Have you ever heard someone make an argument that leaves you shaking your head in disbelief?\u00a0 Does it seem to you like some people are coming from a completely different reality than your own?\u00a0 If so, then this blog is for you.\u00a0 I have spent the last year trying to develop an understanding of the common thought patterns that drive the acrimonious spirit of our social and political dialogue.\u00a0 I am continually amazed by what I hear coming from seemingly informed people.\u00a0 I have assumed that some folks are either deluded, disingenuous, or downright ignorant.\u00a0 There is yet another possibility here, including the reality that different moral schema or belief systems may be driving their thinking.\u00a0 And if this is the case, how do these divergent processes come to be?\u00a0 I\u00a0 have learned a lot through this exploration and feel compelled do provide a recap of the posts I have made.\u00a0 I want to share with you those posts that have gathered the most traction and some that I believe warrant a bit more attention.<\/p>\n
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Over the past year I have posted 52 articles often dealing with Erroneous Thought Processes, Intuitive Thinking, and Rational Thought.\u00a0 Additionally, I have explored the down stream implications of these processes with regard to politics<\/a>, morality<\/a>, religion<\/a>, parenting<\/a>, memory<\/a>, willpower<\/a>, and general perception.\u00a0 I have attempted to be evidenced-based and objective in this process – striving to avoid the very trappings of confirmation bias<\/a> and the erroneous processes that I am trying to understand. \u00a0 As it turns out, the brain is very complicated: and although it is the single most amazing system known to human kind, it can and does lead us astray in very surprising and alarming ways.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n As for this blog, the top ten posts, based on the shear number of hits, are as follows:<\/p>\n What started out as ramblings from a curious guy in a remote corner of New York State ended up being read by folks from all over the planet.\u00a0 It has been a difficult process at times, consuming huge amounts of time, but it has also been exhilarating and deeply fulfilling.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I have been heavily influenced by several scientists and authors in this exploration.\u00a0 Of particular importance have been Steven Pinker, Daniel Simons, Christopher Chabris, Jonah Lehrer, Bruce Hood, Carl Sagan, and Malcolm Gladwell.\u00a0 Exploring the combined works of these men has been full of twists and turns that in some cases necessitated deep re-evaluation of long held beliefs.\u00a0 Holding myself to important standards – valuing evidence over ideology – has been an important and guiding theme.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Several important concepts have floated to the top as I poked through the diverse literature pertaining to thought processes. Of critical importance has been the realization that what we have, when it comes to our thought processes, is a highly developed yet deeply flawed system that has been shaped by natural selection over millions of years of evolution.\u00a0 Also important has been my increased understanding of the importance of genes, the basic element of selective pressures, as they play out in morality and political\/religious beliefs.\u00a0 These issues are covered in the top ten posts listed above.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n There are other worthy posts that did not garner as much attention as those listed above.\u00a0 Some of my other favorites included a review of Steven Pinker’s article in the New York Times (also titled Moral Instinct<\/a>,) a look at Jonathon Haidt’s Moral Foundations Theory in Political Divide<\/a>, as well as the tricks of Retail Mind Manipulation<\/a> and the Illusion of Attention<\/a>.\u00a0 This latter post<\/a> and my series on Vaccines and Autism (Part 1<\/a>, Part 2<\/a>, Part 3)<\/a> were perhaps the most important of the lot.\u00a0 Having the content of these become general knowledge would make the world a safer place.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The evolution of understanding regarding the power and importance of Intuitive relative to Rational Thinking<\/a> was humbling at times and Daniel Simons’ and Christopher Chabris’ book, The Invisible Gorilla<\/em><\/span>, certainly provided a mind opening experience.\u00a0 Hey, our intuitive capabilities are incredible (as illustrated by Gladwell in Blink<\/em> & Lehrer in How We Decide<\/em>) but the downfalls are amazingly humbling<\/a>.\u00a0 I’ve covered other topics such as\u00a0 happiness<\/a>, superstition<\/a>, placebos<\/a>, and the debate over human nature<\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The human brain, no matter how remarkable, is flawed in two fundamental ways.\u00a0 First, the proclivities toward patternicity (pareidolia), hyperactive agency detection, and superstition, although once adaptive mechanisms, now lead to many errors of thought.\u00a0 Since the age of enlightenment, when human kind developed the scientific method, we have exponentially expanded our knowledge base regarding the workings of the world and the universe.\u00a0 These leaps of knowledge have rendered those error prone proclivities unessential for survival.\u00a0 Regardless, they have remained a dominant cognitive force.\u00a0 Although our intuition and rapid cognitions have sustained us, and in some ways still do, the everyday illusions impede us in important ways.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Secondly, we are prone to a multitude of cognitive biases<\/a> that diminish and narrow our capacity to truly understand the world. Time after time I have written of the dangers of ideology with regard to its capacity to put blind-folds on adherents.\u00a0 Often the blind- folds are absolutely essential to sustain the ideology.\u00a0 And this is dangerous when truths and facts are denied or innocents are subjugated or brutalized.\u00a0 As I discussed in Spinoza’s Conjecture<\/a>:\u00a0 “We all look at the world through our personal lenses of experience.\u00a0 Our experiences shape our understanding of the world, and ultimately our understanding of [it], then filters what we take in.\u00a0 The end result is that we may reject or ignore new and important information simply because it does not conform to our previously held beliefs. <\/p>\n Because of our genetically inscribed tendencies toward mysticism and gullibility, we must make extra effort in order to find truth. As Dr. Steven Novella once wrote:<\/p>\n “We must realize that the default mode of human psychology is to grab onto comforting beliefs for purely emotional reasons, and then justify those beliefs to ourselves with post-hoc rationalizations. It takes effort to rise above this tendency, to step back from our beliefs and our emotional connection to conclusions and focus on the process.” <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n We must therefore be humble with regard to beliefs and be willing to accept that we are vulnerable to error prone influences outside our awareness.\u00a0 Recognition and acceptance of these proclivities are important first steps.\u00a0\u00a0 Are you ready to move forward?\u00a0 How do you think?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Have you ever heard someone make an argument that leaves you shaking your head in disbelief?\u00a0 Does it seem to you like some people are coming from a completely different reality than your own?\u00a0 If so, then this blog is for you.\u00a0 I have spent the last year trying to develop an understanding of the … <\/p>\n\n
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