Quote:
Originally Posted by Tinordi
Basically what this says is that people's priors are the dominant motivator of perceiving science and public policy. That we're motivated reasoners using science to project more deeply held political ideologies and personal identities.
The 'left' is just as human as the 'right.'
More directly, what's the point? Does this make the climate debate any less important or insane? Are we to say, well look the left falls victim to basic human psychology as well so therefore my feelings on climate are justified?
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We humans are not reasoned thinkers. Our emotions are a control gate for most of our cognitive processing. Neuroscientists have been proving this for years. We are genetically wired to think in certain ways (right or left, or conservative or liberal if you will) and we are brought up to weigh issues using specific metaphors and frames. We respond positively to narratives that activate those good metaphors and negatively that activate those bad metaphors. Rationality rarely comes into play, and for good reason. These interests spend ungodly amounts of capital to frame arguments to appeal to specific metaphors which evoke emotional responses and inhibit higher brain function cognitive processing. If we are to have some well thought out discussion on either subject, we need to first eliminate all emotional rhetoric and try to find a neutral lexicon that allows people to refrain from referencing engrained metaphors and allow for some actual high level thought to take place.
I have to ask for clarification on the rest of your post as it doesn't read clearly. What point are you exactly trying to make?