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posted by martyb on Wednesday December 12 2018, @04:41AM   Printer-friendly
from the This-is-why-my-tribe-is-correct dept.

From Scientific American

Science literacy is important, but without the parallel trait of "science curiosity," it can lead us astray

What intellectual capacities—or if one prefers, cognitive virtues—should the citizens of a modern democratic society possess? For decades, one dominant answer has been the knowledge and reasoning abilities associated with science literacy. Scientific evidence is indispensable for effective policymaking. And for a self-governing society to reap the benefits of policy-relevant science, its citizens must be able to recognize the best available evidence and its implications for collective action.

This account definitely isn’t wrong. But the emerging science of science communication, which uses scientific methods to understand how people come to know what’s known by science, suggests that it is incomplete.

Indeed, it’s dangerously incomplete. Unless accompanied by another science-reasoning trait, the capacities associated with science literacy can actually impede public recognition of the best available evidence and deepen pernicious forms of cultural polarization.

The supplemental trait needed to make science literacy supportive rather than corrosive of enlightened self-government is science curiosity.

Simply put, as ordinary members of the public acquire more scientific knowledge and become more adept at scientific reasoning, they don’t converge on the best evidence relating to controversial policy-relevant facts. Instead they become even more culturally polarized.

This is one of the most robust findings associated with the science of science communication. It is a relationship observed, for example, in public perceptions of myriad societal risk sources—not just climate change but also nuclear power, gun control and fracking, among others.

In addition, this same pattern—the greater the proficiency, the more acute the polarization—characterizes multiple forms of reasoning essential to science comprehension: polarization increases in tandem not only with science literacy but also with numeracy (an ability to reason well with quantitative information) and with actively open-minded thinking—a tendency to revise one’s beliefs in light of new evidence.

The same goes for cognitive reflection. The Cognitive Reflection Test (CRT) measures how much people rely on two forms of information processing: “fast,” preconscious, emotion-driven forms of reasoning, often called “System 1”; or a conscious, deliberate, analytical, “slow” form, designated “System 2.”

[...] But given what positions on climate change have now come to signify about one’s group allegiances, adopting the “wrong” position in interactions with her peers could rupture bonds on which she depends heavily for emotional and material well-being. Under these pathological conditions, she will predictably use her reasoning not to discern the truth but to form and persist in beliefs characteristic of her group, a tendency known as “identity-protective cognition.”

[...] Conceptually, curiosity has properties directly opposed to those of identity-protective cognition. Whereas the latter evinces a hardened resistance to exploring evidence that could challenge one’s existing views, the former consists of a hunger for the unexpected, driven by the anticipated pleasure of surprise. In that state, the defensive sentries of existing opinion have necessarily been made to stand down. One could reasonably expect, then, that those disposed toward science curiosity would be more open-minded and as a result less polarized along cultural lines.

This is exactly what we see when we test this conjecture empirically. In general population surveys, diverse citizens who score high on the Science Curiosity Scale (SCS) are less divided than are their low-scoring peers.

[...] The findings on science curiosity also have implications for the practice of science communication. Merely imparting information is unlikely to be effective—and could even backfire—in a society that has failed to inculcate curiosity in its citizens and that doesn’t engage curiosity when communicating policy-relevant science.


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  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday December 12 2018, @07:53AM (8 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday December 12 2018, @07:53AM (#773357) Journal

    Real science is about truth, and that is why Americans are so opposed to it. Americans: opposed to truth. There it is, I have said it, and it is true.

    Sorry, but no. It is not true.
    You have to say it three times.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday December 12 2018, @08:54AM (7 children)

    by aristarchus (2645) on Wednesday December 12 2018, @08:54AM (#773371) Journal

    Sadly, for Americans, I do not. They know it. Lincoln said it.

    Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

            Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

            But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

    Makes me glad I am not an American. If I were, I do not know how I could bear with the shame. Such great promise. And now such, well, such desecration. And it is Lincoln's own party that has done it. America should be ashamed.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 12 2018, @12:17PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 12 2018, @12:17PM (#773417)

      Is realDonalTrump your alter-ego?

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday December 12 2018, @01:58PM (2 children)

      by bzipitidoo (4388) on Wednesday December 12 2018, @01:58PM (#773437) Journal

      Take it as a cautionary tale, and pity us. We didn't elect Trump. The Republicans committed massive voting fraud and cheated their way into office. That's the kind of fools they are. Rather than try to win an election honestly, they show their utter moral bankruptcy by resorting to cheating, and they can't see why they shouldn't do that.

      Fools always want to be in the driver's seat, and will seize the wheel any way they can. They think they're such great drivers. Our problem is that our institutions and customs didn't shut down the cheating. They've seized the wheel. And they've been making a mess ever since. It's been a long national nightmare.

      • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Wednesday December 12 2018, @06:14PM (1 child)

        by fustakrakich (6150) on Wednesday December 12 2018, @06:14PM (#773577) Journal

        It's been a long national nightmare.

        Caused by a bad diet [nih.gov]...

        You made no effort to understand why people vote and reelect corrupt politicians, even though it has all been well documented in every first year (animal) psychology book. Don't blame the winners, unless you can show real evidence the count was fraudulent.

        --
        La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
        • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday December 15 2018, @03:36PM

          by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Saturday December 15 2018, @03:36PM (#774785) Homepage Journal

          You made no effort to understand why people vote and reelect corrupt politicians, even though it has all been well documented in every first year (animal) psychology book.

          Please summarise the reason why. I don't have a first-year psychology textbook around.

          -- hendrik

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 13 2018, @02:56AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday December 13 2018, @02:56AM (#773858)

      You poor witless wonder. First, you tell us that Americans are opposed to truth. Then you hold up an American to make your case. If the former is true, then the latter has to be false. Fact is, you don't know truth from fiction, and are unqualified to make any posts on the subject.

      • (Score: 2) by aristarchus on Thursday December 13 2018, @04:30AM

        by aristarchus (2645) on Thursday December 13 2018, @04:30AM (#773885) Journal

        Please, tell us more! Enlighten wretches such as myself with your wisdom! Or, perhaps, you do not understand time as an element of truth?