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The interesting finding isn't that they're dogmatic about their anti-conensus views. It's that they are willing to bet more that they'll perform well on tests

by mlyle 4y ago

The interesting finding isn't that they're dogmatic about their anti-conensus views. It's that they are willing to bet more that they'll perform well on tests of objective scientific knowledge of related fields... and then don't.

somenameforme 4y ago
The paper seems to have largely equated "objective scientific knowledge" with liminal consensus. For instance, among their "objective scientific knowledge" questions asked whether, "The novel coronavirus was unleashed in a laboratory in Wuhan and spread from there." Another was "The numbers of people that have died from COVID-19 are artificially inflated." The latter was at least removed from the results, but emphasizes the point nonetheless that they found it appropriate to include questions that had nothing to do with science. So you end up with results that affirm that people who disagree with consensus disagree with consensus.
- mlyle 4y ago
  > . For instance, among their "objective scientific knowledge" questions asked whether, "The novel coronavirus was unleashed in a laboratory in Wuhan and spread from there." Another was "The numbers of people that have died from COVID-19 are artificially inflated." This is an incorrect reading of the paper. Those are statements intended to determine whether a participant has anti-consensus beliefs, but do not occur on the objective measure we're talking about. Then participants were asked to bet on their ability to pass a middle-school level science test. People with anti-consensus beliefs bet higher on their performance and did worse on the test compared to people without those anti-consensus beliefs. These are the test questions they were asked: 1. True or false? The center of the earth is very hot: True 2. True or false? The continents have been moving their location for millions of years and will continue to move. True 3. True or false? The oxygen we breathe comes from plants: True 4. True or false? Antibiotics kills viruses as well as bacteria: False 5. True or false? All insects have eight legs: False 6. True or false? All radioactivity is man made: False 7. True or false? Men and women normally have the same number of chromosomes: True 8. True or false? Lasers work by focusing sound waves: False 9. True or false? Almost all food energy for living organisms comes originally from sunlight: True 10. True or false? Electrons are smaller than atoms: True 11. True or false? All plants and animals have DNA: True 12. True or false? Humans share a majority of their genes with chimpanzees: True 13. True or false? It is the father’s genes that decide whether the baby is a boy or a girl: True 14. True or false? Ordinary tomatoes do not have genes, whereas genetically modified tomatoes do: False 15. True or false? Sound moves faster than light. False 16. True or false? The North Pole is a sheet of ice that floats on the Arctic Ocean. True 17. True or false? The ozone layer absorbs most of the sun’s UVB radiation, but not UVA radiation. True 18. True or false? Nitrogen makes up most of the earth’s atmosphere. True. 19. True or false? Antibodies are proteins produced by the immune system. True 20. True or false? Pathology is the study of the human body. False 21. True or false? The skin is the largest organ of the human body. True 22. True or false? Ligaments connect muscles to bones. False 23. True or false? All mutations to a human’s or animal’s genes are unhealthy. False 24. True or false? Uranium is an element found in nature. True 25. True or false? Radioactive milk can be made safe by boiling it. False 26. True or false? The process of splitting uranium or plutonium atoms to create energy is called nuclear fission. True 27. True or false? Venus is the closest planet to the sun. False 28. True or false? It takes 24 hours for the earth to orbit the sun: False 29. True or false? A “Red Dwarf” is a kind of planet. False 30. True or false? The universe is expanding. True 31. True or false? Earth is the only place in the solar system where helium can be found. False 32. True or false? Gravity is the theory that serves as the foundation for modern biology. False. 33. True or false? The earliest humans lived at the same time as the dinosaurs. False 34. True or false? “Survival of the fittest” is a phrase used to describe how natural selection works. True
  - somenameforme 4y ago
    No, you're the one that's suffered an incorrect reading here. They created different objective knowledge questions for each of the different studies (there were 5) within this study. I am referencing the COVID "objective knowledge" quiz. "Subjective knowledge" for each study was determined by a single question where participants were asked to rate their knowledge of the various topics on a scale of 1-7. The questions for this ("objective knowledge" of COVID) begin on page 36 of the supplementary materials page. [1] I predictably offered the most extreme example, but there are various other questions that are also more about liminal consensus than "objective fact". But, perhaps most importantly, the observed effect from this study was extremely small. And with only 34 questions, even a small number of questions that measure anti-consensus views, rather than scientific knowledge, is enough to create a false effect through what's basically an obfuscated tautology: people who hold anti-consensus views, hold anti-consensus views. [1] - https://www.science.org/doi/suppl/10.1126/sciadv.abo0038/suppl_file/sciadv.abo0038_sm.pdf https://www.science.org/doi/suppl/10.1126/sciadv.abo0038/sup...
    - mlyle 4y ago
      I now see the question you mentioned from study 5. IMO study 5 is not the interesting substudy. As you mention, you cherry-picked the extreme example. > But, perhaps most importantly, the observed effect from this study was extremely small. The substudies that looked at those set of 34 questions above had an extremely significant result-- both statistical significance and magnitude of effect. I also don't see anything too controversial in that set of 34 questions. Do you?
      - somenameforme 4y ago
        Yes. It's a complete non sequitur to ask somebody to self rate their knowledge on e.g. climate change, and then try to objectively measure that knowledge by asking e.g. what the largest organ in the human body is. It doesn't even make any sense. It's like me asking to self estimate your knowledge of javascript, and then giving you a quiz on C# to measure that objective knowledge. The study is also filled with various issues. For instance they also removed everybody who completely agreed with the scientific consensus on studies 1-4 (see buried in page 44 on the materials and methods supplement) who undoubtedly also rated their objective knowledge highly. They drew participants from outlets like Amazon Mechanical Turk where people are paid peanuts to carry out menial tasks ($0.85 for this study). That's obviously not going to be a representative sample of society, let alone America. The paper claimed to have preregistered their study, yet didn't provide a link to such - which completely negates the point of preregistering, and so on. Something I find quite troubling is how increasingly common studies of this sort are. This study is mostly junk, but it's enticing click bait junk that will also undoubtedly bump up this journal's impact fact as other's unquestioningly cite it more with the goal of generating interest even if in lieu of science. What exactly were the peer reviewers/editors doing? It seems that so long as one concludes the right thing in exciting enough fashion, what editorial process there is becomes quite deferent, a la Sokal.

by mlyle 4y ago

somenameforme 4y ago

The paper seems to have largely equated "objective scientific knowledge" with liminal consensus. For instance, among their "objective scientific knowledge" questions asked whether, "The novel coronavirus was unleashed in a laboratory in Wuhan and spread from there." Another was "The numbers of people that have died from COVID-19 are artificially inflated." The latter was at least removed from the results, but emphasizes the point nonetheless that they found it appropriate to include questions that had nothing to do with science. So you end up with results that affirm that people who disagree with consensus disagree with consensus.

mlyle 4y ago
> . For instance, among their "objective scientific knowledge" questions asked whether, "The novel coronavirus was unleashed in a laboratory in Wuhan and spread from there." Another was "The numbers of people that have died from COVID-19 are artificially inflated." This is an incorrect reading of the paper. Those are statements intended to determine whether a participant has anti-consensus beliefs, but do not occur on the objective measure we're talking about. Then participants were asked to bet on their ability to pass a middle-school level science test. People with anti-consensus beliefs bet higher on their performance and did worse on the test compared to people without those anti-consensus beliefs. These are the test questions they were asked: 1. True or false? The center of the earth is very hot: True 2. True or false? The continents have been moving their location for millions of years and will continue to move. True 3. True or false? The oxygen we breathe comes from plants: True 4. True or false? Antibiotics kills viruses as well as bacteria: False 5. True or false? All insects have eight legs: False 6. True or false? All radioactivity is man made: False 7. True or false? Men and women normally have the same number of chromosomes: True 8. True or false? Lasers work by focusing sound waves: False 9. True or false? Almost all food energy for living organisms comes originally from sunlight: True 10. True or false? Electrons are smaller than atoms: True 11. True or false? All plants and animals have DNA: True 12. True or false? Humans share a majority of their genes with chimpanzees: True 13. True or false? It is the father’s genes that decide whether the baby is a boy or a girl: True 14. True or false? Ordinary tomatoes do not have genes, whereas genetically modified tomatoes do: False 15. True or false? Sound moves faster than light. False 16. True or false? The North Pole is a sheet of ice that floats on the Arctic Ocean. True 17. True or false? The ozone layer absorbs most of the sun’s UVB radiation, but not UVA radiation. True 18. True or false? Nitrogen makes up most of the earth’s atmosphere. True. 19. True or false? Antibodies are proteins produced by the immune system. True 20. True or false? Pathology is the study of the human body. False 21. True or false? The skin is the largest organ of the human body. True 22. True or false? Ligaments connect muscles to bones. False 23. True or false? All mutations to a human’s or animal’s genes are unhealthy. False 24. True or false? Uranium is an element found in nature. True 25. True or false? Radioactive milk can be made safe by boiling it. False 26. True or false? The process of splitting uranium or plutonium atoms to create energy is called nuclear fission. True 27. True or false? Venus is the closest planet to the sun. False 28. True or false? It takes 24 hours for the earth to orbit the sun: False 29. True or false? A “Red Dwarf” is a kind of planet. False 30. True or false? The universe is expanding. True 31. True or false? Earth is the only place in the solar system where helium can be found. False 32. True or false? Gravity is the theory that serves as the foundation for modern biology. False. 33. True or false? The earliest humans lived at the same time as the dinosaurs. False 34. True or false? “Survival of the fittest” is a phrase used to describe how natural selection works. True
- somenameforme 4y ago
  No, you're the one that's suffered an incorrect reading here. They created different objective knowledge questions for each of the different studies (there were 5) within this study. I am referencing the COVID "objective knowledge" quiz. "Subjective knowledge" for each study was determined by a single question where participants were asked to rate their knowledge of the various topics on a scale of 1-7. The questions for this ("objective knowledge" of COVID) begin on page 36 of the supplementary materials page. [1] I predictably offered the most extreme example, but there are various other questions that are also more about liminal consensus than "objective fact". But, perhaps most importantly, the observed effect from this study was extremely small. And with only 34 questions, even a small number of questions that measure anti-consensus views, rather than scientific knowledge, is enough to create a false effect through what's basically an obfuscated tautology: people who hold anti-consensus views, hold anti-consensus views. [1] - https://www.science.org/doi/suppl/10.1126/sciadv.abo0038/suppl_file/sciadv.abo0038_sm.pdf https://www.science.org/doi/suppl/10.1126/sciadv.abo0038/sup...
  - mlyle 4y ago
    I now see the question you mentioned from study 5. IMO study 5 is not the interesting substudy. As you mention, you cherry-picked the extreme example. > But, perhaps most importantly, the observed effect from this study was extremely small. The substudies that looked at those set of 34 questions above had an extremely significant result-- both statistical significance and magnitude of effect. I also don't see anything too controversial in that set of 34 questions. Do you?
    - somenameforme 4y ago
      Yes. It's a complete non sequitur to ask somebody to self rate their knowledge on e.g. climate change, and then try to objectively measure that knowledge by asking e.g. what the largest organ in the human body is. It doesn't even make any sense. It's like me asking to self estimate your knowledge of javascript, and then giving you a quiz on C# to measure that objective knowledge. The study is also filled with various issues. For instance they also removed everybody who completely agreed with the scientific consensus on studies 1-4 (see buried in page 44 on the materials and methods supplement) who undoubtedly also rated their objective knowledge highly. They drew participants from outlets like Amazon Mechanical Turk where people are paid peanuts to carry out menial tasks ($0.85 for this study). That's obviously not going to be a representative sample of society, let alone America. The paper claimed to have preregistered their study, yet didn't provide a link to such - which completely negates the point of preregistering, and so on. Something I find quite troubling is how increasingly common studies of this sort are. This study is mostly junk, but it's enticing click bait junk that will also undoubtedly bump up this journal's impact fact as other's unquestioningly cite it more with the goal of generating interest even if in lieu of science. What exactly were the peer reviewers/editors doing? It seems that so long as one concludes the right thing in exciting enough fashion, what editorial process there is becomes quite deferent, a la Sokal.