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Political beliefs are caused by brain structure and personality traits, in an interaction with environment/identity/self-interest. You saying people can just c

Political beliefs are caused by brain structure and personality traits, in an interaction with environment/identity/self-interest. You saying people can just change their political beliefs when there are scientifically known biological causes of said beliefs is akin to proponents of gay-conversion therapy. If you think personality and brain structure aren't part of the picture, then you're not aligned with current scientific knowledge - your faux outrage and strawmanning notwithstanding.

TameAntelope 6y ago
> when there are scientifically known biological causes of said beliefs This is false, at least to the degree of accuracy, potency, and certainty as you present it here. They are "part of the picture", but one small part, not the overriding majority of how people make choices about what to believe. > then you're not aligned with current scientific knowledge Yes I am. You are not. You misrepresent the degree to which the things you've mentioned impact the things you claim they impact, and I'm beginning to think it's a malicious choice to do so.
- hntrader 6y ago
  "one small part" This is an inaccurate (or at best presumptively overconfident) portrayal of extant science. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4038932/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4038932/ "not the overriding majority" That's another strawman. My claim is that it's a non-trivial cause, not that it's an exhaustive explanation of all the causes or that it explains an "overriding majority" of the variation. Even if it explains just 25 percent of the variation, the assertion that people can change their political views despite that biological underpinning is akin to thinking that gay-conversion therapy can work.
  - TameAntelope 6y ago
    I... think you need to read the abstract you just cited. It agrees with me, not you. And I never said holistically what you claim was, so it cannot be a strawman. I simply (and accurately) said that you are overstating the degree to which biology impacts political affiliation. 25% is not even remotely accurate, and in fact laughably wrong. As your own cited paper explains: > "The combined evidence suggests that political ideology constitutes a fundamental aspect of one’s genetically informed psychological disposition, but as Fisher proposed long ago, genetic influences on complex traits will be composed of thousands of markers of very small effects and it will require extremely large samples to have enough power in order to identify specific polymorphisms related to complex social traits.". Additionally, specifically to your claim that what I was saying wasn't in line with current thinking in the field, again your own citation proves you wrong: > "However, these findings have not been widely accepted or incorporated into the dominant paradigms that explain the etiology of political ideology." You need to re-read the single study you cited. You clearly do not understand what they're claiming, and are pinning a large part of your worldview on something you don't understand. Finally, the idea that people can change their political ideology has absolutely nothing to do with gay conversion therapy. This continued false assertion is tantamount to trolling. You know it's false, I know it's false, but you keep saying it because it's inflammatory.
    - hntrader 6y ago
      "You need to re-read the single study you cited." No, you need to reread it, especially the introduction to the paper. Their whole point is that social scientists need to incorporate a growing body of evidence developed outside of their field pertaining to the genetic and biological causes of political orientation. "More than half a century of research ... has demonstrated that ... political attitudes, are influenced by genetic factors." "We find that genetic factors account for a significant amount of the variance in individual differences" "The results ... supports the call for a revision of the status quo" "25% is not even remotely accurate, and in fact laughably wrong." Twin studies put the variation at 30-60 percent (not that I necessarily think it's that high), so it's not laughably wrong, and you are misrepresenting the science if your think that you know for sure that it's less than 25 percent.
      - TameAntelope 6y ago
        It's an interesting concept, but the requisite examination of the field has not taken place. This is the start, not the end, and you're treating it like there's a clear and actionable conclusion as a result of this single barely-cited paper. These people do not represent the field at large, and to believe them without additional peer review and further study is to give up on scientific objectivity, and instead just favor whatever sounds appealing to you personally. That is what you've done here. You are wrong because of your certainty that this work is Truth. You are not on the side of science here, you're firmly in the world of abject speculation, and you furthermore promote action on information that does not agree with you, even if all of it were true (which it is not). You have a choice here; continue to spout lies and nonsense, and continue to misrepresent what you've read, or take a step back and try to re-assess why it is you were drawn to such an inconclusive ideology to the point of promoting action. I suspect you'll choose the latter, but you have that choice now.
        hntrader 6y ago
        My claim is actually fairly mild, it's not "abject speculation" to say that there's nontrivial biological causes behind political belief. The introduction just summarized five decades of peer reviewed research claiming to show that it plays such a role. That this evidence hasn't (yet) been subsumed into the theories of social scientists doesn't suddenly make it invalid for me to come to the rather mild conclusion that I've come to. What is abject speculation is when you specifically assert as fact that 25 percent variation is high. This is a positive claim requiring its own burden of proof, and which contradicts some tentative evidence from twin studies.

TameAntelope 6y ago

> when there are scientifically known biological causes of said beliefs This is false, at least to the degree of accuracy, potency, and certainty as you present it here. They are "part of the picture", but one small part, not the overriding majority of how people make choices about what to believe. > then you're not aligned with current scientific knowledge Yes I am. You are not. You misrepresent the degree to which the things you've mentioned impact the things you claim they impact, and I'm beginning to think it's a malicious choice to do so.

hntrader 6y ago
"one small part" This is an inaccurate (or at best presumptively overconfident) portrayal of extant science. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4038932/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4038932/ "not the overriding majority" That's another strawman. My claim is that it's a non-trivial cause, not that it's an exhaustive explanation of all the causes or that it explains an "overriding majority" of the variation. Even if it explains just 25 percent of the variation, the assertion that people can change their political views despite that biological underpinning is akin to thinking that gay-conversion therapy can work.
- TameAntelope 6y ago
  I... think you need to read the abstract you just cited. It agrees with me, not you. And I never said holistically what you claim was, so it cannot be a strawman. I simply (and accurately) said that you are overstating the degree to which biology impacts political affiliation. 25% is not even remotely accurate, and in fact laughably wrong. As your own cited paper explains: > "The combined evidence suggests that political ideology constitutes a fundamental aspect of one’s genetically informed psychological disposition, but as Fisher proposed long ago, genetic influences on complex traits will be composed of thousands of markers of very small effects and it will require extremely large samples to have enough power in order to identify specific polymorphisms related to complex social traits.". Additionally, specifically to your claim that what I was saying wasn't in line with current thinking in the field, again your own citation proves you wrong: > "However, these findings have not been widely accepted or incorporated into the dominant paradigms that explain the etiology of political ideology." You need to re-read the single study you cited. You clearly do not understand what they're claiming, and are pinning a large part of your worldview on something you don't understand. Finally, the idea that people can change their political ideology has absolutely nothing to do with gay conversion therapy. This continued false assertion is tantamount to trolling. You know it's false, I know it's false, but you keep saying it because it's inflammatory.
  - hntrader 6y ago
    "You need to re-read the single study you cited." No, you need to reread it, especially the introduction to the paper. Their whole point is that social scientists need to incorporate a growing body of evidence developed outside of their field pertaining to the genetic and biological causes of political orientation. "More than half a century of research ... has demonstrated that ... political attitudes, are influenced by genetic factors." "We find that genetic factors account for a significant amount of the variance in individual differences" "The results ... supports the call for a revision of the status quo" "25% is not even remotely accurate, and in fact laughably wrong." Twin studies put the variation at 30-60 percent (not that I necessarily think it's that high), so it's not laughably wrong, and you are misrepresenting the science if your think that you know for sure that it's less than 25 percent.
    - TameAntelope 6y ago
      It's an interesting concept, but the requisite examination of the field has not taken place. This is the start, not the end, and you're treating it like there's a clear and actionable conclusion as a result of this single barely-cited paper. These people do not represent the field at large, and to believe them without additional peer review and further study is to give up on scientific objectivity, and instead just favor whatever sounds appealing to you personally. That is what you've done here. You are wrong because of your certainty that this work is Truth. You are not on the side of science here, you're firmly in the world of abject speculation, and you furthermore promote action on information that does not agree with you, even if all of it were true (which it is not). You have a choice here; continue to spout lies and nonsense, and continue to misrepresent what you've read, or take a step back and try to re-assess why it is you were drawn to such an inconclusive ideology to the point of promoting action. I suspect you'll choose the latter, but you have that choice now.
      - hntrader 6y ago
        My claim is actually fairly mild, it's not "abject speculation" to say that there's nontrivial biological causes behind political belief. The introduction just summarized five decades of peer reviewed research claiming to show that it plays such a role. That this evidence hasn't (yet) been subsumed into the theories of social scientists doesn't suddenly make it invalid for me to come to the rather mild conclusion that I've come to. What is abject speculation is when you specifically assert as fact that 25 percent variation is high. This is a positive claim requiring its own burden of proof, and which contradicts some tentative evidence from twin studies.