Why do people believe in things when the body of scientific evidence shows otherwise

[technodad]

This is not intended to be an attack on any denomination of belief. The aim of this thread is to try to understand why people choose to believe things, when there are far more likely explanations and why people choose to not trust the scientific opinion.

I am not particularly thinking about a discussion about religion because clearly "faith", some old books and preaching make a difference there (although, please discuss religion if it is relevant). I am thinking more about things like:

• People don't believe global is happening when the vast majority of the scientific community can provide evidence that it is.

• People believe in ghosts when their existance violates all the laws of physics and pretty much all "ghost events" (if not absolutely all) can be explained without mystery.

• People don't get their kids vaccinated (e.g. MMR), when it is clear that not vaccinating is orders of magnitude more dangerous than vaccinating.

• People think that palm reading, tea leaf reading, etc actually works...

• People believe in "alternative" medicines work, when every "alternative" medicine that actually works is now simple called "medicine"!

The rules are as follows:

1. You can say what ever you like, and I don't care if you insult me.

2. If you post something, you may have someone say something that challenges your deeply held beliefs, so please only post if this is acceptable to you.

3. No one is allowed to complain about anyone being horrible, or arrogant, based upon the fact that people will only post here if they are up for a debate (see 2).

4. There is no 4.

Ladyindisguise, people argue about treatment before they have it all the time. My sister is a GP & more often than not, people come in having already made a diagnosis & requesting the treatment they think they want!!!! She says everyone who uses the internet is their own doctor these days.

Not even my sister agrees with some of the medical advice that she has to give out, so I think you'll find conventional medicine is questioned regularly.

Look at the debates people have about HRT! You get long-standing medics with careers in the relevant field directly contradicting each other!!!!!!

What I find baffling is the blind faith people have in CAM. Chinese medicine, for example. Doesn't anyone want to know what's in those bags of herbs you boil up?

And amber necklaces. People who believe in them seem perfectly happy for their babies to absorb an unknown quantity of an untested pain killing chemical through their skins........

curlew, I think testing has been done on Amber beads & next to nothing is absorbed by anything. This is why in Australia, amber bead purveyors are forbidden for marketing them as having pain relieving properties.

Baltic amber contains succinic acid (for which there is some evidence that it has pain relieving properties). However, there is no evidence that body temperatures releases succinic acid from Baltic amber and there has not been sufficient testing to show that saliva or sweat do either.

In all honesty, I'd be more worried about the strangulation risk from an amber bead teething necklace or a choking risk if the beads broke free, than any kind of unknown chemical absorption!

Absolutely. Amber beads have been shown to have no pain reliving properties at all. But some people believe they do. And are completely unbothered by their baby absorbing unknown quantities of untested chemicals. Because it's "natural", presumably,

Ah, ISWYM curlew!