What Kind of Voter Is Most Susceptible When Pols Pile It High and Deep?

[Agnosticsherbet]

Last edited Sat May 14, 2016, 03:12 PM - Edit history (1)

What Kind of Voter Is Most Susceptible When Pols Pile It High and Deep?

Millions of voters this election cycle are shunning “the establishment” and the meaningless platitudes that practiced politicians chew up and spit out like bubblegum. Scientists behind a recent study have come up with a technical term for this political treacle: “bullshit.” And they’ve found that people’s ability to detect it correlates with their political views.
The authors of the PLoS ONE study said they found that people who identify as conservative are more likely than their liberal counterparts to find such meaningless statements profound. What’s more, vulnerability to bullshit is linked to support for specific candidates—with Ted Cruz devotees the most likely to dredge up meaning in phrasal cow patties. The study, conducted by two German psychologists with no clear dog in America’s presidential pit bull fight, has created a real you-know-what storm. “I knew there would be a little bit of a brouhaha” over the study’s formal terminology, says cognitive psychologist Mark Runco of the University of Georgia, who edited the paper. “It happens to be timely and use an unusual label—that is to say, ‘bullshit.’”
The study’s social scientists—Stefan Pfattheicher, a psychologist at the University of Ulm, and Simon Schindler of the psychology department at Kassel University—focused on a particular form of BS: “pseudo-profound bullshit.” On first blush these grammatically correct statements seem to possess deep meaning, but they contain little logic.

So Conservative Bulshit Detectors are permanently broken. That helps explain a lot.

It makes me wonder if Republicans use this on purpose, or if they believe their own profound bullshit.

[scarletwoman]

1. Link?

[moondust]

3. Here:

Scientific American

[Agnosticsherbet]

4. Thanks for adding that.

I added it to the post.

[LiberalArkie]

2. I don't think they used to believe themselves hence Reagan-Bush and GWB-Cheney.

But I think over the years being in the echo chamber they actually believe themselves. What is bad is what used to be a semi-liberal media was in the echo chamber themselves and believed everyone had moved right. Naturally the Democratic party did also. Everyone telling each other how beautiful they and their emperor's new clothes were.

[moondust]

5. "Conservative Bulshit Detectors are permanently broken."

Yep. On Bill Maher's show last night they mentioned that some RW media are blaming liberals and "PC" for the rise of Trump. I rather think it's RW media who dislodged their audiences from reality and a decent respect for facts and truth. Kenyan Muslim, death panels, snowballs disproving climate change, etc. RW media taught their audiences that it's okay to just make shit up and go on pretending that it's true. Orwell would gasp as the RW slogan becomes: "The truth is whatever you want to believe."

[Odin2005]

6. I wonder how much this corresponds with how easily people fall for the fake charm of sociopaths.

They mentioned Cruz supporters as the most gullible to BS and Cruz comes across to me as a classic sociopath.

[Agnosticsherbet]

7. Sociopaths are particularly adept at bullshit games, saying things that manipulate others.

because they have no conscience.

[pampango]

8. "...people who identify as conservative are more likely than their liberal counterparts to find such

meaningless statements profound." “pseudo-profound bullshit.”

Nice. Thanks for posting this, Agnosticsherbet.

[Agnosticsherbet]

9. Welcome.