WEBVTT - Motivated Numeracy and the Politics-ridden Brain 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.840 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:14.080 Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:16.640 your Mind. My name is Robert Laham and I'm Joe 0:00:16.720 --> 0:00:19.160 McCormick and Robert. I want to hit you with a quote. 0:00:19.200 --> 0:00:21.440 I'm sure you've heard this one a million times before. 0:00:21.680 --> 0:00:24.880 It's a quote from the American writer Upton Sinclair. Uh, 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:27.600 and the quote goes like this. He says, it is 0:00:27.680 --> 0:00:31.200 difficult to get a man to understand something when his 0:00:31.280 --> 0:00:35.479 salary depends upon his not understanding it. H Well, that's 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.360 pretty apt. I'm not sure I've actually heard that one before, 0:00:38.400 --> 0:00:41.480 but but that certainly has a ring of truth to it. Really, 0:00:41.680 --> 0:00:43.199 you never heard that? I think I've heard that one. 0:00:43.520 --> 0:00:45.400 People roll that out all the time when they're talking 0:00:45.400 --> 0:00:51.879 about you know, industry shills, paid spokespeople, pr types. Um. Yeah, yeah. So. 0:00:52.000 --> 0:00:55.160 Upton Sinclair ran for governor of California in the nineteen thirties, 0:00:55.600 --> 0:00:58.440 and he claimed in a campaign retrospective that he used 0:00:58.440 --> 0:01:01.000 to tell his rally audience is this and it's a 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:03.840 great line. There's plenty of truth to it. Right. Yeah. 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:05.440 By the way, for anyone who's not familiar up to 0:01:05.440 --> 0:01:08.560 in Sinclair lived through nine sixty eight, and he was 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:11.399 the author of The Jungle and perhaps more known to 0:01:11.440 --> 0:01:14.640 some of our listeners for his story Oil, which was 0:01:14.720 --> 0:01:17.840 loosely adapted into the two thousand seventh film There Will 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:20.679 Be Blood. Always going to be remembered for a movie first. 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:24.720 But did he also write Boogie Nights the original version? 0:01:26.240 --> 0:01:28.640 Maybe so, John, maybe so? But but no, not just 0:01:28.680 --> 0:01:31.120 an author but also a politician. Yeah, so he was 0:01:31.200 --> 0:01:34.399 used to talking about issues of public policy. I mean, 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:37.240 he was a politically concerned writer. I think a lot 0:01:37.280 --> 0:01:39.800 of times people put him in categories like like with 0:01:39.920 --> 0:01:43.480 Charles Dickens. You know, somebody who's known for writing fiction 0:01:43.680 --> 0:01:46.640 but also for exposing the plight of the politically disadvantaged. 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:49.160 And so, yeah, this quote comes up a lot, like 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:53.080 if you're talking about a lawyer representing big tobacco back 0:01:53.080 --> 0:01:54.840 in the day, who would come on TV and say 0:01:54.840 --> 0:01:58.200 the science isn't settled yet, there's no proof cigarettes cause cancer, 0:01:58.880 --> 0:02:02.160 or maybe a col industry lobbyists, maybe literally the same 0:02:02.200 --> 0:02:05.080 exact person comes on TV a few decades later and says, 0:02:05.080 --> 0:02:07.760 don't listen to the climate alarmist, that they're scientists on 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:11.799 both sides. You know, climate change isn't settled yet. When 0:02:11.840 --> 0:02:14.160 you're hearing from people like this who are like paid 0:02:14.360 --> 0:02:17.280 to represent a particular point of view, you obviously don't 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:19.520 have to be a super skeptic to realize you shouldn't 0:02:19.560 --> 0:02:22.600 just take their word for it. Um, But people who 0:02:22.680 --> 0:02:24.640 get paid to tell you that the grass is pink 0:02:24.680 --> 0:02:26.920 and the sky is green are going to keep saying that. 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:29.320 You know, you're not going to change their mind by 0:02:29.360 --> 0:02:32.760 offering them evidence or making good points or something, because 0:02:32.760 --> 0:02:35.000 they're not here to figure out what's true. They're here 0:02:35.000 --> 0:02:37.839 to say their lines. Yeah, I'm I'm always reminded of 0:02:37.880 --> 0:02:40.720 the The Doctor character who would inevitably show up in 0:02:40.720 --> 0:02:44.440 the late night infomercials for various products. Um, you know, 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:47.320 clearly they didn't just do a cold call and get 0:02:47.919 --> 0:02:50.720 get somebody in there to uh to to show for 0:02:50.760 --> 0:02:56.200 this product. Only Marw Burrow stimulates your cue zone when 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:57.720 it comes to people like that. I guess this is 0:02:57.840 --> 0:02:59.600 kind of a tangent. But when it when it comes 0:02:59.639 --> 0:03:02.280 to like people who shill for a particular you know, 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:05.000 point of view, or or spokespeople for some kind of 0:03:05.040 --> 0:03:08.440 line on TV, I always kind of wonder, like, do 0:03:08.560 --> 0:03:12.000 they end up really truly believing the thing that they're 0:03:12.040 --> 0:03:14.360 paid to say, or is there some kind of cognitive 0:03:14.400 --> 0:03:16.280 dissonance in their brain. I don't know what it's like 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:19.240 to be in that mind. Yeah, that's a great question though, 0:03:19.280 --> 0:03:21.520 because I mean it's one thing for just like an 0:03:21.520 --> 0:03:25.000 individual to endorse a product, you know, yeah, like reading 0:03:25.000 --> 0:03:28.400 an ad or or even saying, hey, I tried out 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:30.679 this product. It's really great. You guys should give it 0:03:30.760 --> 0:03:33.320 a try as well, which obviously we do on the show. 0:03:33.760 --> 0:03:36.000 But but but when you get to that level where 0:03:36.040 --> 0:03:38.280 you have an expert, when you have say a medical 0:03:38.360 --> 0:03:43.000 doctor um, appearing on an infomercial or appearing even um, 0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:45.520 you know, in some sort of governmental body and saying, yes, 0:03:45.680 --> 0:03:49.560 I state my reputation on this, I state my professional 0:03:50.160 --> 0:03:54.520 um expertise, uh, put it on the line in support 0:03:54.600 --> 0:03:58.320 of this product or this industry and directly contradicting what 0:03:58.360 --> 0:04:00.920 appears to be the preponderance of the thence right, that 0:04:01.040 --> 0:04:04.120 that's what these industry shills come out to do, right, 0:04:04.120 --> 0:04:06.440 they come out to tell you that the scientists are wrong. 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:11.360 But anyway, given evidence that has emerged in recent years, 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:14.240 I think maybe later on in this episode we should 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:16.440 come back and try to do an updated version of 0:04:16.440 --> 0:04:19.880 this Upton Sinclair quote, because I think that the scope 0:04:19.920 --> 0:04:23.120 of this quote is actually too limited by just focusing 0:04:23.120 --> 0:04:25.480 on the salary. So so we'll come back to this, 0:04:26.160 --> 0:04:29.200 But today we're gonna be talking about a form of 0:04:29.320 --> 0:04:34.280 motivated reasoning, a form of motivated reasoning called motivated numerous ee, 0:04:34.680 --> 0:04:38.000 and specifically how that relates to the idea of identity 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:40.960 protective cognition. And this has come up on the show before. 0:04:41.320 --> 0:04:43.360 We talked about it in an episode a while back 0:04:43.400 --> 0:04:45.960 called Science Communication Breakdown. I think that was like a 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:48.120 year and a half ago, or so, I believe so. 0:04:48.720 --> 0:04:50.760 But it was based on when you had gone to 0:04:51.000 --> 0:04:53.880 the World Science Festival and seen a talk that included 0:04:53.920 --> 0:04:57.200 the work of the Yale psychologist Dan Kahan, who is 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:01.200 he does a lot of really interesting research about biases 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:04.360 and motivated reasoning and the ways in which our brains 0:05:04.640 --> 0:05:07.520 fail to be rational in one way, sometimes by being 0:05:07.760 --> 0:05:11.680 uh sort of subversively rational in another way. Yeah. Isn't 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:14.880 it interesting how we sometimes uh as seem to outsmart 0:05:14.920 --> 0:05:19.760 ourselves in these matters. Yeah. So I want to start 0:05:19.800 --> 0:05:23.320 by thinking about two different kinds of disagreements that come 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:25.560 up when people talk about politics. There are obviously lots 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:28.320 of different ways people can disagree about politics. Here here 0:05:28.320 --> 0:05:33.320 are two different kinds of currently politically relevant statements. One 0:05:33.400 --> 0:05:36.360 is somebody who says the government shouldn't have a right 0:05:36.400 --> 0:05:38.880 to tax my income. Right, you might talk to like 0:05:38.920 --> 0:05:42.400 a libertarian who says that. And then here's a different 0:05:42.560 --> 0:05:46.720 politically relevant statement, human activity is the primary driver of 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:51.000 global climate change. Now, people have political arguments over statements 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:53.280 like both of these two all the time, but these 0:05:53.320 --> 0:05:56.800 are not at all the same kind of statement. One 0:05:56.839 --> 0:05:59.479 big difference is that the first statement is a statement 0:05:59.520 --> 0:06:01.960 about val I'll use like you can't do a bunch 0:06:02.040 --> 0:06:05.520 of empirical experiments to determine if it's correct or not 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:09.080 that the government should be allowed to tax people. That's 0:06:09.120 --> 0:06:12.440 just a question about what you believe should be the case. 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:15.599 What about values and priorities, and about the priorities of 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:18.000 the person making the statement, right, it's a it's a 0:06:18.120 --> 0:06:20.680 it's a commentary on how you think, or how one 0:06:20.720 --> 0:06:25.200 group thinks politics should work or how government should work. Rather, uh, 0:06:25.279 --> 0:06:28.760 and we shouldn't be confused by the idea of political science. 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:33.520 Political science, though a serious field, is a different matter 0:06:33.880 --> 0:06:38.080 compared to the natural sciences. Well, it's certainly true that 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.920 with questions about like whether or not you should tax income, 0:06:42.240 --> 0:06:45.039 you can approach that question from the point of optimizing 0:06:45.040 --> 0:06:47.640 for certain goals, like if you specify a goal and 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:50.320 you compare different methods of achieving that goal, then you 0:06:50.360 --> 0:06:52.400 can do that. But like, absent all of that kind 0:06:52.400 --> 0:06:55.520 of framework, that's just a statement about values. On the 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:58.440 other hand, you've got the human activity is the primary 0:06:58.560 --> 0:07:01.320 driver of global climate change change. That statement is not 0:07:01.440 --> 0:07:04.479 like that. There simply is a fact of the matter, 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:07.840 either human activity is the primary cause of global climate 0:07:07.920 --> 0:07:11.560 change or it isn't. And you can do empirical experiments 0:07:11.600 --> 0:07:14.920 to test this hypothesis, and of course the answer is that, yes, 0:07:15.000 --> 0:07:17.400 we now know that it is the primary driver of 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:20.080 global climate change with like a you know, ninety something 0:07:20.120 --> 0:07:23.520 percent certainty. It's we really really strongly know this. Now. 0:07:23.600 --> 0:07:27.640 This is undoubtedly the scientific consensus. Even though this question 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:32.320 is politically controversial, it's not scientifically controversial. And if you 0:07:32.400 --> 0:07:34.680 doubt this, you actually have the ability to go look 0:07:34.720 --> 0:07:37.800 up the evidence yourself. Especially that's one thing that the 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:40.400 internet is great for. You can go read the most 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:42.760 recent I p. C. C report. You can read the 0:07:42.840 --> 0:07:45.640 thousands of individual studies, you can look at the data 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:48.640 and read the climate scientist's own words about how their 0:07:48.640 --> 0:07:51.920 conclusions are drawn from the data of their experiments. And 0:07:51.960 --> 0:07:55.080 if you actually do that, I think any reasonable person 0:07:55.200 --> 0:07:58.640 should be able to conclude, of course, human activities the 0:07:58.640 --> 0:08:01.960 primary cause of climate change change. And yet that's not 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:06.400 what happens, is it? Questions like this remain politically controversial, 0:08:06.480 --> 0:08:09.320 with people often judging the answer in a way that 0:08:09.400 --> 0:08:13.000 aligns with their political identity. Now, speaking of politics, I 0:08:13.000 --> 0:08:15.440 just want to throw in a quick fact Lloyd here 0:08:15.480 --> 0:08:19.440 about this episode. We were recording this on election day. 0:08:20.000 --> 0:08:23.440 It will be published after election day. So yeah, so 0:08:23.480 --> 0:08:25.360 we don't know what the outcome is going to be. Yeah. So, 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:27.840 so none of this, none of this is a commentary 0:08:27.840 --> 0:08:31.920 on things that have not yet occurred as of this recording. Yeah, 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:34.680 And it's not really a commentary on politics per se. 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:38.320 It's a commentary on psychology really that that is going 0:08:38.360 --> 0:08:41.520 to be at play and people of all political persuasions exactly. 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:44.240 So I think we should turn to look at the 0:08:44.720 --> 0:08:46.760 big paper that we're going to be focusing on in 0:08:46.800 --> 0:08:49.920 this episode. The the lead author was was Dan Kahan, 0:08:50.360 --> 0:08:53.720 but the other authors include Ellen Peters, Rika Cantrell Dawson, 0:08:53.800 --> 0:08:58.040 and Paul Slovak. And it's called Motivated Numerousy and Enlightened 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:01.920 Self Government, published in Behavioral Public Policy, I think first 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:06.800 published in Revised in and they start off by observing 0:09:06.840 --> 0:09:08.680 the same kind of thing we've just been talking about 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:11.720 that Obviously, there are questions where people can argue about 0:09:11.720 --> 0:09:14.560 their political values, but the politics is also full of 0:09:14.600 --> 0:09:19.360 these arguments about purely empirical questions, many of which are 0:09:19.400 --> 0:09:23.839 no longer in fact empirically controversial, like is climate change 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:27.360 driven by greenhouse gas emissions? The answer is yes, but 0:09:27.559 --> 0:09:31.120 this is still politically controversial. Other questions like this that 0:09:31.200 --> 0:09:33.120 they give a big list of them. One would be 0:09:33.160 --> 0:09:36.680 like could we improve public safety by storing nuclear waste 0:09:36.679 --> 0:09:39.680 deep underground? And that one is a yes as well. 0:09:39.720 --> 0:09:41.679 I believe that's one that was brought up in the 0:09:42.040 --> 0:09:45.000 Penal World Science Festival that Kahan spoke on, and that 0:09:45.120 --> 0:09:49.920 was one that actually I seem to be more divisive. Um, 0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:52.160 they kind of pulled the audience there at the World 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:54.240 Science Festival, so you know, for the most part of 0:09:54.320 --> 0:09:57.480 very informed and curious bunch, but even they were not 0:09:57.920 --> 0:10:01.400 as well informed, uh on this issue as they were 0:10:01.440 --> 0:10:04.199 on some of these other issues we're talking about here. Yeah, Now, 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:06.720 not all of these questions are going to be as 0:10:06.760 --> 0:10:10.520 settled with as much confidence as other ones are. So like, 0:10:10.679 --> 0:10:13.720 we have a very high confidence now that greenhouse gas 0:10:13.800 --> 0:10:16.400 emissions are driving climate change, but there could be other 0:10:16.679 --> 0:10:20.079 questions that are in theory empirical, even if we don't 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:24.080 have a scientific consensus yet. I honestly don't know where 0:10:24.320 --> 0:10:27.439 this this next question falls in, whether it's more settled 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:30.800 or less settled. But other questions would include things like, uh, 0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:35.000 do gun control measures reduce violent crime or increase it? Uh? 0:10:35.080 --> 0:10:39.000 Does public spending in the aftermath of an economic recession 0:10:39.240 --> 0:10:42.400 increase the length of the recession or shorten it? And 0:10:42.440 --> 0:10:45.160 so with some of these questions, we don't always yet 0:10:45.240 --> 0:10:48.160 know the correct answer, but they are at least empirical. 0:10:48.320 --> 0:10:50.520 You can do tests, and you can gather data, and 0:10:50.600 --> 0:10:53.000 you can find with some degree of confidence that there 0:10:53.080 --> 0:10:54.839 is a correct answer. It's not just going to be 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:58.240 an endless contest of values. Yes, it's in the domain 0:10:58.280 --> 0:11:01.080 of science, and science can have at it. One of 0:11:01.080 --> 0:11:03.360 the interesting things about a lot of these questions is 0:11:03.400 --> 0:11:05.960 that they, for some reason almost always seem to concern 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:11.000 questions or perceptions of risk. I guess maybe that's just 0:11:11.040 --> 0:11:13.400 what politics is about. Yeah, I think there is a 0:11:13.400 --> 0:11:17.120 lot of risk analysis in politics. I mean, obviously there's 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:19.960 there's there's always a certain amount of fear mongering as well, 0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:23.360 Like how do you how do you capitalize on the 0:11:23.360 --> 0:11:27.480 sort of risks that that voters are considering? How do 0:11:27.520 --> 0:11:32.440 you potentially stir up the flames or or or or 0:11:32.480 --> 0:11:34.280 tap them down a bit depending on what kind of 0:11:34.320 --> 0:11:36.720 a reaction you're looking for. Well, I guess you could 0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:41.240 look at many major policy decisions as um as conflicts 0:11:41.280 --> 0:11:44.920 between perceptions of different kinds of risks, right, Like, so 0:11:45.000 --> 0:11:47.440 somebody will say, well, there's a certain amount of risk 0:11:47.480 --> 0:11:50.360 we're running by not doing anything about global climate change. 0:11:50.400 --> 0:11:53.320 Here the things that could result, and somebody else's yes, 0:11:53.360 --> 0:11:55.840 But if we do something about it, we risk I 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:58.640 don't know, we risk not making enough money or something 0:11:58.880 --> 0:12:01.439 or or perrap perhap halps, it's yeah, we risk hurting 0:12:01.440 --> 0:12:03.559 ourselves in the short term or a lot of a 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:05.760 lot of times, the short term risk versus long term risk, 0:12:05.800 --> 0:12:10.920 immediate risk versus more you know, elusive risks, Yeah. Now, obviously, 0:12:10.920 --> 0:12:13.560 when you look at these questions that have been pretty 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:18.439 convincingly answered with empirical evidence, and yet intense disagreement persists 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:22.560 in politics, this obviously isn't helpful. Like there's enough under 0:12:22.600 --> 0:12:26.760 dispute over what values should drive public policy that it 0:12:26.840 --> 0:12:30.360 really doesn't help to add to that that, like unnecessary 0:12:30.480 --> 0:12:34.320 dead end disputes about underlying empirical facts when the science 0:12:34.440 --> 0:12:37.680 or the facts are actually pretty clear. So the question 0:12:37.800 --> 0:12:41.040 is why how come you can have a question where 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:43.440 the evidence is very clear, such as the cause of 0:12:43.480 --> 0:12:46.920 climate change being related to the burning of fossil fuels, 0:12:46.920 --> 0:12:50.199 but the public not being in general agreement about it. 0:12:50.559 --> 0:12:54.520 And this this paper looks at two major competing hypotheses 0:12:54.559 --> 0:12:57.959 to explain this, like why people don't accept the facts 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:00.880 when the facts are pretty clear. And the first one 0:13:01.160 --> 0:13:05.120 is the hypothesis they call the science comprehension thesis or 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:09.120 the SCT, and basically it goes like this, the public 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:12.160 in general has a pretty weak understanding of science. We 0:13:12.200 --> 0:13:16.280 are likely to misunderstand what scientists are telling us. If 0:13:16.320 --> 0:13:18.360 you put a scientific paper in front of us, we're 0:13:18.360 --> 0:13:21.240 probably not gonna understand it. Thus, we're likely to be 0:13:21.320 --> 0:13:24.280 misled by people who are trying to deceive us to 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:28.120 their own advantage. And I think unfortunately, or well, I 0:13:28.120 --> 0:13:29.960 don't want to pre empt what we get to in 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:32.640 a bit, but I guess we could say unfortunately. This 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:36.960 hypothesis is pretty common among skeptics and science enthusiasts and 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:39.840 even scientists themselves, and I feel myself very drawn to 0:13:39.960 --> 0:13:44.720 it because if you accept that the problem is, um, 0:13:44.920 --> 0:13:48.520 we're just not scientifically literate enough to understand what's being 0:13:48.520 --> 0:13:51.200 talked about, in a way, this is actually kind of hopeful, 0:13:51.640 --> 0:13:54.560 especially if you're an educator or a science communicator, because 0:13:54.559 --> 0:13:56.800 the problem is simply a lack of knowledge. There's just 0:13:56.840 --> 0:14:00.160 a deficit that can be made up. And so if 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:03.920 you just you know, community, you give people better scientific education, 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:09.040 better communication of the scientific reality. Under this hypothesis, if 0:14:09.040 --> 0:14:12.400 you just teach people better scientific literacy skills, they will 0:14:12.440 --> 0:14:15.160 finally see the light and come around and accept the 0:14:15.200 --> 0:14:18.640 empirically verifiable facts. Yeah, there's hoping this because you can 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:21.120 you can teach people about science. You can you can 0:14:21.120 --> 0:14:24.760 teach people more about logical thinking as well. Um And 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:27.400 though of course I think that's clearly part of scientific 0:14:27.440 --> 0:14:30.840 literacy as well. But but I can't help but think 0:14:30.840 --> 0:14:33.600 back to, for instance, Carl Sagan's discussion of on the 0:14:34.320 --> 0:14:37.760 Bologna Detection Kit, like, the problem is people don't have 0:14:37.880 --> 0:14:40.160 the kit online, right, or they don't have all the 0:14:40.160 --> 0:14:42.320 tools and the kit for instance, just to just to 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:44.440 blow through these really quickly. He goes into far more 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:48.240 detail in the demon Haunted world. But the nine tools 0:14:48.360 --> 0:14:51.920 are and again abbreviated Number one. Whenever possible, there must 0:14:51.920 --> 0:14:56.480 be independent confirmation of the facts. Facts and quotations uh 0:14:56.560 --> 0:15:00.240 Number two. Encourage a substantive debate on the evidence by 0:15:00.360 --> 0:15:04.480 knowledgeable proponents of all points of view. Number Number three. 0:15:04.560 --> 0:15:07.920 Arguments from authority carry little weight. Authorities have made mistakes 0:15:07.920 --> 0:15:09.960 in the past, they will do so again in the future. 0:15:09.960 --> 0:15:13.320 In science, there are no authorities. At most there are experts. 0:15:13.960 --> 0:15:17.320 Number four. Spin more than one hypothesis. Number five. Try 0:15:17.360 --> 0:15:20.000 not to get overly attached to a hypothesis just because 0:15:20.000 --> 0:15:24.920 it's yours. Hard Number six quantify If whatever it is 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:28.800 you're explaining has some measure, some numerical quantity attached to it, 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:32.160 you'll be much better able to discriminate among competing hypotheses. 0:15:32.280 --> 0:15:35.040 This is why numbers are often useful in science exactly. 0:15:35.440 --> 0:15:38.120 Number seven. If there's a chain of argument, every link 0:15:38.120 --> 0:15:40.920 in the chain must work, including the premise, not just 0:15:41.160 --> 0:15:44.920 most of them. Number eight Acam's razer. This is basically, 0:15:44.920 --> 0:15:48.640 when you have um two hypotheses that explain data equally well, 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:50.920 you choose the simpler of the two. Right, So like 0:15:51.000 --> 0:15:54.000 a dream or a hallucination is probably a better explanation 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:58.200 for your alien abduction experience than aliens coming here exactly. 0:15:58.440 --> 0:16:01.280 And then finally, the knife tool in a Bolognay detection 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:04.840 kit always ask whether the hypothesis can be at least 0:16:04.880 --> 0:16:09.440 in principle falsified. Propositions that are untestable or unfalsifiable are 0:16:09.520 --> 0:16:12.840 not worth much. That's a really good kit. And I 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:15.840 think Carl Sagan, I don't want to put words in 0:16:15.880 --> 0:16:18.600 his mouth, but I do think he he seems to 0:16:18.640 --> 0:16:23.920 operate from that kind of hopeful scientific comprehension thesis point 0:16:23.920 --> 0:16:25.960 of view. At least as best I can tell, it 0:16:26.000 --> 0:16:28.520 seems like he thinks, you know, the problem with the 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:32.040 lack of scientific skepticism among the people is just that 0:16:32.120 --> 0:16:34.520 they need access to better tools like this, and if 0:16:34.560 --> 0:16:37.560 we can communicate those tools to them, they can bring 0:16:37.600 --> 0:16:40.160 them online. And then they'll be more protected against the 0:16:40.280 --> 0:16:43.320 titular Bolognay, yeah, I think so. Now back to this paper, 0:16:43.400 --> 0:16:46.360 the authors write that on this hypothesis, on the science 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:50.680 comprehension thesis, the lack of comprehension skill causes people to 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:54.040 over rely on what's calling what's known as system one 0:16:54.280 --> 0:16:58.880 thinking when judging empirical scientific questions like perceptions of risk. 0:16:59.160 --> 0:17:01.640 Now we should mention a little bit about the difference 0:17:01.680 --> 0:17:05.040 between these concepts of system one thinking and system to thinking. 0:17:05.080 --> 0:17:07.960 This is big in the works of people like Daniel 0:17:08.000 --> 0:17:11.360 Kanaman who have written about behavioral economics and the psychology 0:17:11.400 --> 0:17:13.600 of bias and stuff that's right. It was key to 0:17:13.720 --> 0:17:17.080 his two thousand and eleven book Thinking Fast and Slow. Um, 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:19.640 And we've talked about system one thinking system to thinking 0:17:19.640 --> 0:17:21.760 on the show before I Think, I think so. Yeah. 0:17:21.960 --> 0:17:28.639 The basic explanation here, system one thinking is all about fast, automatic, frequent, emotional, stereotypic, 0:17:28.720 --> 0:17:32.840 and unconscious thinking. This is the theory. This is ruled 0:17:32.840 --> 0:17:36.720 by heuristics, you know, shortcut ways of thinking. When you 0:17:37.240 --> 0:17:39.680 when you look at two piles of things and want 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:42.640 to know how many, you know which pile has more 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:45.040 things in it. If you just judge by I don't 0:17:45.040 --> 0:17:48.240 know your eyeball. It that system one system to thinking 0:17:48.240 --> 0:17:51.560 would be what maybe you count the things in the pile? Right? 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:56.679 It is slow, effortful, infrequent, logical calculating, and conscious. This 0:17:56.720 --> 0:17:58.560 reminds me a lot of the two fear networks that 0:17:58.640 --> 0:18:01.479 were recently discussed in the show Yeah and the Slayer 0:18:01.480 --> 0:18:05.040 episode Yeah. System two is all about avoiding the tiger 0:18:05.080 --> 0:18:08.040 haunted thickets. Well, if you rely on system one, then 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:10.760 you're more of a tiger racer, a tiger boxer, or 0:18:10.880 --> 0:18:14.120 just I guess, just a straight up tiger denier. And 0:18:14.280 --> 0:18:16.760 you know, both of those systems are necessary actually because 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:22.159 we don't always have time to do deliberate, slow logical 0:18:22.320 --> 0:18:25.600 calculating conscious thought a lot. You know, if we did 0:18:25.640 --> 0:18:28.520 that about every decision we made, we couldn't live. That 0:18:28.560 --> 0:18:31.040 would be no way to survive. You have to be 0:18:31.520 --> 0:18:34.440 fast and reactive and unconscious about all kinds of things. 0:18:34.760 --> 0:18:37.480 And so the question is how do you choose which 0:18:37.600 --> 0:18:40.480 types of decisions and scenarios to apply these two different 0:18:40.880 --> 0:18:44.520 thinking schema to on the science comprehension thesis, I think 0:18:44.520 --> 0:18:48.280 the idea is that people are relying on system one 0:18:48.440 --> 0:18:52.920 thinking to answer empirical questions about science that are politically relevant, 0:18:53.119 --> 0:18:55.520 whereas they should be using their system to thinking to 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:59.680 get through the get through the fast reactive, stereotypic kind 0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:03.200 of thing ing and come to the correct answer. Fun fact, 0:19:03.680 --> 0:19:05.800 we used to be owned by a company that called 0:19:05.840 --> 0:19:10.040 itself System one UH, named after this this mode of thinking. 0:19:10.240 --> 0:19:12.760 But that's not the only hypothesis on offer. That's the 0:19:12.760 --> 0:19:17.239 science comprehension thesis. The other hypothesis, the rival hypothesis, is 0:19:17.760 --> 0:19:21.359 what if the problem with controversies over empirical questions is 0:19:21.440 --> 0:19:25.119 not that they're caused by a deficit of knowledge or 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:29.200 cognitive skill UH. And this other idea the authors called 0:19:29.200 --> 0:19:32.560 the identity protective cognition thesis or the i C t 0:19:33.280 --> 0:19:37.600 They write, quote, whereas s CT attributes conflicts over decision 0:19:37.680 --> 0:19:42.600 relevant science two deficits in science comprehension, I SET sees 0:19:42.640 --> 0:19:47.520 the public's otherwise intact capacity to comprehend decision relevant science 0:19:47.800 --> 0:19:52.200 as disabled by cultural and political conflict. In other words, 0:19:52.359 --> 0:19:55.840 it's not that people can't understand the science, it's that 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:59.600 they could understand the issue if they were not politically 0:19:59.680 --> 0:20:03.320 charged urged. And it is specifically the political charging of 0:20:03.359 --> 0:20:06.919 the issue that makes it impossible for them to understand 0:20:07.000 --> 0:20:09.920 what they otherwise might be able to. All right, so 0:20:09.960 --> 0:20:12.119 I have to try and put this into tiger terms. Okay, 0:20:12.119 --> 0:20:16.160 So it's like having the capabilities to avoid tiger kill zones, 0:20:16.200 --> 0:20:19.760 but refusing to do so for political reasons. Right, Yes, 0:20:20.480 --> 0:20:24.040 all your friends around you maybe are saying like, oh no, 0:20:24.440 --> 0:20:27.080 that the people who say that the tigers hang out 0:20:27.080 --> 0:20:30.000 in the jungle are dumb. They are the bad people, 0:20:30.400 --> 0:20:33.199 real people, really, the good people all know that there 0:20:33.240 --> 0:20:35.479 are no tigers in the jungle, that the tigers are 0:20:35.520 --> 0:20:37.840 somewhere else. I do admit I love it anytime we 0:20:37.880 --> 0:20:40.879 can put things in terms of big cat attacks. That 0:20:40.920 --> 0:20:43.399 always just seems to really help explain the topic. You 0:20:43.400 --> 0:20:46.280 should know, I'm picturing not a real tiger, but Tony 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:50.000 the tiger. Yeah, Tony the tiger mauling and killing people 0:20:50.160 --> 0:20:54.600 a right. Okay, So here's the question. If this hypothesis 0:20:54.680 --> 0:20:57.240 is correct, why would it be the case that political 0:20:57.320 --> 0:21:01.159 charging of issues would make us enable to use our 0:21:01.240 --> 0:21:04.119 normal reasoning faculties. Well, first of all, I mean think 0:21:04.119 --> 0:21:06.480 about the Upton's and Claire quote. It's difficult to make 0:21:06.480 --> 0:21:09.679 a person understand something when their salary depends on it. 0:21:09.960 --> 0:21:12.920 Here we're not talking about a salary, but about something 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:16.760 else of immense psychic and material value, and that is 0:21:17.080 --> 0:21:20.919 your membership, status and standing within a social group that 0:21:21.119 --> 0:21:24.720 is in part defined by its commitment to certain moral 0:21:24.760 --> 0:21:27.919 and political values. Well, I think that's very much like salary. 0:21:27.920 --> 0:21:30.720 I mean, salary is money, money is life, money is happiness. 0:21:30.800 --> 0:21:33.520 I mean we say it's not, but it is. Uh, 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:35.760 and then uh and then but but it is the 0:21:35.760 --> 0:21:38.119 thing that allows us to eat and live and be 0:21:38.840 --> 0:21:41.400 in most circumstances, certainly in the world that we've we've 0:21:41.680 --> 0:21:46.000 we've made and remade for ourselves and likewise, in a 0:21:46.000 --> 0:21:48.560 more primal sense, belonging to a group, being part of 0:21:48.359 --> 0:21:51.760 a group, that is, that is survival for for the 0:21:52.040 --> 0:21:55.840 Homo sapiens. Yes, that is how we have historically and 0:21:55.880 --> 0:22:00.600