LIBERALS - high on openness, intellectually curious, interested in novel ideas, strive to get the facts right.
SCIENCE - always characterized by uncertainty and an engine of change, uncovers
Uncomfortable realities about our species and our world (Like the fact that we have a common ancestor with the rest of life on Earth. The fact that we are causing dangerous changes to the planet)
Science creates new technologies that can be very destabilizing (in vitro fertilization to embryonic
stem cell research, human cloning, genetic engineering, biological enhancements)
CHAPTER 5
You can make a liberal into a conservative very easy. Through fear, distraction and heavy drinking.
Rigidity increases in both directions as you depart from the center, but increases more on the right
than on the left.
In three cases of temporary liberal to conservative shift, it appears that liberals turn more
conservative not b/c they are swayed intellectually by conservative arguments, but rather b/c they
are impaired---emotionally or cognitively---from engaging in the types of nuanced reasoning
processes that make them liberals.
CHAPTER 6 - ARE CONSERVATIVES FROM THE AMYGDALA?
U of Nebraska at Lincoln - political conservatives & more particularly, those who hold tough-on-
crime & pro-military views have a more pronounced startle reflex, measured by eye-blink
strength after hearing a sudden loud noise. Furthermore when shown threatening images, maggots
in an open wound, a large spider on a persons face, these conservatives also showed greater
"skin conductance". Their sweat glands moistened more, making their skin more electrically
conductive, an indication of sympathetic nervous system arousal. Consistent with an "amygdala
theory" of conservatism. Liberals undergo a response "But in conservatives, it appears to be stronger."
"THE AMYGDALA IS DEFINITELY A FEAR AND THREAT CENTER, AND A CENTRAL
COMPONENT OF OUR EVOLUTIONARILY OLDER AND EMOTION-CENTERED BRAIN."
The amygdala has been called the heart and soul of the fear system, processing inputs from different
brain regions to structure our life-preserving defensive responses.
COLIN FIRTH STUDY & 2007 study published in "Nature Neuroscience" John Jost, David Amodio liberals have a more active anterior cingulate cortex or ACC - more flexible, intellectually innovative
and more tolerant of uncertainty. ACC - complicated function but general scientific consensus indicates that it is involved in error detection and conflict monitoring and cognition control. More
willing to update and change beliefs.
CHAPTER 7 - A TALE OF TWO REPUBLICANS:
Kerry Emanual - meteorologist at MIT - lifelong Republican and sole invited witness by Democrats before the House Committee on Science with the GOP inviting five witnesses, one a marketing professor. MIT atmospheric sciences students can do "hand calculations or use simple models" to show why global warming is a serious concern. You don't get an atmospheric sciences degree at MIT, with a climate focus, if you can't show on the back of an envelope what much of Congress calls into question. Emanual investigated "ClimateGate" - "no evidence for an intent to deceive".
"I don't like it when ideology trumps reason, and I see that the Republicans are guilty of that in spades at the moment."
Create-your-own-reality conservative Conservapedia founder Andrew Schlafly and son of Phyllis.
In three cases of temporary liberal to conservative shift, it appears that liberals turn more
conservative not b/c they are swayed intellectually by conservative arguments, but rather b/c they
are impaired---emotionally or cognitively---from engaging in the types of nuanced reasoning
processes that make them liberals.
CHAPTER 6 - ARE CONSERVATIVES FROM THE AMYGDALA?
U of Nebraska at Lincoln - political conservatives & more particularly, those who hold tough-on-
crime & pro-military views have a more pronounced startle reflex, measured by eye-blink
strength after hearing a sudden loud noise. Furthermore when shown threatening images, maggots
in an open wound, a large spider on a persons face, these conservatives also showed greater
"skin conductance". Their sweat glands moistened more, making their skin more electrically
conductive, an indication of sympathetic nervous system arousal. Consistent with an "amygdala
theory" of conservatism. Liberals undergo a response "But in conservatives, it appears to be stronger."
"THE AMYGDALA IS DEFINITELY A FEAR AND THREAT CENTER, AND A CENTRAL
COMPONENT OF OUR EVOLUTIONARILY OLDER AND EMOTION-CENTERED BRAIN."
The amygdala has been called the heart and soul of the fear system, processing inputs from different
brain regions to structure our life-preserving defensive responses.
COLIN FIRTH STUDY & 2007 study published in "Nature Neuroscience" John Jost, David Amodio liberals have a more active anterior cingulate cortex or ACC - more flexible, intellectually innovative
and more tolerant of uncertainty. ACC - complicated function but general scientific consensus indicates that it is involved in error detection and conflict monitoring and cognition control. More
willing to update and change beliefs.
CHAPTER 7 - A TALE OF TWO REPUBLICANS:
Kerry Emanual - meteorologist at MIT - lifelong Republican and sole invited witness by Democrats before the House Committee on Science with the GOP inviting five witnesses, one a marketing professor. MIT atmospheric sciences students can do "hand calculations or use simple models" to show why global warming is a serious concern. You don't get an atmospheric sciences degree at MIT, with a climate focus, if you can't show on the back of an envelope what much of Congress calls into question. Emanual investigated "ClimateGate" - "no evidence for an intent to deceive".
"I don't like it when ideology trumps reason, and I see that the Republicans are guilty of that in spades at the moment."
Create-your-own-reality conservative Conservapedia founder Andrew Schlafly and son of Phyllis.
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