The thing is, I don't think that the vast majority of human beings actually "think" when it comes to things like cryonics or political theory or religion, and many other abstract concepts. For some reason, these areas are out of bounds, and they do not apply their reasoning powers to them.
I hate to say it, but I'm pretty much of the opinion that "the vast majority" could be removed from your statement in order to let the blanket of accusation fall onto our entire species. It really hit home for me during the "evolution in public schools" controversy. I had the luck of living out in the western US at the time, and it was often a topic of conversation due to the very real chance that the schools in our area might decide it was a good idea. It was a great community, but one covered in a thick gloss of christian fundamentalism. It was a real boost at first, when I discovered how much company I had in my annoyance at a public so illiterate in even the basics of scientific methodology. Unfortunately, it didn't take much time in conversation with my fellow boosters to realise that a very large percentage had absolutely no understanding of evolution at all. In fact, their explanations boiled down to just as much magic and hand waving as the "God did it" crowd. Not that the people yelling "teach the controversy!" fared any better with either their promotional pieces or in being able to really talk about what constitutes science.
I have to admit to feeling a bit smug in knowing that I actually understood what we were supporting. No clique here, no need to follow the tow of instinct and "us Vs. them" mentality. I had concrete, testable, reasons for believing what I believed. And then I looked at the carpet.
It reminded me of strings made up of subatomic particles. And that, in turn, reminded me that I know jack shit about particle physics. The occasional remnant of a half remembered definition might pop into my head, but at the end of the day I still couldn't describe what a gluon is. And yet my certainty that the universe worked by means of its various subatomic kinfolk was as strong as ever. I knew that I'd be cheering right along with any fight to keep particle physics in schools. And I also knew that there'd be someone just as much a judgemental bastard as myself who'd look down on me a bit for it.
But the important step I'd made at that point came in being able to occasionally ask "why" I believed something. To take a contrary position and see if I could smash a hole in my own core beliefs. Without that one winds up in the position highlighted by both crackpots and non-objective "skeptics". They believe what they believe fueled by regurgitated self-validation spewed by one community member to another. And of course they're right, so anything which appears to act contrary to their beliefs is obviously either a lie or a conspiracy by whatever group they've posited into the role of crusader against truth. Suddenly, someone proving you wrong is actually absolute proof that you were right all along! Otherwise, why would these people be working so hard to create false evidence and twist the nets of control to make society agree with them.
I don't know that there's really any way around it though. We're social animals, and an intuitive grasp of the core beliefs of our group has and continues to be a huge asset to any individual within it. My only hope is to echo something stated by many of the participants in Stanley Milgram's obedience to authority experiment. Namely, that acceptance of possessing such a limitation has a side effect of lessening its impact, thanks to varying levels of watchfulness directed towards it.
In the end though, we still have the limitations imposed on our understanding of the world by lack of time, lack of memory, and lack of educational aids. With the time we've been given, there's just not time to get a true grasp of all the sciences and philosophies in the world. Which pretty much brings us full circle back to the usefulness of intuitively basing ones own beliefs on that of the group. A group which itself, in theory at least, would be pushed to belief by the positive results that come in a more reproducible fashion with things that are actually true.
I can't help but just shrug. I even note that while writing this a number of studies leaped to my mind, but none clearly enough to really cite. And yet these very studies are ones which served as guideposts to this theory for me. So I think I'll take that "In the end" and upgrade it from a shrug to a laugh.
You need to have video infotainment, dispersed widely, and give the impression that people of high status accept the idea.
I agree once again. Branding works, marketing gets results. We don't like to think we're that easily manipulated, but for the most part it seems to be the case. In short, "Give me a five minute video of Walkin begging people to give to research and I'll give you results." Or Oprah, I suppose. But...c'mon...Walkin.
Edited by emerson, 24 June 2006 - 12:42 PM.
