re: #139 freetoken

Saw the headlines of stories that covered that Nature paper.

Anecdotally, it has been illustrated many times with salesmen - they do better when they believe what they sell. This gets manifested in religion too.

In regards to the wingnut stream of outrages on social media - I don’t know how much any single one believes, but I do suspect there are many people who once they close off their bubble and only listen to hate-talk radio and Fox News, are no longer open to doing research that will be able to convince them otherwise.

I discovered the phenomenon as a young child trying to scam my parents about some bullshit thing during a long road trip. I can’t remember what I was trying to get away with but I clearly remember there was a moment when I realized my reactions to having my lie challenged evoked an initial genuine feeling that the lie was true and they were wrong. At that point without even being scolded I pulled back, realizing the danger at play in attempting to continue the ruse.

When I grew up I just kind of considered that a basic phase of development that everyone must go through.

Clearly not everyone goes through it.