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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (284456)	12/3/2015 12:06:36 PM
From: koan	Respond to of 541786

<< Those more receptive to bull**** are less reflective, lower in cognitive ability (i.e., verbal and fluid intelligence, numeracy), are more prone to ontological confusions [beliefs in things for which there is no empirical evidence (e.g. that prayers have the ability to heal)] and conspiratorial ideation, are more likely to hold religious and paranormal beliefs, and are more likely to endorse complementary and alternative medicine.>> Epicure, that particular subject has fascinated me more than any other my entire life. The above paragraph is pretty easy to see if you simply go to a conservative thread and compare it to a liberal thread. Or have just paid attention to how people think over a lifetime. Where it gets confusing, is that it has been my experience, that there is also a large number of very intelligent and highly educated people that still have trouble with magical thinking e.g. religion. Not being able to understand complex concepts like existentialism because of a lack of education is easy to understand. But not being able to see reality when you're a highly educated person, is not so easy to understand. The one variable, that seems to determine the inability, or difficulty, of a person to shed magical thinking as they mature and become educated is early childhood indoctrination. My guess, is that there is some sort of critical period where genetic imprinting takes place, not unlike the imprinting baby birds have with their mothers. I have personally known countless people far and away my intellectual superior, who engage in magical thinking and nothing can convince them that it is not real. It is really baffling. In fact one of my ex-wives, who is just brilliant, with advanced degrees and is the director of research at a large institution, is a devout believer in a Eckankar, as is her mother and sister? So I had many years, to examine her thinking. She is a very sweet and very intelligent person in every aspect of her life, except this one thing. She has an ability to read people, and be incredibly rational and logical but still goes to church every Sunday. Over an 11 year marriage we had virtually no arguments or fights, and even today we are the best of friends. In fact I recently had her new husband's house listed for sale. She is one of the most wonderful people I've ever known in my life, but she is dead certain about her religious beliefs.