by J. Jerrald Hayes | Apr 5, 2018 | Irrational Thinking, Pseudoscience
Ignorance and stupidity are not the same things but both seem to be at time embodied in the minds of flat-earthers, A short collection of videos I recently watched on engaging with flat-earthers…(This guy Victor from Brooklyn in videos one, two, and three is...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Nov 26, 2017 | Cognitive Bias, Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking
Why incompetent people often think they’re actually the best Maybe you’ve experienced this at school or work before: Dealing with someone who thinks he’s much better at his job than he really is. This can not only be really annoying, but it can lead...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Oct 7, 2017 | Brain Science, Cognitive Bias, Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking
Dr. Steven Novella Talks About Why Our Brains Really Suck at QED 2011 in Manchester. At approximately 37:00 minutes in he explains how the reasoning powers in our prefrontal cortex can evaluate the interpretations from other areas of our brain and use “Critical...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Sep 10, 2017 | Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking, Religion
Aron Ra did a good take-down of one of Prager U’s videos RationalWiki on Dennis Prager and his Prager U: Prager “University” actually presents history and politics from a hard-right point of view. This includes rampant New Dealdenialism, promotion of...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Sep 6, 2017 | Cognitive Bias, Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking
The full speech from which this shorter video was...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Jun 6, 2017 | Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking
When I post some article or video on FaceBook about GMOs being safe, Homeopathy being a fraud, Chiropractic being pseudoscience, Gluten sensitivity being an imagined condition, or anything else from my list I invariably get people who disagree with me and instead of...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | May 3, 2017 | Cognitive Bias, Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking
Wow,… this is arguably one of the very best explanations of why we believe what we believe and perhaps more importantly why it is so hard for us to change our minds. It’s long for The Oatmeal but it is well worth it. You’re not going to believe what...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Feb 22, 2017 | Cognitive Bias, Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking
Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds In 1975, researchers at Stanford invited a group of undergraduates to take part in a study about suicide. They were presented with pairs of suicide notes. In each pair, one note had been composed by a random individual, the other...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Feb 6, 2017 | Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking, Science
The Baloney Detection Kit: Carl Sagan’s Rules for Bullshit-Busting and Critical Thinking Carl Sagan (November 9, 1934-December 20, 1996) was many things – a cosmic sage, voracious reader, hopeless romantic, and brilliant philosopher. But above all, he...
by J. Jerrald Hayes | Jan 23, 2017 | Cognitive Bias, Critical Thinking, Irrational Thinking, Psychology, Science, Science Denial
Researchers Say They’ve Figured Out What Makes People Reject Science, and It’s Not Ignorance A lot happened in 2016, but one of the biggest cultural shifts was the rise of fake news – where claims with no evidence behind them (e.g. the world is flat...
