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People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

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Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#101

Post by jjkaczor »

rglover wrote: post #98
jjkaczor wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"but that terminology/connection was made by the media" She put enough of her thoughts and 'research' into her post that it was a 'dog whistle' for like-minded-thinkers. You do not always have to explicitly say something, to actually say something... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_whistle_(politics)

No. This is a rationalization for a belief that is incorrect.

It can be both. Typically one doesn't need to rationalize publically - by posting this thing to a large enough audience, this was past the point of rationalization - but was instead performative and seeking agreement/attention and acknowledgment.

And rather than stating the incorrect belief explicitly, she was using dog-whistle rhetoric techniques.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#102

Post by rglover »

jjkaczor wrote: post #101
rglover wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. This is a rationalization for a belief that is incorrect.

It can be both. Typically one doesn't need to rationalize publically - by posting this thing to a large enough audience, this was past the point of rationalization - but was instead performative and seeking agreement/attention and acknowledgment. And rather than stating the incorrect belief explicitly, she was using dog-whistle rhetoric techniques.

Again, you're rationalizing. You're making assumptions about her intent without any evidence to the contrary. This sort of thinking is the exact problem. You're finding your own conclusion, accepting it as fact, and then (in the case of the media) promoting that as what took place. That's a lie, no matter how you twist it.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#103

Post by bulatb »

denton-scratch wrote: post #70
notreallyserio wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They become a problem when they go viral, among groups of people with limited critical thinking skills. Agreed, and to expand on this: I believe another problem is that these conspiracy theorists also believe that they have secret knowledge that the man doesn’t want you to have. Finally, they are smarter about something than those folks with education and success. This makes them an easy target for real conspiracie…

> See, for example, the anti-GMO movement I'm against GMO. Not because I believe retail GMO food is likely to be harmful; I mean, harmful foods could be made, but we have testing. I'm against GMO because (a) a lot of GMO plants have been engineered to be grown with heavy use of herbicides and pesticides, (b) GMO crops make a farm non-organic, and I'm in favour of organic farming for environmental reasons; and (c) GMO…

It's rational for them to lobby against GMO labeling because it's a lose-lose proposition, even if they honestly believe their food is safe and eat it themselves. Either it scares off consumers (some of whom won't know what GMO means but understandably assume it's bad because it's disclosed) or they have to spend a bunch of money on "consumer education" and lose some of them anyway.

That's whether GMOs are safe or not.

Water companies would also lobby against "Warning: heavy water" and Cisco would lobby against "gigahertz radiation" labels, but not because they have something to hide.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#104

Post by denton-scratch »

bulatb wrote: post #103
denton-scratch wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> See, for example, the anti-GMO movement I'm against GMO. Not because I believe retail GMO food is likely to be harmful; I mean, harmful foods could be made, but we have testing. I'm against GMO because (a) a lot of GMO plants have been engineered to be grown with heavy use of herbicides and pesticides, (b) GMO crops make a farm non-organic, and I'm in favour of organic farming for environmental reasons; and (c) GMO…

It's rational for them to lobby against GMO labeling because it's a lose-lose proposition, even if they honestly believe their food is safe and eat it themselves. Either it scares off consumers (some of whom won't know what GMO means but understandably assume it's bad because it's disclosed) or they have to spend a bunch of money on "consumer education" and lose some of them anyway. That's whether GMOs are safe or no…

> Doesn't mean they're hiding something.

No it doesn't.

But without a label of the form "contains GM ingredients", I am being deprived of choice about what I eat. It's reasonable to expect people to care a lot about what they eat.

> Water companies would also lobby against "heavy water" labels

If you mean labelling ordinary water as "heavy" because it contains a tiny amount of deuterium, I'm not that's analogous. Even if it is, I'm not sure that saying "They would say that, wouldn't they" makes their arguments against labelling more persuasive.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#105

Post by jjkaczor »

rglover wrote: post #102
jjkaczor wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can be both. Typically one doesn't need to rationalize publically - by posting this thing to a large enough audience, this was past the point of rationalization - but was instead performative and seeking agreement/attention and acknowledgment. And rather than stating the incorrect belief explicitly, she was using dog-whistle rhetoric techniques.

Again, you're rationalizing. You're making assumptions about her intent without any evidence to the contrary. This sort of thinking is the exact problem. You're finding your own conclusion, accepting it as fact, and then (in the case of the media) promoting that as what took place. That's a lie, no matter how you twist it.

The lie is pretending that people who post statements on a platform like Twitter and have a wide-spread audience or follower-base do not have any intent.

The lie is pretending that someones' written words are not actually enough evidence to show their intent.

The lie is pretending that statements exist completely isolated from any cultural or historical context. Marjorie Taylor Green has a well documented history of making very controversial statements.

The lie is ignoring the fact that time and time again conspiracy theorists keep bringing up the same scapegoats. Perhaps you are simply unaware that historically, attempting to link things with "Rothschild" is a very long-standing anti-semetic conspiracy and a known dog whistle.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#106

Post by GoblinSlayer »

kibwen wrote: post #96
umvi wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but unfortunately it appears to quickly devolve into actual, very firm beliefs for many people. Is it possible to quantify "many people"? Like, what percentage of people that are ostensibly flat earthers are actually genuine flat earthers vs. trolls? I would guess trolls make up the majority of internet flat earthers.

Trying to ascribe the intent of an action rather than focusing on the action itself is part of the problem in this circumstance. It's impossible to know how many are sincere, or how many are trolls pretending to be sincere, or how many are sincere but are pretending to be trolls so as to plausibly deny their sincere beliefs, etc. At the end of the day, the intent doesn't matter. If one is in a public forum (especiall…

Flat earther trolls that I saw didn't look sincere or stupid, they looked ironic.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#107

Post by iammisc »

TigeriusKirk wrote: post #75
rglover wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire "Jewish space laser" thing was never actually said. She mentioned names of people who are Jewish, but that terminology/connection was made by the media. Nothing she said illuminated this connection in any way. Was her point grounded in reality? Hell no. But the exact point being made above is highlighted by your comment. Her original post: https://politizoom.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Greene-las... .

The phenomenon of the exaggerations of "Jewish space lasers" and "horse paste" is an interesting topic. There's a perfectly reasonable point to be made in each case, but many of the people making it feel the need to overstate the case and make it even more absurd. I think it's because mockery spreads faster on the internet than a simple debunking. And so the thing being debunked is turned into its most extreme form.…

> The problem with this technique is that it can backfire if people start repeating it as what was actually being asserted. For example, the horse paste meme has backfired when it came to Rogan and the CNN doctor. When this happens, now the debunkers are on the defensive and they don't have a great way out of it since they're no longer on the side of accuracy and truth.

This is the problem with tribal audiences. CNN can say to its audience (mainly older liberals) that ivermection is horse paste, and face no repercussions. Conformity is so valued by society as a whole, that no one is going to stand up for the truth on CNN itself. But then in those brief moments when the outside world comes in, their bluff is called.

The right does it as well, and your mockery maximization principle (great name BTW) mandates that the meme is produced solely for their primary audience to sell clicks.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#108

Post by iammisc »

crazy_horse wrote: post #42
version_five wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've always felt like the belief in a large group of "conspiracy theorists" is probably one of the biggest "conspiracy theories". A friend of a relative is an apparent flat earther - my relative is always saying things like "oh you wouldn't believe what this guy thinks, he says the world is actually shaped like a UN map, what a goof". In this situation, which of the two is actually the more gullible? From the situati…

Read the conspiracy subreddit and get back with us.

The conspiracy subreddit gets discredited for the random stuff that gets posted on there, which ought to be expected since they do little moderation.

On several key points, the conspiracy subreddit has been correct. For example, in March 2020, they accurately predicted the course of covid, namely that vaccines would be developed, that there would be large-scale hesitancy, and that this would be used to justify the keeping of covid lockdowns / masking requirements / eviction moratoria far beyond the stated 15 days. Regardless of your belief in whether this was justified or not, this happened.

Similarly, the subreddit was correct about things later revealed by edward snowden.

Of course the next post will be about lizard people, but frankly, that doesn't mean we ought to discount the well thought out, presented, and reasonable 'conspiracies' that get trotted out there. Some of them actually happen.

It's just a bad place to trust, because they do no moderation. On the other hand, the places that do moderate are always behind on the things that end up being true.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#109

Post by iammisc »

helen___keller wrote: post #67
rglover wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he probably also believes The entire problem. You're not speaking to this person to figure out what they actually believe, you're forming a belief based on your own assumption.

This is a hypothetical person, so no, I am not speaking to the hypothetical person. My point is that IF uncle bob's belief system segued into beliefs about masks and vax, then it becomes more visible and causes conflict with family members who didn't give a shit about the previous belief system; not that all conspiracies will necessarily turn into beliefs about masks and vax.

It seems to me that there's been an uptick in cutting off family members because it sends a social signal to those you're speaking with that you're the kind of person that only cavorts with rational people. Given how individualistic america is today, cutting off your family for 'rationality's sake is seen as a good thing, whereas to most cultures, this is seen as utterly horrific.

Well that and the preponderance of cutting off hypothetical family members.

Re: People who jump to conclusions show other kinds of thinking errors

#110

Post by iammisc »

macksd wrote: post #95
motohagiography wrote: post #17

"Jumpers," as described mostly just lacked a fear of consequences of being wrong and were presented with an incentive to guess. Not to be conspiratorial, but one can't help but notice a recent preoccupation in mainstream outlets with pathologizing conspiracy theorists, dissenters, and now, "jumpers." Referencing Khaneman and Tversky's "system 1 and system 2" from their bestseller Thinking Fast and Slow without credit…

> lacked a fear of consequences of being wrong This is interesting. It used to be that some of the people we're discussing, let's use flat-earthers as an example, were just really, really committed to their idea. It was their whole identity and persona, and they would just never be able to accept anything different. This seems to me to be the opposite of what you describe. It's like they were terrified of being wrong…

I'm a right winger. I don't know any Q people. It seems to me that mostly left wingers know Q people and know all the details. My leftist father in law will explain in detail to me everything Q said, and I just nod along going like... why would you even bother reading this stuff?
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