Your Political Facebook Posts Aren't Changing How Your Friends Think (qz.com) 399
An anonymous reader writes:It may be hard to resist airing political grievances or appealing to voters on social media during a U.S. presidential race as heated as this one. But no one wants to hear about your politics, least of all on Facebook. Those long rants about how Trump is a bully and a buffoon, Hillary is a crook, and conspiring against Bernie Sanders has doomed America forever aren't changing voters' minds, a new study found. A staggering 94% of Republicans, 92% of Democrats, and 85% of independents on Facebook say they have never been swayed by a political post, according to Rantic, a firm that sells social media followers. The firm surveyed 10,000 Facebook users who self-identified as Republicans, Democrats, or independents. The only thing those opinionated election posts are doing is damaging your friendships. Nearly one-third of Facebook users surveyed said social media is not an appropriate forum for political discussions. And respondents from each political affiliation admitted they've un-friended people on Facebook because of their political posts.
Incomplete title... (Score:5, Insightful)
But they are changing how your friends think ABOUT YOU!
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:5, Insightful)
Most facebooks posts are the same as bumper stickers.
Where if a bumper sticker can change your mind on a topic, it means you didn't give that topic any though.
But those political posts are just annoying, the sad part is they really think they are doing something important to the political process, while all they are really doing is isolating people who have different beliefs. Because the arguments are so vague that you are really just insulting the person who thinks differently.
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:4, Insightful)
The aphorism: You can't fix stupid comes to mind.
And I can be stupid.
The quieter among us work at the polls, get people to vote by driving them, and try to aid the process. Many people have vocal cords and social media accounts, but many fewer still have the guts to actually work for a process that's inclusive and makes representative democracy a reality.
We don't change minds. We act upon convictions.
Re: Incomplete title... (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, it's a shockingly misleading title. 15% of independents have changed their mind after reading a Facebook post?!? That's a huge number. Elections have been won by far smaller margins. Any candidate would give an arm for that kind of movement.
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:5, Informative)
Anecdote time: I've got a friend who, for just the past year or two, suddenly, has bashed on his friends (or their family members) everyday on FB, and says how stupid he realizes they are now (without naming names, however), how racist or homophobic they are, how Trump is Hitler, Sanders is great, and religion is for mindless idiots, etc.. never thinking about the fact that some of his friends' wives are actually fairly religious and he's insulting them on a daily basis as well, and some are also conservative. He gets downright nasty.
Worse, he copies and pastes quotes he gets from his newsfeed to sound worldly and intelligent, but I've known the guy for 30 years; he's never voluntarily cracked open a fucking book in his life. He's barely computer literate and was probably lucky to graduate High School. He doesn't know about half the famous people whose quotes he uses, so it's even more irritating that he's a total pseudo-intellectual who now believes he's the intelligentsia, all due to his political stances; and then he gets baffled why anyone should get "offended" at the toxic crap he spews everyday! Freakin' Trump has got more tact than him.
He's changed dramatically in just the past year or two, to the point where his wife just left him a few weeks ago (his second divorce). He's gone completely off the SJW rails, all except for one aspect: feminism; women are still great when they're sitting on a Harley, wearing leather and showing their tits, and making him a sammich.
He's ruining all his relationships via Facebook,and it's not changing one damn opinion, except ours of him.
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:5, Insightful)
Every single political post I see on Facebook is not really about politics, it's about someone trying to snidely imply that they are much more intelligent, high-minded, and enlightened than everyone else. It's not about Trump or Hillary. It's about trying to make themselves look like an upright, cultured, magnanimous person by publicly expressing disdain for others.
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Gary Johnson.
Thus, I prove your point ;) But consider Trump and Clinton as viable and "only" choice we have is kinda stupid, don't you think?
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Third party, hell I'd like to see the top 4 minimum included in the televised debates. With the old Bernie supporters taking a serious look at Jill Stein and the Tea Party faction looking at Gary Johnson, we'd have a completely different race right now. Both Trump and Clinton would have to quite the "vote for me because the other is Evil(tm)" routine and the MSM might actual have to do some real reporting for a change.
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I would feed puppies into wood chippers if it meant no Donald or Hillarity.
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:5, Informative)
>No one wants Trump or Hilary,
This is demonstrably wrong.
... plus even if it was true, most people would still vote for one of those two candidates, because the anti-Trump people really don't want to see Trump in office, and the anti-Hillary people really don't want to see Hillary in office. In those circumstances, very few of them will be willing to effectively annul their influence on the election by throwing their vote away on a third-party candidate who isn't going to win anyway.
Now if we had a third-party candidate who was polling competitively with the two first-party candidates, or if we had a voting system that didn't suffer significantly from the spoiler effect, things might be different. But we don't, so they aren't.
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... it's about someone trying to snidely imply that they are much more intelligent, high-minded, and enlightened than everyone else ... It's about trying to make themselves look like an upright, cultured, magnanimous person by publicly expressing disdain for others.
In the recent post on Twitter's free speech woes [slashdot.org] a lot of commenters decried the utterly vulgar language and bullying that manifests on it under the guise of "free speech".
I'd venture to say that anyone trying to debate any issue insightfully and civilly, will be seen as much more intelligent, high-minded, cultured etc. etc. as that baseline. And may draw a lot of abuse upon himself for that reason.
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:5, Insightful)
The exact same thing can be said about Slashdot.
Re:Incomplete title... (Score:5, Insightful)
A political post from someone I know has never changed my mind about politics, but it has changed my mind about the person posting it. I have quietly ended a childhood friendship with someone through conscientious lack of contact, because they were just so fanatical about their political beliefs that I really didn't care to have anything to do with them any more. It killed a 30+ year friendship.
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But facebook likes 'em (Score:3)
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This past week on Facebook, I've clicked on two ads that were interesting to me, and one of them even got me to sign up for a webinar for my own personal interest.
Contrast this with actual users on Facebook - there's almost nothing I want to see. The confirmation bias and echo chamber are so strong, that I can't even stand people talking about candidates I like.
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Fuck all advertisers.
People are sick of advertising ALL THE TIME, EVERYWHERE!
The buying and selling or our personal info just so advertisers can present more of their annoying and stupid advertisements
The Tyranny of Specificity (Score:5, Funny)
Your Political Facebook Posts Aren't Changing How Your Friends Think
This study is just a rip-off of earlier research into human psychology--specifically, of all previous research into human psychology--which has proven pretty conclusively that nothing anyone says has ever changed anyone's mind about anything ever.
Re:The Tyranny of Specificity (Score:5, Funny)
.. has proven pretty conclusively that nothing anyone says has ever changed anyone's mind about anything ever.
I was going to reply to your post with a detailed rebuttal, but you changed my mind.
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You're wrong and nothing you say will change my mind about it.
Salesmanship (Score:5, Insightful)
Your Political Facebook Posts Aren't Changing How Your Friends Think
This study is just a rip-off of earlier research into human psychology--specifically, of all previous research into human psychology--which has proven pretty conclusively that nothing anyone says has ever changed anyone's mind about anything ever.
That's certainly true in the studies, and of course the scientists couldn't think of any other avenue to research so it must be true.
OTOH, listening to Brian Tracy's "The Psychology of Selling [amazon.com]" gave me the chills because, listening to him explain the methods, I got the distinct feeling that these methods would work on me *and* I can recall many times when they were used on me.
The audio is downright scary at times, but I highly recommend it simply because it'll help you put your guard up against some of the techniques.
He points out, quite correctly, that you can't get someone to change their mind without first pulling them out of heuristic mode [wikipedia.org] and into systemic mode. The easiest way to do this is to ask a question, but there are other methods.
Then you need to phrase the concept in a way that's important to the listener. You don't come in to an office and say "our copiers make xxx copies per minute, and are very reliable", you say "our copiers can save you $2000 per month in expenses, would you like to know how?". The $2000 is something the listener is interested in, and the question pops them into systemic mode. It's how you start a successful sales call.
Most political screeds don't do this - they just state the position, and mostly it's not very convincing to begin with. Donald Trump has been called every bad name in the book, but I don't see how any of that would be persuasive or even make him a bad president. Donald Trump is behind in the polls *if the election were held today*, that's not persuasive *and* I don't even see the point of posting something like that.
So if I wanted to convince people to vote for Trump, I might point out that amnesty for 14 million illegals will bring unemployment to 20% and decrease job security, then ask if there's any other issue that's more important to them than their own job security.
(Is there? I'd be interested to know.)
So if I wanted people to vote for Hillary, I might suggest that Trumps policies will cause economic decline in the US, and companies will flee to other countries or go out of business, then ask if there's any other issue that's more important to them than the economy.
(Is there? I'd be interested to know.)
And then there's people like Scott Adams [dilbert.com], who has put a completely original spin on everything about the election, and predicted everything that actually happened from the viewpoint of hypnosis. (Even Nate Silver mis-interpreted [fivethirtyeight.com] Trump's popularity, which is what you get when you look solely at the numbers and not at the situation.)
So no, I don't think it's quite correct to say "nobody has ever changed anyone's mind about anything ever". It happens all the time... in sales.
(Here's Scott Adams talking about trying to purchase a vehicle [dilbert.com]. It's quite an interesting story, and shows a first-person view of one of the techniques of sales.)
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So no, I don't think it's quite correct to say "nobody has ever changed anyone's mind about anything ever". It happens all the time... in sales.
My critique of this statement would be that much of the time in "sales" you're dealing with people who are motivated to purchase a product, often one of your specific products, and all "sales" people are doing is either convincing them to buy a configuration of that model you already have on hand and which might deviate trivially from their up front choice or convincing them to buy (usually) a more expensive model. The minor switch or the upsell.
In that case you're not really changing anyone's mind. If Sc
Ingenious! (Score:3)
I think that technique is this: Post in Internet forums that you know a sales technique that is sooo effective it's forbidden. Don't go into any specifics! Just give enough pointers that people can find the book. Sold!
Really, the website I found after actually googling your hints had no useful content whatsoever, and did not talk about any ingenious sale strategy. What it said could be on any generic sales newsletter.
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This study is just a rip-off of earlier research into human psychology--specifically, of all previous research into human psychology--which has proven pretty conclusively that nothing anyone says has ever changed anyone's mind about anything ever.
Unless of course, spoken by Saruman.
Generalization is appropriate in this case (Score:4)
I think it is appropriate to state that majority of people are never swayed by an argument coming from out-group. That is, trying to reason with people that made up their mind is highly ineffective in all circumstances.
Re:Generalization is appropriate in this case (Score:5, Interesting)
The thing is, people THINK they aren't being swayed. Everyone, of course, thinks they've reached their opinion through careful thought and introspection. In actuality, we have a tremendous tendency to believe the very first thing we hear.
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No, sinij is right on this one.
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Other obligatory XKCD: http://xkcd.com/386 [xkcd.com]
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Only because you read his post first. :(
Re:Generalization is appropriate in this case (Score:4, Insightful)
Even better, people have distorted thinking. When the political party line changes tack, people change with them. The old Republican line was that a raise in minimum wage would push all wages up, because a middle-class worker doesn't want to be $5 away from a McJob; the new Republican line is that prices will go up instead, and everyone's wages won't react, and we'll all get poorer (this is more correct, but they take it to an incorrect extreme). Veteran Republicans argue fervently that the ideal of minimum-wage increases causing a lock-step increase in all wages WAS ALWAYS A LIBERAL-DEMOCRAT LINE and was never a position they had--even when, 15 years ago, they were the ones arguing exactly that.
They actually believe their new beliefs are their old beliefs, and their old beliefs are some ancient Liberal lie they'd never bought into. They believe they've professed their new beliefs all their lives, and never professed their old beliefs.
Re:Generalization is appropriate in this case (Score:4, Insightful)
Incorrect conclusion. (Score:5, Insightful)
They're looking at the wrong number by using the 94%.
If 6%, 8%, and 15% of people are swayed, and the vote is nearly 50/50, then these posts are in fact potentially effective...
Re:Incorrect conclusion. (Score:4, Interesting)
A truly insightful AC post - elections in this country are tight, numerically speaking. In the last 40 years, only the re-election of Reagan was the spread more than 45%-55%, which means that a shift of just 6% of the votes would have changed every outcome.
Re: (Score:2)
I think that's absolutely it.
The fact that 6% can be swayed is huge, that's the kind of margin that politicians spend millions to achieve.
Re:Incorrect conclusion. (Score:5, Insightful)
They're looking at the wrong number by using the 94%.
If 6%, 8%, and 15% of people are swayed, and the vote is nearly 50/50, then these posts are in fact potentially effective...
More than that just because someone doesn't think they've been swayed doesn't mean they haven't been swayed. People typically underestimate how much their views change over time. I can say that my views have evolved over the years on many topics, probably more than I realize. How much of that came from social media?
At the same time I wouldn't expect a single post to radically change someone's opinions, in fact if it does than it's probably evidence that you never thought deeply about that subject to begin with. But give me a few days, weeks, or months to think about a set of arguments and evidence, then my views do indeed change even on established subjects.
But it almost never happens instantaneously in response to a single argument or piece of evidence.
Where should that conversation happen? (Score:5, Interesting)
Nearly one-third of Facebook users surveyed said social media is not an appropriate forum for political discussions.
Then where is the appropriate forum? Seriously, what does this third of users think it's for?
And by the way ...
... a firm that sells social media followers
That makes me sad.
Re: (Score:2)
A political forum perhaps? The rest of us really don't want to hear from you.
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Then where is the appropriate forum?
I empirical evidence suggest that it is on /. as AC replies to random unrelated topics.
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More targeted ads, of course! Four out of five marketers agree, people actually love advertisements, if only they can target them accurately enough.
For example, on a site that knows everything about you and your entire network of family and friends - Such a site would never need to worry about AdBlock, because it would have such awesomely high-precision ads that people would go there just to see the ads!
/ That holdout fifth marketer still belie
That's why I don't bother (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't say anything political on Facebook because as the study says, whose mind would it change? In the end it's only virtue signaling at best, semi-trolling at worst. And there's the potential of friends I like going cold because they can't handle different political views (even though that's a flaw in people it's the kind of flaw I forgive friends for, even if a little sad).
That doesn't stop everyone ELSE on Facebook ramping up political expressions though, which is why I've pretty much stopped reading Facebook (and Twitter) until after November.
Changing minds is not the goal (Score:4, Insightful)
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Presenting real facts... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Presenting real facts... (Score:5, Insightful)
Posting the damning email evidence that she is lying crook will change the minds of any sensible people
Problem is, you think that is smoking gun evidence, but the people you send it to don't see it as such, because they view it critically and know how to read between the lines, which maybe you should start looking into as well... if there is good evidence, it isn't what's been passed around, so you should probably figure out what's wrong with that "evidence" and find the real evidence. And if there is actually no such evidence, well, maybe it's you who should change your mind.
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surprised it's not even higher (Score:3)
Emotion vs Logic (Score:2)
Believe it or not, politics (as well as religion) is largely an emotional topic. It's hard to sway emotion with logic, least with an FB post.
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I wouldn't quite put it that way. Often a life-time of experience builds up "notions" of patterns. We don't remember every detail, but we do grow aggregate impressions similar to how artificial neural nets are trained over time even though the nets don't remember each specific training case.
For example, I've experienced the slime-ballery of big companies like Microsoft, the cable/telecoms (AT&T, Comcast), banks, etc. I've even worked for some to see the slime-ballery from
It does change the way you think (Score:5, Insightful)
Those incessant political Facebook posts have certainly changed the way I think.
First, they have changed my opinion of many of my Facebook friends due to their endless attempts to shove political arguments (of all persuasions) in my face (thank God for the "unfollow" button).
Second, they have changed my opinion of Facebook and social media as a whole. Social media continues to devolve into more yelling, screaming, threats, trolling, guilt by association, and mob justice. And what makes it bad for Facebook is that the harder they try to "fix" things, the worse it becomes.
I learned long ago to be extremely careful about discussing politics or religion, especially with friends. I sincerely wish more people would take that lesson to heart.
Clinton smoking gun posts are the worst (Score:2)
I'm a Gary Johnson supporter, but I have a few friends that are always posting smoking gun posts from fringe conservative sites that claim "Hillary's going to be indicted any day now!" or "Hillary's campaign is over when this gets out!" I keep telling them these are just clickbait links and don't offer any substance.
They're in La-La Land if they think they're going to change anyone's mind. Hillary Clinton's supporters know she's a corrupt liar, but they don't care, just like everyone knows Trump is a crass
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Re:Clinton smoking gun posts are the worst (Score:4, Interesting)
Whenever I look into the attacks, they either turn out to either have no real substance, or else be on some subject I really don't care about. They keep saying there's a smoking gun, but all I ever see is smoke. But the attacks seem to be mostly "let's make a lot of smoke, so that people will think, 'where there's smoke there's fire'."
About the worst people really say is "well, she does all the same things all successful politicians do!"
So, I'd say in this case, social media is changing my mind, although in the opposite direction perhaps from the one intended.
(Similar things are partly true of Trump: half of the stuff people accuse him of is out of context or stuff he didn't really said at all. But there's the other half, which is stuff he really did say or do.)
By the way, is it getting any more obvious to anyone that Trump is a Hillary plant?
He seems to act just exactly like what he seems to be: like a reality-television performer who has learned that the more outrageously he talks, the more viewers are attracted to the show.
Every day he's shooting his mouth off with some preposterous remark,
Which gives him more press coverage, which is what he wants.
In denial (Score:5, Insightful)
"94% of Republicans, 92% of Democrats, and 85% of independents on Facebook"
THINK that they have never been swayed. They are wrong. Maybe no individual post has ever swayed them; however, multiple people posting opinions almost certainly has. There's a reason why WWII Germany, modern day Russia, and political parties worldwide put out propaganda. IT WORKS.
Look at all the politicians who were against LGBT rights 10 years ago compared to now. Someone has changed their mind. It is the gradual acceptance of people and the political zeitgeist. People preaching acceptance have made a difference on their audience. A single post may not change anyone's mind. Dozens of people expressing an opinion might change someone's mind without them even knowing it.
Sure, some things may never change. Trump's die hard supporters are never going to give him up- and Hillary's won't either; however, chances are at some point in our lives EVERYONE has changed their opinion on something- and it might have been the opinion of another that changed our opinion but we just didn't realize it.
I'm not affected by social media postings (Score:2)
Incidentally have you tried Cuke? It's like heaven in a can!
Oh yeah? (Score:2)
6% or 8% can still tip the balance (Score:2)
Not even facts... (Score:2)
People don't even let FACTS change their political opinion. Why should random rants they call "friends" only cause facebook doesn't offer "moron" as a status work?
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We all know that things can be taken out of context or spun in precise ways to generate implications. You can see the bias in every piece of media out there.
It's like statistics... You can make the actual numbers mean almost anything you want by just presenting them in specific ways (non zero-indexed graphs, for example).
I say, beware of anyone trying to get you to do anything. They have an agenda that fits their self interest. That is the default view. Prove to me otherwise and maybe we can talk. Until the
6%-15% success rate is pretty awesome (Score:2)
Wait, you're saying a staggering 6% of Rs, 8% of Ds, and 15% of Is have been swayed at least once? I'd call that amazingly effective.
au contraire (Score:2)
Discussions (Score:3)
Gary Johnson (Score:2)
I keep writing about Presidential candidate Gary Johnson [johnsonweld.com], who is neither Trump nor Clinton, and he is coming close to being at 15% in the polls and should be in the Presidential debates...
Those 15% of independents... (Score:3)
Donald Trump could be beaten severely by any random democrat except Hillary Clinton (who brings out massive amounts of GOP hatred based on her name). Hillary Clinton could be beaten severely by any random republican except Donald Trump (who sabotages his own campaign on a daily basis). It almost seems as if neither of the two parties actually want to win this election.
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It almost seems as if neither of the two parties actually want to win this election.
I had a thought the other day along this and it wouldn't surprise me if there were some truth to that. It seems like there are a lot of systemic problems in the US that are just starting to bubble up and who ever is in charge when it finally goes is going to take the blame for it. There are a lot of racial tensions, lots of unemployed people, lots of debt, and probably other things I am unaware of but if there isn't a massive turnaround the next few election cycles are gonna suck for either party. At least
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...and Ted Cruz, Ben Carlson, Carly Fiorina, Rick Santorum... the Republicans had no shortage of unelectable candidates this time around, which is why Trump managed to float to the top.
Sounds successful to me. (Score:2)
Seriously, what other form of media changes the minds of 6% of Republicans and 8% of Democrats? I'd bet this is at least as successful as most any other kind of media, and seen far more often.
I've Persuaded Voters on Facebook (Score:3)
If you're only looking at the Presidential general election, then it's probably true that Facebook posts aren't going to be flipping votes. But that's not the only election. Political posts can make a huge difference in primaries. Political posts can also make a difference in down-ticket races.
Several times people have told me that my posts have convinced them to change their vote in a primary to a different candidate in the same party. I once had someone tell me that they flipped their vote to a candidate in a different party in a general election (down-ticket) based on my Facebook post (in what turned out to be the closest state-wide race on the ballot).
For example:
If you're in Massachusetts, please vote in the state primary on September 8th. If you take a Democratic ballot, I've met the Middlesex Sheriff, Peter Koutoujian, several times, and he's working on important criminal justice reforms. Please vote for him. Also, Bob Jubinville is doing an excellent job on the Governor's Council--please reelect him (I could go on and on and on as to the reasons why). If you're in Tom Sannicandro's district, he's stepping down, and Brett Walker is the best of the three seeking to replace him; I was briefly running myself and withdrew to support him--I'm that convinced he's the best candidate.
Self-reporting? Stupid methodology (Score:2)
This is garbage. Measuring the effect based on simply asking people if they have been swayed by a Facebook post is a laughable approach and misses how this actually does happen. Yes, nobody (or very few) reads a post containing a logical argument for why Politician X shouldn't have your support and then changes their mind. But many people, especially those who might consider themselves apolitical, absolutely are influenced by their friends mocking Politician X and supporters of Politician X.
Most people do n
Kony 2012 (Score:2)
Internet Echo Chamber (Score:2)
I'm not so much worried about people trying to change opinions, because I know how hard that is to do, especially with stupid Facebook memes and copy-pasted propaganda. The thing I don't like is that, ironically, people having access to such a huge microphone in the form of social media makes it harder to hear a different opinion. I argue that if you're a die hard liberal or conservative, there exists an echo chamber that will prevent any opinions you don't like getting through, and make it impossible for t
15% Is Insignificant!? (Score:3)
Gonna need a bigger song (Score:2)
Yeah, right! (Score:2)
" say they have never been swayed by a political post"
And they also never were influenced in any way by TV ads, right? Those morons just throw money away.
Just because you _think_ you're not swayed, doesn't make it so.
What about my meta-political facebook /. posts? (Score:2)
If I post a link to this /. summary to facebook will my friends stop posting political posts? Or is that covered too?
They're not? (Score:2)
A staggering 94% of Republicans, 92% of Democrats, and 85% of independents on Facebook say they have never been swayed by a political post, according to Rantic, a firm that sells social media followers.
I am shocked that the number of people claiming to have their mind changed is so high (~10%). These margins of people who polled that they can be swayed is larger than any margin of victory in a presidential election in recent history.
And that's just the people that admit that they are being swayed.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It's ironic, but the same is also true for Democrats. Democrats constantly use pseudo science to justify their non-scientific position and ideology. Worse, for many on the left, science is becoming their religion. So you wind up with two religiously dogmatic zealots arguing about who's idiocy is best.
Re:Duh! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Duh! (Score:4, Interesting)
“The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.”
Werner Heisenberg
Re:Duh! (Score:5, Funny)
“The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.”
Werner Heisenberg
He's overstating it. He was uncertain about the outcome.
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It's called math:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
If equation is 2 + 2,
then start at 2 move two spaces to the right, you get 4.
You can actually see it. Science does tests and proves things. Religion is just blind ignorant faith despite the lack of any proof
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Faith is belief without evidence. Science however is not arithmetic and unlike arithmetic is not concrete. Science is however the best method we have for determining the most concrete answers possible given the proof available. It does require faith in the scientific method, however that method is explicitly designed to require the le
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Science is not a belief.
It takes faith to believe that 2 + 2 is 4. The word "because" isn't a good answer.
No. There are plenty of examples of the requirement of "belief" in science, this isn't one of them.
You cannot be an expert in every field of study, and perform all your own experiments verifying the entirety of accumulated human knowledge. That means, to some extent, you must trust (i.e. have faith in) the processes that produced all that knowledge. It's the kind of faith that can be replaced with a degree of certainty, if you care to prove these things to yourself and replicate the experiments, but i
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It's ironic, but the same is also true for Democrats. Democrats constantly use pseudo science to justify their non-scientific position and ideology. Worse, for many on the left, science is becoming their religion. So you wind up with two religiously dogmatic zealots arguing about who's idiocy is best.
[citation needed]
With the exceptional outlier of the anti-vaxers (largely a liberal phenomenon) the facts would seem to be against you. Please support your assertion.
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The anti-vax nonsense seems to be equally from the right and left loonies. As a parent of a child with autism - and also as someone who is on the spectrum - It's infuriating when a major political candidate touts the "Vaccines Cause Autism" garbage.
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Soicialism fails, yet socialists continue to believe that with enough "tweaks" and "adjustments" it will work ... this time!
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Socialism works, until you inject mankind and human greed and deception
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To Be honest, the main difference between socialism and Capitalism is the fact that capitalism actually accounts for greed and deception, while Socialism really cannot.
Why? Because captialism (free economics) is about people being able to make decsions for themselves (libertarian) while socialism says that government should decide for everyone, regardless of how good it is to the individual. Socialism doesn't care about the individual, and therefore the individual is at odds with socialism (and why Socialis
Climate [Re:Duh!] (Score:5, Insightful)
That's not quite a fair assessment of their stance. In general they believe that the profit motive applies to scientists as well as business-persons such that scientists will bias their results to get more money just like any salesperson would. You could argue they are projecting their own greed into scientists, but they can claim that human nature is human nature, and most humans are naturally greedy (which is the basis of capitalism's feedback mechanism).
You can argue specific climate facts, but they can always find a scientist (or a shill acting like a scientist) to poke holes in such facts.
It's true that the Earth is a complex system with lots of "moving parts" such that its climate is the aggregate result of jillions of factors.
You could point out that in most models, more CO2 warms the earth, and we know the CO2 increase is largely man-made due to the isotope signature.
But they may reply that not all models show CO2 warming the Earth and/or the temperature readings are rigged by those "greedy scientists" I mentioned above such that there is no excessive warming beyond the normal natural ebb and flow.
How does one prove scientists didn't rig temperature readings? There were no cameras following them 24/7. Ultimately it relies on trust, and if they believe scientists don't deserve our trust, there's not much one can do.
Unfortunately we may have to wait until their tushies bake off or their houses are under the sea until they get a clue. Reality is merely poking them right now, but they'll only notice it when it kicks them in the nuts/cunt.
What is Chaos [Re:Climate [Re:Duh!]] (Score:5, Informative)
Science 101 should have taught you that with any chaotic system, it is not possible to make predictions about the future state of said system.
That is a misunderstanding of deterministic chaos based on oversimplified popular science.
Some things can be predicted in a deterministic system, some cannot. But, in general, you very often predict the average properties of the system, even if you cannot predict the exact path through the phase space. In a chaotically dripping faucet, you can predict the average number of gallons per hour, even if you cannot predict the exact pattern of the drops. In a weather system, you can predict that July in Bismarck North Dakota will be warmer than January, even though you can't predict whether July 12 2019 will be rainy or dry. In a climate system, you can predict that radiative input equals radiative output, even if you cannot predict the exact temperature in Bismarck on July 12.
Chaos is well defined. It does not mean "anything at all can happen."
Re: (Score:2)
I have not seen any. Some mistake corrections for malice without giving a solid case that it's malice.
I will agree that "messaging" data is fairly common in science to exaggerate the intended conclusion because conclusion-free papers don't get much attention, but that works both ways. There's no reason why the vast majority of such fudging should be in the pro-change direction instead of the anti-change direction.
A tenured professor in a private university close to retirement has no financial incentive to
Re: (Score:2)
Republicans won't listen to science, you think Facebook posts are going to make a difference?
He's got you there, my friend. Indeed, I would submit that Republicans, more often than not, won't listen to reason. But then I'm probably not being fair to an awful lot of Republicans, lumping them all in with those who think Trump is the answer to their prayers. But then again, virtually all Republicans think Ronald Reagan was their messiah, when the facts show something much darker for the average Republican voter. So yeah, don't expect facts or reason to sway the Republican faithful on Facebook.
Re: (Score:2)
It's just a choose your own hell scenario here.
Either a complete idiot that says anything he think will win him votes and probably won't know how to do anything once in power vs a T500 with the wrong skin.
Of course, you could just "waste your vote away", but if enough people do...
Re: (Score:2)
Bashing gives useful information (Score:2)
Regardless of political affiliation and dislike, I think the blurb is in the wrong when claiming that political posts will only harm your friendships. I think it's more right to say that it will help expose unworkable friendships.
If anyone really have faith in [insert extremist party or politician], I truly want to know about it, because that's people I cannot trust. Whether they're stupid or evil, they're not friendship material.
Re: (Score:2)
I started this reply to disagree with you, but realized, I actually do agree with you, albeit with a twist...
I have no interest in anyone's political opinions. Don't want to hear it, don't want to discuss it, don't want to see memes about Trump's toupee or Hillary's stroke. I sincerely wish the Founding Fathers had thought to ban all political campaigning outside a one-month window leading up to an election. I don't even
Re:Even more (Score:5, Insightful)
Rallies aren't valuable because the attendees are swayed. They're valuable because they appear in glowing terms on local TV. They're valuable because they pump up the attendees to vote/donate/volunteer. They're valuable because without them diehards won't have seen the candidate and may lose faith.