When evidence backfires

[Perspicuo]

Neurobonkers Blog: When Evidence Backfires
http://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/when-evidence-backfires

Don't read this blog post. Definitely don't read it to the end. Didn't I tell you not to read this blog post? You're still doing it... We can laugh at our inherent ability to be contrary, but unfortunately something similar can happen when we give a human being scientific evidence that debunks misinformation. One of the most depressing paradoxes of science communication is that not only can misinformation often spread faster and wider than the truth (just take the ubersuccessful but often not so factual "uberfacts" or the success of the paragons of science misinformation Natural News if you need examples); but even worse, combating misinformation with evidence can often have the complete and utter opposite of the desired effect. This horrifying phenomenon known as the backfire effect was demonstrated once again recently by a study of the responses of parents to various different forms of evidence that vaccines are not dangerous.

 

[Keith&Co.]

After 3 days, older adults misremembered 28% of false statements as true when they were told once that the statement was false but 40% when told three times that the statement was false". Interestingly, in this study the effect was the precise opposite in younger people - reinforcing that the claim was false made them less likely to believe the claim.

I wonder if this explains Syed's posting habits? Or donwtt's?

The more often [statement] appears in replies, the more it reinforces belief. Even if it's presented in the context of 'untrue [statement] untrue,' the context is not retained.

Huh.
So as i pass 52 this year, I have an excuse to keep all my opinions in the face of rising evidence against them.... Cool.

 

[Kharakov]

This horrifying phenomenon known as the backfire effect was demonstrated once again recently by a study of the responses of parents to various different forms of evidence that vaccines are not dangerous.

"That won't kill my kid, but not giving it to them might?" All of the sudden I don't believe any of the evidence that vaccines are not dangerous.

 

[Bronzeage]

Neurobonkers Blog: When Evidence Backfires
http://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/when-evidence-backfires

Don't read this blog post. Definitely don't read it to the end. Didn't I tell you not to read this blog post? You're still doing it... We can laugh at our inherent ability to be contrary, but unfortunately something similar can happen when we give a human being scientific evidence that debunks misinformation. One of the most depressing paradoxes of science communication is that not only can misinformation often spread faster and wider than the truth (just take the ubersuccessful but often not so factual "uberfacts" or the success of the paragons of science misinformation Natural News if you need examples); but even worse, combating misinformation with evidence can often have the complete and utter opposite of the desired effect. This horrifying phenomenon known as the backfire effect was demonstrated once again recently by a study of the responses of parents to various different forms of evidence that vaccines are not dangerous.

When we decide to accept an authority's word for something(Guy in lab coat says "vaccines are safe, woman on youtube says "vaccines cause autism"), what goes into that decision? What authority grants authority to authority?

I believe the sun is 93million miles away. I was told this at a very early age and I accepted it as a fact. It may be the earliest scientific fact I absorbed. If someone were to come along and say, "The sun is much closer and much smaller than we once thought," I would have trouble accepting that, even though I have no practical way if verifying either story.

I accept the efficacy of vaccines, not so much because I trust all the white coat guys, or because I have never contracted one of the diseases which they are supposed to prevent, but more because I really want vaccines to work. It's a great comfort to think I don't have to worry about smallpox or tetanus.

The keyword here is comfort. The human mind needs comfort. We'll do almost anything to have it. It's not difficult to see why the parent of an autistic child wants the comfort of knowing the condition was caused by an external source. It's not preposterous. In the 60's, Thalidomide was considered to be an effective anti-nausea drug. It took a while to connect this drug to babies with flippers for arms. It took much longer to understand how it happened, but eventually the connection and causation was found.

It's easy to forget, when trying to present information to people, the first question which must be satisfied is, "Why should I believe you?"

 

[Keith&Co.]

t's easy to forget, when trying to present information to people, the first question which must be satisfied is, "Why should I believe you?"

Good post.
I'm reminded of Jame Herriot and 'All Creatures Great and Small.'
He noted that half the time he was trying to prescribe or explain a course of treatment, farmers would resist his college-educated, trade magazine updated, experienced opinions in favor of stuff that was damned near superstition passed around in the pubs between farmers.
On the other hand, if he offered an opinion on home repair, buying a new car, choosing schools, anything that came after 'You know what you oughta do...' was accepted almost as gospel.

I wonder if there's an element of suspicion in your 'comfort' assessment? I don't have a degree in medicine, so i might not want to trust a doctor's view on vaccines because i know i don't know enough to catch him in a lie, mistake or bias? But i can trust Jenny McCarthy because she's not a doctor, either, so I can assume i can tell if she's mistaken....

 

[Bronzeage]

t's easy to forget, when trying to present information to people, the first question which must be satisfied is, "Why should I believe you?"

Good post.
I'm reminded of Jame Herriot and 'All Creatures Great and Small.'
He noted that half the time he was trying to prescribe or explain a course of treatment, farmers would resist his college-educated, trade magazine updated, experienced opinions in favor of stuff that was damned near superstition passed around in the pubs between farmers.
On the other hand, if he offered an opinion on home repair, buying a new car, choosing schools, anything that came after 'You know what you oughta do...' was accepted almost as gospel.

I wonder if there's an element of suspicion in your 'comfort' assessment? I don't have a degree in medicine, so i might not want to trust a doctor's view on vaccines because i know i don't know enough to catch him in a lie, mistake or bias? But i can trust Jenny McCarthy because she's not a doctor, either, so I can assume i can tell if she's mistaken....

When it comes to vaccines and autism, I wouldn't be surprised to find the anti-vac crowd over crowded with various conspiracy enthusiasts and the generally suspicious. I remember being told about Laetrile. This was in the 1970's. The standard line is, cancer is the medical industry's best seller and they don't want people to know the cure can be bought at General Nutrition. Why any sensible person would believe it was possible to conceal such a conspiracy among several million people, when statistics say a few of them have cancer, is beyond my powers.

It doesn't help that we don't actually know what autism really is. We have a collection of symptoms and behaviors which is labeled the autism spectrum. A person could have a stroke or aneurysm and end up with the same symptoms as an autistic person, but would not be diagnosed as autism. I don't believe there is a recognized aneurysm induced autism. It's hard enough to believe science when science presents difficult facts, but when science presents vague facts, it leaves a lot of room for speculation.

 

[rousseau]

Neurobonkers Blog: When Evidence Backfires
http://bigthink.com/neurobonkers/when-evidence-backfires

Don't read this blog post. Definitely don't read it to the end. Didn't I tell you not to read this blog post? You're still doing it... We can laugh at our inherent ability to be contrary, but unfortunately something similar can happen when we give a human being scientific evidence that debunks misinformation. One of the most depressing paradoxes of science communication is that not only can misinformation often spread faster and wider than the truth (just take the ubersuccessful but often not so factual "uberfacts" or the success of the paragons of science misinformation Natural News if you need examples); but even worse, combating misinformation with evidence can often have the complete and utter opposite of the desired effect. This horrifying phenomenon known as the backfire effect was demonstrated once again recently by a study of the responses of parents to various different forms of evidence that vaccines are not dangerous.

When we decide to accept an authority's word for something(Guy in lab coat says "vaccines are safe, woman on youtube says "vaccines cause autism"), what goes into that decision? What authority grants authority to authority?

I believe the sun is 93million miles away. I was told this at a very early age and I accepted it as a fact. It may be the earliest scientific fact I absorbed. If someone were to come along and say, "The sun is much closer and much smaller than we once thought," I would have trouble accepting that, even though I have no practical way if verifying either story.

I accept the efficacy of vaccines, not so much because I trust all the white coat guys, or because I have never contracted one of the diseases which they are supposed to prevent, but more because I really want vaccines to work. It's a great comfort to think I don't have to worry about smallpox or tetanus.

The keyword here is comfort. The human mind needs comfort. We'll do almost anything to have it. It's not difficult to see why the parent of an autistic child wants the comfort of knowing the condition was caused by an external source. It's not preposterous. In the 60's, Thalidomide was considered to be an effective anti-nausea drug. It took a while to connect this drug to babies with flippers for arms. It took much longer to understand how it happened, but eventually the connection and causation was found.

It's easy to forget, when trying to present information to people, the first question which must be satisfied is, "Why should I believe you?"

Humans have a blind spot that tells them that they need to be consistent. We don't like being too bendy and changing our beliefs, so the longer we've held on to a belief the more likely we are to hold on to that belief despite evidence to the contrary. So it's not so much "why should I believe you", it's "who got there first".

To get a little personal I can remember a time in my life that I was a lot like this, I literally wouldn't shift my opinion about almost anything because of a desire to be right. Then over the last few years I realized that was a dumb way to be, so I changed. Thing is, as much as I can't claim to know the inner minds of everyone on the planet, the more I think about it the more I believe that most people are a lot like the way I used to be, and just haven't figured out how to question themselves yet. Then when people point out that they may be misinformed their defense mechanisms immediately go up.

 

[Shadowy Man]

I believe the sun is 93million miles away. I was told this at a very early age and I accepted it as a fact. It may be the earliest scientific fact I absorbed. If someone were to come along and say, "The sun is much closer and much smaller than we once thought," I would have trouble accepting that, even though I have no practical way if verifying either story.

You do have a practical way of verifying the distance to the sun. It may not be trivial, but it's not impractical. It was done rigorously first in 1672, so you don't need fancy equipment or modern technology to do it. Now, I agree that there may be other scientific facts that are not practically re-determined by an amateur, but at some point you need to trust the process of science and the scientists who are doing it.

 

[fromderinside]

It doesn't help that we don't actually know what autism really is.

ASDs are any developmental disabilities that have been caused by a brain abnormality. A person with an ASD typically has difficulty with social and communication skills.

Wow. So an identification of a developmental disability that can be traced to a brain abnormality does not tell one what is autism. I suspect the problem is with preconceptions and stereotypes about developmental disability and by whom the Disease (abnormality) should be treated. Its pretty clear that if one traces a developmental disability of any type (fixed behaviors, turning inward, slow development, etc) to a recognized brain abnormality, one that medicine says should be treatable by medical methods (not touchie-feelie methods), it is an ASD (love that qwerty keyboard, or, should I say ASDFGH keyboard).

OHMYGOSH There it is. A abnormality. Is it really a disease?

The disorder attacked by specially trained teachers and specialists in the course of normal learning in school because it is a developmental abnormality. Is that really the medical way to treat disease?

It's hard enough to believe science when science presents difficult facts, but when science presents vague facts, it leaves a lot of room for speculation.

As I point out above the problem is not that science presents difficult facts but that we are probably treating a disease (according to medical model anyway) with education a behavioral methodology. So rather than calling ASD a medical condition and a scientific problem. I think a more proper statement because of the way we treat these disabilities is that ASD a medically defined condition and socio-cultural problem. I don't see the nexus between the definition and the process for treating it, medical-scientific, in what we do with those who exhibit the conditions.

 

[Bronzeage]

ASDs are any developmental disabilities that have been caused by a brain abnormality. A person with an ASD typically has difficulty with social and communication skills.

Wow. So an identification of a developmental disability that can be traced to a brain abnormality does not tell one what is autism. I suspect the problem is with preconceptions and stereotypes about developmental disability and by whom the Disease (abnormality) should be treated. Its pretty clear that if one traces a developmental disability of any type (fixed behaviors, turning inward, slow development, etc) to a recognized brain abnormality, one that medicine says should be treatable by medical methods (not touchie-feelie methods), it is an ASD (love that qwerty keyboard, or, should I say ASDFGH keyboard).

OHMYGOSH There it is. A abnormality. Is it really a disease?

The disorder attacked by specially trained teachers and specialists in the course of normal learning in school because it is a developmental abnormality. Is that really the medical way to treat disease?

It's hard enough to believe science when science presents difficult facts, but when science presents vague facts, it leaves a lot of room for speculation.

As I point out above the problem is not that science presents difficult facts but that we are probably treating a disease (according to medical model anyway) with education a behavioral methodology. So rather than calling ASD a medical condition and a scientific problem. I think a more proper statement because of the way we treat these disabilities is that ASD a medically defined condition and socio-cultural problem. I don't see the nexus between the definition and the process for treating it, medical-scientific, in what we do with those who exhibit the conditions.

Don't take it personally. It's just an analogy for the purposes of this discussion. A discussion of autism and it's causes and treatment would be better served with a thread specifically for that topic.

 

[Angry Floof]

t's easy to forget, when trying to present information to people, the first question which must be satisfied is, "Why should I believe you?"

Good post.
I'm reminded of Jame Herriot and 'All Creatures Great and Small.'
He noted that half the time he was trying to prescribe or explain a course of treatment, farmers would resist his college-educated, trade magazine updated, experienced opinions in favor of stuff that was damned near superstition passed around in the pubs between farmers.
On the other hand, if he offered an opinion on home repair, buying a new car, choosing schools, anything that came after 'You know what you oughta do...' was accepted almost as gospel.

I wonder if there's an element of suspicion in your 'comfort' assessment? I don't have a degree in medicine, so i might not want to trust a doctor's view on vaccines because i know i don't know enough to catch him in a lie, mistake or bias? But i can trust Jenny McCarthy because she's not a doctor, either, so I can assume i can tell if she's mistaken....

Reminds me of a conversation with my sister a couple of years ago. She took issue with my saying that we are all made of stuff formed in stars a long time ago. She looked at me and said, "How do you know?"

Virgin birth, talking snakes, resurrection - all perfectly legit, no question, but science? That's just hocus pocus nonsense.

 

[bilby]

t's easy to forget, when trying to present information to people, the first question which must be satisfied is, "Why should I believe you?"

Good post.
I'm reminded of Jame Herriot and 'All Creatures Great and Small.'
He noted that half the time he was trying to prescribe or explain a course of treatment, farmers would resist his college-educated, trade magazine updated, experienced opinions in favor of stuff that was damned near superstition passed around in the pubs between farmers.
On the other hand, if he offered an opinion on home repair, buying a new car, choosing schools, anything that came after 'You know what you oughta do...' was accepted almost as gospel.

I wonder if there's an element of suspicion in your 'comfort' assessment? I don't have a degree in medicine, so i might not want to trust a doctor's view on vaccines because i know i don't know enough to catch him in a lie, mistake or bias? But i can trust Jenny McCarthy because she's not a doctor, either, so I can assume i can tell if she's mistaken....

Reminds me of a conversation with my sister a couple of years ago. She took issue with my saying that we are all made of stuff formed in stars a long time ago. She looked at me and said, "How do you know?"

Virgin birth, talking snakes, resurrection - all perfectly legit, no question, but science? That's just hocus pocus nonsense.

The answer to her question begins: "It’s a warm summer evening, circa 600 BC, you’ve finished your shopping at the local market, or agora, and you look up at the night sky. There you notice some of the stars seem to move, so you name them planetes, or wanderer... This is the beginning of a twenty six hundred year journey we’re going to take together from the ancient Greeks through Isaac Newton to Niels Bohr to Erwin Schrodinger"

 

[Kharakov]

Reminds me of a conversation with my sister a couple of years ago. She took issue with my saying that we are all made of stuff formed in stars a long time ago. She looked at me and said, "How do you know?"

Technically the stars existed as a superposition of states until there was an observer. And if you want to get really philosotechnical, the natural laws which govern our viewing of stars didn't exist until there was an observer either. So, without an observer noticing the existence of stars, and the law, the law did not exist. Bootstrap levitation of the universe, creation of the big bang by backwards observation of law, etc.- they all started with the first conscious focus upon reality. The sun really did orbit the earth until someone observed a simpler system that existed as a possibility within a superposition of states.

The point being, we've been fed scientific bullshit our whole lives. Just because someone tells you something, or you are taught something and manipulate reality with what you've been taught, does not mean that you are manipulating anything more than a shadow of the true reality. Formed of star stuff? How do you know that isn't an elaborate, awesome back story developed to anchor you to a vast, interrelated story, an MMORPG of epic proportions? Play your part, but that's the game, not the truth, and you can play the game and state the truth.

Virgin birth, talking snakes, resurrection - all perfectly legit, no question, but science? That's just hocus pocus nonsense.

Yeah, especially since the stars didn't come into existence until there was an observer.

The ho cuss "poke us" all night long.

 

[Angry Floof]

Technically the stars existed as a superposition of states until there was an observer. And if you want to get really philosotechnical, the natural laws which govern our viewing of stars didn't exist until there was an observer either. So, without an observer noticing the existence of stars, and the law, the law did not exist. Bootstrap levitation of the universe, creation of the big bang by backwards observation of law, etc.- they all started with the first conscious focus upon reality. The sun really did orbit the earth until someone observed a simpler system that existed as a possibility within a superposition of states.

The point being, we've been fed scientific bullshit our whole lives. Just because someone tells you something, or you are taught something and manipulate reality with what you've been taught, does not mean that you are manipulating anything more than a shadow of the true reality. Formed of star stuff? How do you know that isn't an elaborate, awesome back story developed to anchor you to a vast, interrelated story, an MMORPG of epic proportions? Play your part, but that's the game, not the truth, and you can play the game and state the truth.

Virgin birth, talking snakes, resurrection - all perfectly legit, no question, but science? That's just hocus pocus nonsense.

Yeah, especially since the stars didn't come into existence until there was an observer.

The ho cuss "poke us" all night long.

You may be right about all of that, but the most critical factor is belief. I don't have to believe anything, and I don't have to believe anything absolutely. The methods of science as tools of thought and understanding are useful not because the find us some absolute truth but because they foster questioning and openness to change and uncertainty, and discourage attachment to ideology.

At the moment, being told that elements that make up life on Earth were formed far away and long ago does not contradict my actual experience of life and whatever knowledge I have managed to gain in four decades of being alive. Talking snakes and virgin births do, though.

 

[Mageth]

LOL, kharakov. That's some funny stuff. Typical woo nonsense, but hilarious.

BTW, if things don't come into existence until there's an observer, how the fuck did the observer come to be?

 

[Kharakov]

LOL, kharakov. That's some funny stuff. Typical woo nonsense, but hilarious.

Here to entertain.

BTW, if things don't come into existence until there's an observer, how the fuck did the observer come to be?

These aren't the droids you're looking for. [YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7l8rWfLAus[/YOUTUBE]

And I thought I escaped coincidence with that last post until I searched for the statement "these aren't the droids you were looking for." on google.

 

[Kharakov]

At the moment, being told that elements that make up life on Earth were formed far away and long ago does not contradict my actual experience of life and whatever knowledge I have managed to gain in four decades of being alive. Talking snakes and virgin births do, though.

I've no problem with the universe having a virgin birth, unless you postulate it was born to a few horny universes? Or a horny universe, and a slightly grumpy universe that was like, "ok, I guess, but then I'm going to sleep" and then ended up being happy, although a little bit annoyed at the thought of having to raise a whole other universe.


And talking snakes, well, I've no real reason to doubt their existence. Just because a snake hasn't talked to me, doesn't mean they don't talk. Maybe they choose who they talk to, and only do so at times of great dramatic <pauzzzzzzzzze> or comic importance. Technically, they've been around for millions of years longer than people.... and the time of dramatic importance, hell, they are apparently awesome actors if nobody has caught them talking in 1000s of years.

 

[hurtinbuckaroo]

The answer to her question begins: "It’s a warm summer evening, circa 600 BC, you’ve finished your shopping at the local market, or agora, and you look up at the night sky. There you notice some of the stars seem to move, so you name them planetes, or wanderer... This is the beginning of a twenty six hundred year journey we’re going to take together from the ancient Greeks through Isaac Newton to Niels Bohr to Erwin Schrodinger"

Wait, I forgot my notebook!