Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#231

Post by majewsky » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:09 AM UTC

coldtea wrote: post #200

Brockenstein wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right? Might as well be critical of public schools not teaching object oriented programming in the 1950's. And that's why my parents can't program, because schools were inferior...

Well, how about refraining from teaching BS state of the art? Newton's theory wasn't proven wrong -- just inefficient at larger units / speeds, and was superseded by a more accurate theory that still gives the same results (more or less) for regular everyday observations. Contrast with the kind of dietary advise of the 70s/80s which has been totally reversed. It wasn't "correct, but not entirely accurate", it was irr…

Newton's theory was proven wrong: astronomers have observed movement patterns of celestial bodies which Newton's theory did not predict. But that doesn't change the fact that the first-order description of the planets' movements that Newton's theory produced is correct. And it doesn't change the fact that Newton's theory describes very accurately all types of motion across which we come in our daily life.

Facts always are true or false forever. If something can be considered true one day and false the next one, it never was a fact. It's just a theory.

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#232

Post by dragonwriter » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:09 AM UTC

xapata wrote: post #230

coldtea wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but they seldom influence others in what to believe as much as the institutions I've mentioned, so that's their problem.

Hmm. I'd say it's often "our" problem. Racism, sexism, climate-change denialism, etc. All stem from anti-empiricism. As the main said, "It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so."

Except for Climate Change Denialism, those problems predate empiricism as a thing noticeable enough to have coherent opposition, by (at least) hundreds of generations. They aren't produced by anti-empiricism (though, insofar as empiricism threatens them, they may be a source of resistance to empiricism.)

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#233

Post by majewsky » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:12 AM UTC

pcmaffey wrote: post #154

gmarx wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I remember my science training properly "fact" is a synonym for "observation". One interprets facts in order to develop a model or "theory". So facts published in peer reviewed articles probably represent objective reality (if you believe in objective reality and trust the author to record observations accurately); the conclusion in peer reviewed articles (theories for example or statistical associations) should n…

And then Heisenberg happened.

What do you mean? Heisenberg just implies that you cannot observe everything at once. It puts an upper limit on the amount of facts (as in: observations).

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#234

Post by brianberns » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:18 AM UTC

Spivak wrote: post #217

tbrownaw wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well yeah. If you conflate those things or tie them together, you've basically declared your intent to demand a mile if they give so much as an inch. Which means the only sensible response is to fight tooth and nail every step of the way.

This is basically the NRAs strategy as well and it's been incredibly successful. They know that their opponents intend to use compromise as a foothold for total disarmament so they have no choice but to occasionally take extreme or irrational stances. I don't blame them in the slightest.

> They know that their opponents intend to use compromise as a foothold for total disarmament.

Really? Care to provide any factual evidence for that statement?

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#235

Post by Mz » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:22 AM UTC

I find this bit ironic:

(Respondents were so unsure of Ukraine’s location that the median guess was wrong by eighteen hundred miles, roughly the distance from Kiev to Madrid.)

If this is written for an American audience, the odds are good that most of us not only don't know where the Ukraine is, we don't know where Kiev and Madrid are relative to each other. It would have made more sense to use two U.S. cities to give some perspective on how far off people were.

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#236

Post by chki » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:31 AM UTC

Mz wrote: post #235

I find this bit ironic: (Respondents were so unsure of Ukraine’s location that the median guess was wrong by eighteen hundred miles, roughly the distance from Kiev to Madrid.) If this is written for an American audience, the odds are good that most of us not only don't know where the Ukraine is, we don't know where Kiev and Madrid are relative to each other. It would have made more sense to use two U.S. cities to giv…

Well Kiev is in Ukraine and Madrid is in Spain, so that is just the full width of Europe which makes it really funny for those who know (and those who know are - to honestly reply to your concern here - those who read The New Yorker)

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#237

Post by majewsky » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:33 AM UTC

bambax wrote: post #167

Silhouette wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suggest a more simple and straightforward explanation for the limitations of "reason": our brain is, in fact, write only. That seems to be inconsistent with the research described in the article where subjects were asked for an opinion, then in some way required to explain that opinion, and then asked for another opinion on the same issue. People apparently did weaken in their convictions, but only when forced to c…

If you're referring to this paragraph: > A recent experiment performed by Mercier and some European colleagues neatly demonstrates this asymmetry. Participants were asked to answer a series of simple reasoning problems... then no. While I don't know the exact content of the experiment or the wording of the questions, a reasoning problem isn't an opinion, it's a process. A process (a function) can indeed yield a diffe…

> my theory is that opinions, once formed, are difficult / impossible to change

How can you explain that this completely contradicts my experience, down to basic everyday experiences like: "I didn't like this album initially, but it has grown on me"?

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#238

Post by Thrymr » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:34 AM UTC

meheleventyone wrote: post #91

coldtea wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Isn't this more a distinction between science and science reporting In a way yes, but if we include the summaries of findings that scientists deliver to the public/governments/etc as "science reporting", then science reporting is 100% of science as we know it (unless we happen to practice it). Consider dietary advice that has since found to be BS, that was passed in the 70s and 80s as "scientific fact", not just by…

Right but wasn't that advice basically the state of the field at the time? That we know different now doesn't mean the scientists then should have acted on information unavailable to them.

Sometimes the state of the field at the time was inherently biased. See "How the Sugar Industry Shifted Blame to Fat" [0] for example. Science is not always a progressive quest for the truth.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/13/well/eat/how-the-sugar-in...

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#239

Post by Mz » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:36 AM UTC

chki wrote: post #236

Mz wrote: post #235

I find this bit ironic: (Respondents were so unsure of Ukraine’s location that the median guess was wrong by eighteen hundred miles, roughly the distance from Kiev to Madrid.) If this is written for an American audience, the odds are good that most of us not only don't know where the Ukraine is, we don't know where Kiev and Madrid are relative to each other. It would have made more sense to use two U.S. cities to giv…

Well Kiev is in Ukraine and Madrid is in Spain, so that is just the full width of Europe which makes it really funny for those who know (and those who know are - to honestly reply to your concern here - those who read The New Yorker)

I know where Madrid is and I have lived in Europe and I just read an article in the New Yorker. I even have a spiffy Certificate in GIS.

I still don't find it to readily be a good comparison for a mostly American audience. If the point is to elucidate, I don't think it is a great example to use. If the point is to be all superior and imply or emphasize the idea that "if you don't know where these things are, you are dumb," hey, it works well.

But trying to make your audience feel stupid is not really a great place from which to start. I mean, unless the point is to be toxic. Then, sure, go with that.

Re: Why Facts Don't Change Our Minds

#240

Post by majewsky » Wed, Mar 08, 2017, 12:37 AM UTC

77pt77 wrote: post #163

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Human beings are full of way-overcranked early optimizations. I guess that's what was required for the propagation of the selfish gene (and individuals be damned, Stalin-like), and you can't really blame a natural process - but sheesh, the whole thing just looks like a stinking pile of bad engineering. Maybe that's because I'm thinking from the side of the individual. The selfish genes, however, must be pretty happy…

> the whole thing just looks like a stinking pile of bad engineering Well, there is no engineering at all involved, so not really unexpected.

I never thought about it that way, but this is probably one of the most popular arguments about creationism.

(There's a joke where people argue about the profession of God, based on his creation of man. The punchline is someone suggesting he must have been an architect, "because who else would send the sewer pipe through the amusement park.")