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| zinjanthropos |
 Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 12:13 pm Post subject: Why Are Some People Impressionable and Some Not? |
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Forum Ph.D.
Joined: 11 Dec 2005
Posts: 862
Location: Driving in my car
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Or what makes a good skeptic or believer?
You see a lot of videos these days, it seems like every second post contains a link to something that will prove a point. I saw one the other day where I guy apparently filmed some lights moving across a field of tall grasses and miraculously crop circles started to appear. Now I have read where this video has been established as a hoax but to the person who offered this video it proves crop circles are a result of some outworldly paranormal event.
Imagery is powerful. Our eyes see and the brain wants to believe. Many people get convinced. However there are some of us who are either never convinced or need a lot of scientific proof in order to make it happen.
Is there a conscious or unconscious need for people to believe what they see? or hear? What mechanism helps separate a skeptic from a believer? Do skeptics have something in their physical make up that believers don't or vice versa? Is skepticism more prevalent in older people? If so when does it take over or is it a gradual awakening.
I can remember reading Von Daniken when I was young and thinking, wow, aliens have been here. I believed it wholeheartedly at first but now I am very skeptical. Same thing for Bigfoot, Nessie and that ilk. Why do believers disregard evidence to the contrary?
You would think with the advent of computer graphics that people wouldn't be too quick to latch onto some video displaying something paranormal, but they do.
Thoughts? |
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| Orleander |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 3:51 pm Post subject: |
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Forum Freshman
Joined: 25 Mar 2008
Posts: 90
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I grew up going to church 3x a week, bible camp, etc. I believed everything. I had no concept of people you love lying to you. Why would they do that?
Then I got married. 
I also think its a low self-esteem thing. People smarter than you obviously know what they are talking about. If you question them they will laugh at you and you will look as stupid as you feel. |
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| 425 Chaotic Requisition |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 4:45 pm Post subject: |
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The Doctor
Joined: 18 Jun 2007
Posts: 2682
Location: UKGBNI, England, Derbyshire
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Seeing is not believing. People who are around that belief stuff when young often become opposed to it when older, its sort of anti conformity with your emotions. You oppose the events that occured in your childhood, the events of what you went through with the bad events, therefore anything associated with them (unprovable beliefs) will be shown the same negative treatment.
Its most probably why I believe in things, when I was young I was not forced to believe anything go to churches etc, didn't really give two hoots about religion. But now I do. Reverse psychology does work.
Anyone see what I mean? The theory that the opposite of events are portrayed into your adulthood.
_________________
"There is no knowledge, that is not power" - Ralph Waldo Emerson. |
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| i_feel_tiredsleepy |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 4:48 pm Post subject: |
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Forum Senior
Joined: 21 Mar 2008
Posts: 373
Location: Montreal
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| My parents never brought me to church or talked about God, and I grew up to be a non-believer and still am a non-believer lol. So, I suppose it doesn't work in everyone. |
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| 425 Chaotic Requisition |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 4:56 pm Post subject: |
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The Doctor
Joined: 18 Jun 2007
Posts: 2682
Location: UKGBNI, England, Derbyshire
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Yeah. We're all different. As long as we understand each other, what else better can we do?
_________________
"There is no knowledge, that is not power" - Ralph Waldo Emerson. |
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| zinjanthropos |
| Posted: Thu Mar 27, 2008 5:38 pm Post subject: |
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Forum Ph.D.
Joined: 11 Dec 2005
Posts: 862
Location: Driving in my car
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Could it be that some people just want more. Is there a point of self realisation that occurs when one looks at the world and asks 'is that all there is?' Everything you've experienced up until then has a certain finality attached to it. Perhaps being unsatisfied with what life really has to offer flips a switch in some people and they need to know if there's more. For those people there is a lot to choose from and once intrigued by something different then that's it.
Still, I wonder how big a role the imagination plays? |
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| qwertyman |
| Posted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 11:57 am Post subject: |
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Forum Freshman
Joined: 28 Mar 2008
Posts: 62
Location: England
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sometimes I think that people 'want' to beleave so much that they will.
i saw a video on youtube that shows cam-corder footage of a meteor crashing and an alien coming out, even though the creators of the video came forwards and said it is a hoax they did as a little project, some people still beleave it is proof of aliens coming to earth and disregard all evidence.
_________________
'if one man beleaves in fairies its called madness
if one million men beleave in faries its called religion'- Richard Dawkings
(but i think he was quoting someone when he said it...but who cares) |
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| zinjanthropos |
| Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2008 9:55 am Post subject: |
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Forum Ph.D.
Joined: 11 Dec 2005
Posts: 862
Location: Driving in my car
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| Just introducing my new avatar. Since my previous one was of a thinker, this face swallower or girner, as they are called, probably leaves a first impression not conducive to intelligent speech. Imagine if Einstein looked similar. I wonder how much our looks affect the way people form biases? |
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| NeptuneCircle |
| Posted: Sun Apr 06, 2008 8:59 am Post subject: |
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Forum Freshman
Joined: 22 Oct 2007
Posts: 32
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| We all have a schema of how me make sense of the world. Often times, we need to have a biased to what reinforces our belief and disregard information that goes against it, otherwise the continuous fluctuation of our beliefs will make us highly neurotic. |
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| Pong |
| Posted: Tue Apr 08, 2008 6:23 am Post subject: |
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Forum Senior
Joined: 08 Apr 2008
Posts: 304
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| I was agnostic for a long time. Finally decided - without any stimulus or fresh insight in the matter whatsoever - to firmly believe there is no God. That's faith. |
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