Those Opposed To Scientific Consensus Bolstered By 'Illusion of Knowledge' (edmontonjournal.com)

The Edmonton Journal reports: Recently, researchers asked more than 2,000 American and European adults their thoughts about genetically modified foods. They also asked them how much they thought they understood about GM foods, and a series of 15 true-false questions to test how much they actually knew about genetics and science in general. The researchers were interested in studying a perverse human phenomenon: People tend to be lousy judges of how much they know. Across four studies conducted in three countries -- the U.S., France and Germany -- the researchers found that extreme opponents of genetically modified foods "display a lack of insight into how much they know." They know the least, but think they know the most. "The less people know," the authors conclude, "the more opposed they are to the scientific consensus."

Science communicators have made concerted efforts to educate the public with an eye to bringing their attitudes in line with the experts," they write in the journal Nature Human Behaviour. But people with an inflated sense of what they actually know -- and most in need of education -- are also the ones least likely to be open to new information.... Extreme views often come along with not appreciating the complexity of the subject -- "not realizing how much there is to know," said Philip Fernbach, lead author of the new study and a professor of marketing at the University of Colorado Boulder. "People who don't know very much think they know a lot, and that is the basis for their extreme views."
Slashdot reader Layzej links to Rational Wiki's article on "The Backfire Effect," to illustrate Fernbach's observation that "People double down on their 'counter-scientific consensus attitudes'.

"Epecially when people feel threatened or if they are being treated as if they are stupid."

Comments

Not asking the right questions

[Anonymous Coward]

As much as I welcome this study, it didn't really ask the right questions and unfortunately kind of insinuates that knowledge of GM technology is the most important factor in judging whether GM food should be allowed. That's not true in general, my arguments against GM food have almost nothing to do with the way the genetic modifications work or with direct environmental impacts, they are political and philosophical. I'm pretty sure others have similar doubts.

The philosophical argument is a bit complex, involving several steps and premises. First, there is not much doubt that in the far future humans will drastically modify species including their own, given that almost every technology that has ever been invented has been used. Second, nevertheless it seems possible to kind of limit the impact of technologies, as for example the bans against nuclear proliferation show. Not every nation has nuclear weapons -- at least not yet, and that seems a good thing. Third, the larger the possible negative and positive long-term consequences of new technologies, the more you will need to err on the side of caution. (Technically, this could mean that you should use possibility theory instead of Expected Utility principles, for example.) Fourth, the more a technology is accepted and used in a society for one purpose, the more likely it will also be accepted and used for other purposes. Once GM food is ubiquitous, maybe animals will be modified next, and then humans, and so forth. I'm not claiming that there is an inevitable slippery slope, but some caution seems advisable. Fifth, human history has shown so far that humans are incapable of judging the very long-term impacts of technologies correctly. Both the net positive and net negative effects are blatantly misjudged once we're talking about time spans of 100-200 years. If you combine all those points, especially the third and fifth, then it seems that not being too liberal about GM technology and thinking this through in a bit more detail could be advisable. You certainly don't only want geneticists specializing in GM food in your expert panels for evaluating the technology. At the very least, we should perhaps delay or restrict technologies with a potential to have a high impact on the ecological system in the light of point five and point four. Again, the claim is not that a slippery slope is inevitable, but point five is still something to take into account. It's naive and irresponsible to make this a debate about "GM food" only.

The political point is simpler. The corporations who most fervently lobby for GM food have a proven history of not necessarily having the best interests of their consumers in mind, neither the interests of farmers nor those of end consumers, and have in the past been involved in all kinds of shady business about pesticides, seeds that make farmers dependent on the company, aggressive lawsuits against customers and aggressive patent policies, and so on. They also are lobbying very intensively against labelling GM food, even though there is almost no sane reason against such a requirements. In fact, their attempts to explain this rationale are mostly ridiculous despite the fact that they spend so much money on P&R. For example, they frequently argue that "there is not enough space on the packaging". In reality, their motivations are purely economical, they want to ensure that in mass production GM modified and non-GM-modified resources can be freely mixed in order to save costs. This is only a benefit to large food corporations, of course, who destroy smaller farmers and companies by sheer numbers. Irrespectively of the more philosophical worries, this alone should give you reason to think twice. Do you want no mandatory labelling, no free consumer choice, and instead laws that favour large corporations with a shady past? Do you wish to support Nestle and Bayer instead of local farming? Then maybe you should politically support GM food. If not, if you think that large food corporations are not necessarily the best choice for consumers