Your Brain Lies To You

I was websurfing and came across this article. It's funny because I remember ATS member and aficionado, St. Udio mentioning it the other day in a thread.
The article is called Your Brain Lies To You.

False beliefs are everywhere. Eighteen percent of Americans think the sun revolves around the earth, one poll has found. Thus it seems slightly less egregious that, according to another poll, 10 percent of us think that Senator Barack Obama, a Christian, is instead a Muslim. The Obama campaign has created a Web site to dispel misinformation. But this effort may be more difficult than it seems, thanks to the quirky way in which our brains store memories - and mislead us along the way...

This phenomenon, known as source amnesia, can also lead people to forget whether a statement is true. Even when a lie is presented with a disclaimer, people often later remember it as true.

With time, this misremembering gets worse. A false statement from a noncredible source that is at first not believed can gain credibility during the months it takes to reprocess memories from short-term hippocampal storage to longer-term cortical storage. As the source is forgotten, the message and its implications gain strength. This could explain why, during the 2004 presidential campaign, it took weeks for the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against Senator John Kerry to have an effect on his standing in the polls.

Even if they do not understand the neuroscience behind source amnesia, campaign strategists can exploit it to spread misinformation...

I think this is something that is important to realize because it reinforces the fact that you can't believe everything you read...especially on the internet, without questioning it and looking it up for yourself. People can easily take advantage of this source amnesia; I see it all the time.

So give the article a read, and next time someone offers you an idea that they consider "outside the box," do a little research on both sides of the argument. When I'm considering a theory, such as one off of ATS, I generally research the theory first and get all the information I can on it. Then, I will usually go do a search for the debunking of that theory and see how much sense it makes as compared to the actual theory itself.

This gives a more broad perspective on the subject at hand and allows for more careful and logical consideration.

I agree with you. You need to look at all sides of an issue before you can make an imformed decision. Many peple make up their minds before checking out the soucre material. This is especially true for beliefs one has held for a long time. Look at all supporting info then look at all debunking info. I beleive this is the only way to make an informed decision. Or maybe my brain is lying to me.

How odd.

My fellow human brethren appear to be keeping pace with me.



Still, the understanding is a little wobbly, i had put this down to simply over-loading the brain with too much information in between each sleep cycle.

In otherwords; Burn out.

I can't deny i'm not invulnerable from this, i've actually noticed myself doing it more than a few times (but at least i figured out how to recognise the memory pattern).

source amnesia is too strong a word, i think - perhaps one that was left to boil for too long.

It's nothing more than a simple loophole in the mind, one that can be taken advantage of by both the mind-host and others.





[edit on 30-6-2008 by Anti-Tyrant]

That's true -- sometimes there's such a rush to argue against something outlandish that people miss the unspoken assumptions, and end up standing on the same shaky ground as their opponents.

Politicians use this technique in their posturing all the time, so they can sway people without having to get specific and factually polarizing.

reply to post by Mad_Hatter


Great post mad hater, Ive seen this happen all to often, even with mysef on the odd occasion. But I guess dirt sticks if you throw it at someone.

-fm

That poll result should have read "18% of Americans missread the question and ticked the wrong box" Cos I don't believe that 18% of american don't know that the earth revolves around the sun.

Originally posted by Acidtastic
That poll result should have read "18% of Americans missread the question and ticked the wrong box" Cos I don't believe that 18% of american don't know that the earth revolves around the sun.

18% of America is only 54 million people...
i can understand that many are uneducated or choose to be moronic, but when we are talking about millions upon millions of people, it does seem disproportionate.

our brain does play these tricks on us though. a good example is when you remember something, but you question its reality. you ask yourself, "did that actually happen, or did i dream that last night?" for me, it sometimes is really hard to figure it out.