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Why do conservatives believe lies?

weaver2

weaver2

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Why Are Conservatives More Susceptible to Believing Lies?
An interplay between how all humans think and how conservatives tend to act might actually explain a lot about our current moment.
By JOHN EHRENREICH
NOV 09, 2017 9:00 AM

"Many conservatives have a loose relationship with facts. The right-wing denial of what most people think of as accepted reality starts with political issues: As recently as 2016, 45 percent of Republicans still believed that the Affordable Care Act included “death panels” (it doesn’t). A 2015 poll found that 54 percent of GOP primary voters believed then-President Obama to be a Muslim (…he isn’t).

Then there are the false beliefs about generally accepted science. Only 25 percent of self-proclaimed Trump voters agree that climate change is caused by human activities. Only 43 percent of Republicans overall believe that humans have evolved over time.

And then it gets really crazy. Almost 1 in 6 Trump voters, while simultaneously viewing photographs of the crowds at the 2016 inauguration of Donald Trump and at the 2012 inauguration of Barack Obama , insisted that the former were larger. Sixty-six percent of self-described “very conservative” Americans seriously believe that “Muslims are covertly implementing Sharia law in American courts.” Forty-six percent of Trump voters polled just after the 2016 election either thought that Hillary Clinton was connected to a child sex trafficking ring run out of the basement of a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., or weren’t sure if it was true.

If “truth” is judged on the basis of Enlightenment ideas of reason and more or less objective “evidence,” many of the substantive positions common on the right seem to border on delusional. The left is certainly not immune to credulity (most commonly about the safety of vaccines, GMO foods, and fracking), but the right seems to specialize in it. “Misinformation is currently predominantly a pathology of the right,” concluded a team of scholars from the Harvard Kennedy School and Northeastern University at a February 2017 conference. A BuzzFeed analysis found that three main hyperconservative Facebook pages were roughly twice as likely as three leading ultraliberal Facebook pages to publish fake or misleading information."




Why do conservatives believe lies????? Worse yet why do they continue to post these lies after someone post irrefutable proof that they are lies? This is a common problem on discussion sites like this. So much time has to be spent refuting their lies that they make intelligent discussion impossible. Is that their goal, put an end to a topic they want to suppress ?
 
weaver2 said:
Why Are Conservatives More Susceptible to Believing Lies?
An interplay between how all humans think and how conservatives tend to act might actually explain a lot about our current moment.
By JOHN EHRENREICH
NOV 09, 2017 9:00 AM

"Many conservatives have a loose relationship with facts. The right-wing denial of what most people think of as accepted reality starts with political issues: As recently as 2016, 45 percent of Republicans still believed that the Affordable Care Act included “death panels” (it doesn’t). A 2015 poll found that 54 percent of GOP primary voters believed then-President Obama to be a Muslim (…he isn’t).

Then there are the false beliefs about generally accepted science. Only 25 percent of self-proclaimed Trump voters agree that climate change is caused by human activities. Only 43 percent of Republicans overall believe that humans have evolved over time.

And then it gets really crazy. Almost 1 in 6 Trump voters, while simultaneously viewing photographs of the crowds at the 2016 inauguration of Donald Trump and at the 2012 inauguration of Barack Obama , insisted that the former were larger. Sixty-six percent of self-described “very conservative” Americans seriously believe that “Muslims are covertly implementing Sharia law in American courts.” Forty-six percent of Trump voters polled just after the 2016 election either thought that Hillary Clinton was connected to a child sex trafficking ring run out of the basement of a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., or weren’t sure if it was true.

If “truth” is judged on the basis of Enlightenment ideas of reason and more or less objective “evidence,” many of the substantive positions common on the right seem to border on delusional. The left is certainly not immune to credulity (most commonly about the safety of vaccines, GMO foods, and fracking), but the right seems to specialize in it. “Misinformation is currently predominantly a pathology of the right,” concluded a team of scholars from the Harvard Kennedy School and Northeastern University at a February 2017 conference. A BuzzFeed analysis found that three main hyperconservative Facebook pages were roughly twice as likely as three leading ultraliberal Facebook pages to publish fake or misleading information."




Why do conservatives believe lies????? Worse yet why do they continue to post these lies after someone post irrefutable proof that they are lies? This is a common problem on discussion sites like this. So much time has to be spent refuting their lies that they make intelligent discussion impossible. Is that their goal, put an end to a topic they want to suppress ?
Click to expand...




So many discussion simply descend into interminable refutations of conservative, especially conservative Christian, lies that the subject of the topic is completely eclipsed.
 
Anyone hyper-partisan enough will believe bull****.
 
"Science." Teh.
 
weaver2 said:
Why Are Conservatives More Susceptible to Believing Lies?
An interplay between how all humans think and how conservatives tend to act might actually explain a lot about our current moment.
By JOHN EHRENREICH
NOV 09, 2017 9:00 AM

"Many conservatives have a loose relationship with facts. The right-wing denial of what most people think of as accepted reality starts with political issues: As recently as 2016, 45 percent of Republicans still believed that the Affordable Care Act included “death panels” (it doesn’t). A 2015 poll found that 54 percent of GOP primary voters believed then-President Obama to be a Muslim (…he isn’t).

Then there are the false beliefs about generally accepted science. Only 25 percent of self-proclaimed Trump voters agree that climate change is caused by human activities. Only 43 percent of Republicans overall believe that humans have evolved over time.

And then it gets really crazy. Almost 1 in 6 Trump voters, while simultaneously viewing photographs of the crowds at the 2016 inauguration of Donald Trump and at the 2012 inauguration of Barack Obama , insisted that the former were larger. Sixty-six percent of self-described “very conservative” Americans seriously believe that “Muslims are covertly implementing Sharia law in American courts.” Forty-six percent of Trump voters polled just after the 2016 election either thought that Hillary Clinton was connected to a child sex trafficking ring run out of the basement of a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., or weren’t sure if it was true.

If “truth” is judged on the basis of Enlightenment ideas of reason and more or less objective “evidence,” many of the substantive positions common on the right seem to border on delusional. The left is certainly not immune to credulity (most commonly about the safety of vaccines, GMO foods, and fracking), but the right seems to specialize in it. “Misinformation is currently predominantly a pathology of the right,” concluded a team of scholars from the Harvard Kennedy School and Northeastern University at a February 2017 conference. A BuzzFeed analysis found that three main hyperconservative Facebook pages were roughly twice as likely as three leading ultraliberal Facebook pages to publish fake or misleading information."




Why do conservatives believe lies????? Worse yet why do they continue to post these lies after someone post irrefutable proof that they are lies? This is a common problem on discussion sites like this. So much time has to be spent refuting their lies that they make intelligent discussion impossible. Is that their goal, put an end to a topic they want to suppress ?
Click to expand...

OK, given you know that this climate change thing is real and we need to act right now to save the world you can answer my challenge very easily;

$100 easy give away. My money to you.

I will give you $100 to the first person to cite a single place, a single local council, which will have to spend more than it will spend on traffic lights (it has to have some) in order to counter, to sort out, a single effect of the warmer climate, as per the IPCC's numbers for climate. You must explain, in your own words, the mechanism, the bit between the warming and the bad thing, and support it with some sort of science, a paper or such, to show this mechanism in detail and so we can look at it to see if it is going to be so bad that the local council will have to spend more than the traffic light budget.

I will exclude only one aspect of warming; the need for places which have permafrost to change the foundations of their buildings. But I recon that such places will be better not worse for some warming.

Just think you get to take my money and wipe the smile off my face.

Obviously if you can't manage it you, and everybody else, will know you don't have any argument at all.
Click to expand...
 
Crovax said:
Most democrats don’t think GMOs are safe, why are democrats so susceptible to believing lies?

Poll: Scientists overwhelmingly think GMOs are safe to eat. The public doesn't. - Vox
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LOL Since when do Conservatives believe in science?

Gallup released its annual survey on American perceptions about global warming last week, and the results were a bit discouraging. While 85–90% of Democrats are worried about global warming, realize humans are causing it, and are aware that most scientists agree on this, independents and Republicans are a different story. Only 35% of Republicans and 62% of independents realize humans are causing global warming (down from 40% and 70% last year, respectively), a similar number are worried about it, and only 42% of Republicans and 65% of independents are aware of the scientific consensus – also significantly down from last year’s Gallup poll.
Click to expand...

American conservatives are still clueless about the 97% expert climate consensus | Dana Nuccitelli | Environment | The Guardian
 
I think for a good many conservatives, it's not about opposing facts, it's more about opposing ideas especially lefty socialist ideas. It doesn't seem to matter how poor or miserable they are, they want to believe that if they work hard enough, they too can be stinking rich. But most never make it but that doesn't matter as long as they have faith. They also hate seeing people of color succeed or become their betters, so any idea that helps equalize the playing the field, they are against. This kind of thinking goes way back to the civil war. The South told poor whites that Lincoln wants to free the slaves and if they don't join the rebel cause that blacks will become their equals in society. It worked like a charm. I think conservatives still have the same kind of thinking going on today only now its not just against Blacks, but Latinos, Muslims, Jews and basically, just brown skinned people in general.

Wake up people Trump is trying to commit an ethnic cleansing right before your eyes.
 
Tim the plumber said:
OK, given you know that this climate change thing is real and we need to act right now to save the world you can answer my challenge very easily;

$100 easy give away. My money to you.

Click to expand...


So you're excluding the thawing of permafrost which pretty adequately gives proof to climate change? Isn't this just proof that conservatives will go to any length to believe lies?
 
weaver2 said:
Why Are Conservatives More Susceptible to Believing Lies?
An interplay between how all humans think and how conservatives tend to act might actually explain a lot about our current moment.
By JOHN EHRENREICH
NOV 09, 2017 9:00 AM

"Many conservatives have a loose relationship with facts.
Click to expand...

Conservatives don't have a lock on a loose relationship with facts. I mean, have you heard the nonsense from the left? Especially from the media? Oh...wait...yes. Your own words indicate that YOU have a loose relationship with facts, as well.

Moving on...
 
weaver2 said:
Why Are Conservatives More Susceptible to Believing Lies?
An interplay between how all humans think and how conservatives tend to act might actually explain a lot about our current moment.
By JOHN EHRENREICH
NOV 09, 2017 9:00 AM

"Many conservatives have a loose relationship with facts. The right-wing denial of what most people think of as accepted reality starts with political issues: As recently as 2016, 45 percent of Republicans still believed that the Affordable Care Act included “death panels” (it doesn’t). A 2015 poll found that 54 percent of GOP primary voters believed then-President Obama to be a Muslim (…he isn’t).

Then there are the false beliefs about generally accepted science. Only 25 percent of self-proclaimed Trump voters agree that climate change is caused by human activities. Only 43 percent of Republicans overall believe that humans have evolved over time.

And then it gets really crazy. Almost 1 in 6 Trump voters, while simultaneously viewing photographs of the crowds at the 2016 inauguration of Donald Trump and at the 2012 inauguration of Barack Obama , insisted that the former were larger. Sixty-six percent of self-described “very conservative” Americans seriously believe that “Muslims are covertly implementing Sharia law in American courts.” Forty-six percent of Trump voters polled just after the 2016 election either thought that Hillary Clinton was connected to a child sex trafficking ring run out of the basement of a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., or weren’t sure if it was true.

If “truth” is judged on the basis of Enlightenment ideas of reason and more or less objective “evidence,” many of the substantive positions common on the right seem to border on delusional. The left is certainly not immune to credulity (most commonly about the safety of vaccines, GMO foods, and fracking), but the right seems to specialize in it. “Misinformation is currently predominantly a pathology of the right,” concluded a team of scholars from the Harvard Kennedy School and Northeastern University at a February 2017 conference. A BuzzFeed analysis found that three main hyperconservative Facebook pages were roughly twice as likely as three leading ultraliberal Facebook pages to publish fake or misleading information."




Why do conservatives believe lies????? Worse yet why do they continue to post these lies after someone post irrefutable proof that they are lies? This is a common problem on discussion sites like this. So much time has to be spent refuting their lies that they make intelligent discussion impossible. Is that their goal, put an end to a topic they want to suppress ?
Click to expand...

The better question is, in light of the point you think you're making, why do you buy this article hook, line, and sinker?

Do you, one who asks why "conservatives believe lies," think this article represents good science done well, with reliable conclusions? Do tell.
 
weaver2 said:
Why Are Conservatives More Susceptible to Believing Lies?
An interplay between how all humans think and how conservatives tend to act might actually explain a lot about our current moment.
By JOHN EHRENREICH
NOV 09, 2017 9:00 AM

"Many conservatives have a loose relationship with facts. The right-wing denial of what most people think of as accepted reality starts with political issues: As recently as 2016, 45 percent of Republicans still believed that the Affordable Care Act included “death panels” (it doesn’t). A 2015 poll found that 54 percent of GOP primary voters believed then-President Obama to be a Muslim (…he isn’t).

Then there are the false beliefs about generally accepted science. Only 25 percent of self-proclaimed Trump voters agree that climate change is caused by human activities. Only 43 percent of Republicans overall believe that humans have evolved over time.

And then it gets really crazy. Almost 1 in 6 Trump voters, while simultaneously viewing photographs of the crowds at the 2016 inauguration of Donald Trump and at the 2012 inauguration of Barack Obama , insisted that the former were larger. Sixty-six percent of self-described “very conservative” Americans seriously believe that “Muslims are covertly implementing Sharia law in American courts.” Forty-six percent of Trump voters polled just after the 2016 election either thought that Hillary Clinton was connected to a child sex trafficking ring run out of the basement of a pizzeria in Washington, D.C., or weren’t sure if it was true.

If “truth” is judged on the basis of Enlightenment ideas of reason and more or less objective “evidence,” many of the substantive positions common on the right seem to border on delusional. The left is certainly not immune to credulity (most commonly about the safety of vaccines, GMO foods, and fracking), but the right seems to specialize in it. “Misinformation is currently predominantly a pathology of the right,” concluded a team of scholars from the Harvard Kennedy School and Northeastern University at a February 2017 conference. A BuzzFeed analysis found that three main hyperconservative Facebook pages were roughly twice as likely as three leading ultraliberal Facebook pages to publish fake or misleading information."




Why do conservatives believe lies????? Worse yet why do they continue to post these lies after someone post irrefutable proof that they are lies? This is a common problem on discussion sites like this. So much time has to be spent refuting their lies that they make intelligent discussion impossible. Is that their goal, put an end to a topic they want to suppress ?
Click to expand...

Why does anyone believe what they are told without question? For example, wise people don't believe dinosaurs died off as a result of a meteor hit just because some speculator with a pocket full of secular government grant money made up the idea. Wise people wait for proof before committing to questionable ideas.
 
marke said:
Why does anyone believe what they are told without question? For example, wise people don't believe dinosaurs died off as a result of a meteor hit just because some speculator with a pocket full of secular government grant money made up the idea. Wise people wait for proof before committing to questionable ideas.
Click to expand...


This is what the article is talking about. There is adequate geological proof about meteor hits on earth, how big they were, when they happened and in most cases excavated meteor parts so the mineralogical and chemical composition of the meteor is known. Why is the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky an authority on the ages of the earth and geology is a lie?
 
weaver2 said:
This is what the article is talking about. There is adequate geological proof about meteor hits on earth, how big they were, when they happened and in most cases excavated meteor parts so the mineralogical and chemical composition of the meteor is known. Why is the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky an authority on the ages of the earth and geology is a lie?
Click to expand...

So, per my earlier question, you DO think this article represents good science, done well.

In light of this thread, the irony is thick, smooth, creamy, and delicious.

And it pretty much answers the question for you. You believe it because you want to believe it. Because it flatters your worldview and your view of people you disagree with. You buy it uncritically because of a deep-seated ideological confirmation bias.
 
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weaver2 said:
This is what the article is talking about. There is adequate geological proof about meteor hits on earth, how big they were, when they happened and in most cases excavated meteor parts so the mineralogical and chemical composition of the meteor is known. Why is the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky an authority on the ages of the earth and geology is a lie?
Click to expand...

The theory that the dinosaur extinction was caused by a single meteor (which impacted in what is now the Gulf of Mexico, creating what is called the Chicxulub crater) was born just 30 years ago and already scientists have dismissed that theory for something else they like to think might have happened. Mass extinctions worldwide caused by a single meteor impact are pretty far-fetched and I am not surprised the young theory is already being cast aside.

At any rate, these various speculations for the causes of mass extinctions are not scientific facts because they have not been actually scientifically observed and verified.
 
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Harshaw said:
So, per my earlier question, you DO think this article represents good science, done well.

In light of this thread, the irony is thick, smooth, creamy, and delicious.

And it pretty much answers the question for you. You believe it because you want to believe it. Because it flatters your worldview and your view of people you disagree with. You buy it uncritically because of a deep-seated ideological confirmation bias.
Click to expand...

I believe that all people, Democrats as well as Republicans, liberals or conservatives, as the article said, to believe things that reinforce a belief system in which they have a vested interest. I don't believe that simply because I want to believe it nor do I believe it because of a deep seated ideological bias. I think there are probably enough research projects that bear that out as a truth about human nature.

It's possible that the question is wrong. Instead of "Why do conservatives believe lies." The question should be "Why do conservatives have a belief system that is reinforced by lying and
believing lies."?
 
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