[JurisDictum]

Scientists Say They've Found The Driver of False Beliefs, And It's Not a Lack of Intelligence

Why is it sometimes so hard to convince someone that the world is indeed a globe, or that climate change is actually caused by human activity, despite the overwhelming evidence?

Scientists think they might have the answer, and it's less to do with lack of understanding, and more to do with the feedback they're getting.

Getting positive or negative reactions to something you do or say is a greater influence on your thinking than logic and reasoning, the new research suggests – so if you're in a group of like-minded people, that's going to reinforce your thinking.

Receiving good feedback also encourages us to think we know more than we actually do.

In other words, the more sure we become that our current position is right, the less likely we are to take into account other opinions or even cold, hard scientific data.

"If you think you know a lot about something, even though you don't, you're less likely to be curious enough to explore the topic further, and will fail to learn how little you know," says one of the team members behind the new study, Louis Marti from the University of California, Berkeley.

In other words. If you can create a few echo chambers most the population goes to. You can create your own facts.