strawman of religion.

Re:A partial solution:

[madcow_bg]

Yes, he's 99% right.

Quit trolling.