Gullibility

Based on the subject of this forum, I thought this was an interesting little snippet that I took from an article.

What Does it Mean to be Gullible?:
Gullibility is an affliction which is no respecter of class, religion, gender, or race. Gullibility is a widespread product of people’s failure to properly apply reason, logic, and skepticism to a claim or idea. Unfortunately, the worse a person is at doing this, the less likely they are to realize it; indeed, they can be among those who think they do the best. As a consequence, gullibility festers and encourages the development of false, irrational, and even dangerous beliefs.

Alternative Archaeology & Cryptozoology:
Just about every science has pseudoscientific parasites that feed off its scientific credibility and fuel people’s gullibility. Cryptozoology is the “study” of nonexistent creatures like Bigfoot and the Yeti. Alternative archaeology is the study of ideas such as how ancient astronauts helped create ancient human civilizations or how ancient cultures actually had more sophisticated scientific knowledge than mainstream archaeology will admit.

Ghosts & Apparitions:
Closely connected to belief in an afterlife is belief in encountering the spirits of those who have physically died. This form of gullibility includes belief in ghosts, poltergeists, and hauntings of various sorts. No investigations of alleged ghosts or hauntings have turned up any solid, reliable evidence that such spirits really exist. Lots of frauds, hoaxes, and mistakes have been revealed, though. In any given case, the chances of a fraud or mistake are higher than the truth of the claim.

UFOs & Alien Abductions:
In America, at least, a popular form of gullibility revolves around the idea that aliens visit Earth and, at least occasionally, abduct humans for experiments. A UFO is an unidentified flying object; gullible believers think that they can identify some objects as alien craft. There is no hard evidence for either the visits or the abductions, though. Not only would such visits be technologically implausible, but there are more mundane explanations for these claims which better fit the evidence.

Does it Matter if People are Gullible?:
One might wonder whether it really matters if people are gullible and believe so many things without or despite contrary evidence. Even if the evidence and arguments against some of these beliefs are incontrovertible, so what? Clearly these beliefs serve some sort of need in people, otherwise they wouldn’t be so popular. Whether people derive pleasure or comfort from them, why not let them be? Why insist on critical, skeptical evaluations which make believers feel anxious and insecure?

Such points might have more merit if gullibility never did any harm and baseless beliefs never had any real impact outside the belief itself. The truth, however, is that habits of gullibility cannot be restricted to just a few isolated beliefs in a person’s life. If a person develops a habit of accepting claims without requiring commensurate evidence and reason to back that claim, then such habits of thinking will necessarily influence their approaches in areas like politics and social policies — and this affects us all.

The article doesn't really address the real definition of Gullible.

gul·li·ble   [guhl-uh-buhl]
adjective
easily deceived or cheated. easily taken in or tricked
Synonyms
credulous, trusting, naive, innocent, simple, green.

Now just because someone has a belief in anyone of the mentioned things does not make them Gullible.
Are you Gullible if you experience something and you can not or someone can not explain it? NO

What about when Evidence of things are presented in a scientific manner and those conclusions are different than main stream does that make a person Gullible? NO

This article is making Huge Basie judgments and is putting down everyone who has first hand experience of things that can not be explained YET.
Who becomes the Gullible one, when Science gets its hand on a Bigfoot or the Aliens Land on the lawn of the white house.

We live in an age that might someday be seen as the most absurd in human history. On one hand, every educated person knows that the physical structure of the human brain controls what people think and do. At the same time, the vast majority of humans also believe brains are part magic. We give names to the magic part of our brain such as mind, soul, spirit, and free will. The most common view that educated people hold about the brain is that its physical structures give us some tendencies and biases but we can use the magic part - the "mind" - to override all of that.

Recently scientists have discovered the area in your brain that controls your gullibility. It's the ventromedial area of the prefrontal cortex. When it's underdeveloped, as in kids, or degraded as in the elderly, or damaged in an accident, the result is more gullibility.

Now we know which part of the brain makes people think they are part meat and part magic. If the ventromedial area of the prefrontal cortex is suboptimal, you'll believe in horoscopes, ghosts, devils, conspiracy theories, and whatever your favorite politician is saying.

I'm guessing we're already at or near the point at which scientists can measure a normal adult's level of gullibility. I'm sure there's some way to devise gullibility tests in the lab. And it looks as if we might someday be able to do a brain scan and see how active the ventromedial area of the prefrontal cortex is while a subject is contemplating certain hard-to-believe topics. Imagine how our ability to quantify gullibility could affect politics.

How long will it be before pollsters can show their results filtered by gullibility? I'd like to see the opinions of the gullible compared to the opinions of the people who have robust and fully functioning prefrontal cortexes. Even better, the first filter would test for knowledge on a topic, a second filter would test for general intelligence, and a third would test for gullibility. I'd only care about the opinions of people who passed all three filters.

Interestingly, a person can be brilliant and well-informed but gullible at the same time because the brain uses different zones for different functions. I'd like to know who my brilliant-but-gullible fellow citizens are because those folks are a menace to society. The brilliant part makes them highly capable while the gullible part makes them dangerous. The ones who don't become serial killers are voting. In terms of body count, which is worse?

Here is your LINK
http://atheism.about.com/od/aboutskepticism/p/Gullibility.htm
The AUTHOR:
http://atheism.about.com/bio/Austin-Cline-5577.htm

Austin Cline has been actively involved in educating people about atheism, agnosticism, and secular humanism on the Internet for over 15 years.
You can also read more about Austin's current and past work on his Google Profile: Austin Cline.

Austin Cline was a Regional Director for the Council for Secular Humanism and a former Publicity Coordinator for the Campus Freethought Alliance. Austin has also lectured on religion, religious violence, science, and skepticism.
Austin Cline holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Pennsylvania and a Master of Arts from Princeton University. He also studied for one year each at the University of Zurich and the Ludwig-Maximillian University in Munich, Germany. In America, Germany, and Switzerland, Austin has studied both religion and philosophy.
Both atheism and agnosticism are neglected in popular culture, despite the popularity of recent books by atheists. When was the last time you saw an openly atheist politician, an article on atheism in a major periodical, or anyone discussing secular humanism as a serious alternative to religion?

No Bias'ness in HIS theory NO not at all... Where is his SCIENCE degree? OH lets see its all ART no science.
That is why you were afraid to post where you got it from

If you wanted a link I would have gladly provided them, just ask next time.

I will provide a link in the future, so as to avoid accusations against me.

I did not write these, I just found the perspective interesting and thought others may as well.

I never looked at the authors credentials simply because this is an article that is based on a subjective opinion, and should be taken as such.

My intent was not to offend anyone, just food for thought!

Oh I was reading it I found it interesting but then of course reading the authors BIO and his agenda it is like people looking at bigfooters to see what their motives are, can you trust them what have they done in past etc...

http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/quantifying_gullibility/

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-08-brain-gullibility-center.html

The ventromedial area of the prefrontal cortex of the brain—a softball-sized lobe in the front of your head, just above your eyes—appears to be responsible for allowing you to pause after hearing or reading something and consider whether it's true, according to a study published recently in the journal Frontiers in Neuroscience. "When most adults hear or read something, they believe it at first, and begin to process it," explained study author Erik Asp, a researcher in the department of psychology at the University of Chicago who conducted the study while at the University of Iowa. "And then they start asking questions. But we're all susceptible to believing something initially."

In the study, the University of Iowa researchers selected 39 participants from its Neurological Patient Registry and 10 healthy people for comparison. They showed eight consumer ads to 18 people with focal brain damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, 21 people with focal brain damage outside that area, and also to the healthy individuals.

The research is flawed.
Lets look at the situation: Do you know the past of the people? The Information Were these people Isolated all their life? What kinda of other information had they processed?
Its we process data and then we add it to the data we already have read and seen or experienced and make the conclusion does this fit in with what we already know?
Seriously to take this and added it to Bigfoot, and all the other fringe research is a huge step in the Psuedo science of this all.
Hell you could be gullible in believing this research.

I am gullible to a certain degree in certain areas, just as I believe everyone is in one way or another.

I already stated that I took this as a subjective opinion article that I found interesting. I didn’t consider it real research or science. I didn’t research or write it, I just read it and found it intriguing. If you disagree with it, then address the article or Author.

Do what you want with it, for me it was just a little insight from another perspective to consider.

Well you placed it in the forum so I assume you agree with it to a point.
So I assumed you wished to have a discussion on it.

Anyway:
The main research was interesting the silly agnostic write-up was just a way to say LOOK SEE science says your gullible for believing in these things.
How silly of you.

Yes I agree with some of it to a point that is why I posted it. But not a factual paper based on science that answers and tells all for the classification of being Gullible. I just use these type of differing opinions and perspectives from other sources and groups to help with the checks and balances within my own process of thinking.

To take this article as factual science was never my intent. I have stated before that I will not argue or debate a subjective subject or the validity of the researchers or research being done. I will however have a civil discussion on the presented ideas / info.