• luciole (he/him)@beehaw.org
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    2 months ago

    It’s not a take though, it’s a thing. The tendency to fall into irrational beliefs has been called “Dysrationalia” in psychology and is linked to higher education and intelligence. An example would be the tendency of Nobel prize winners to espouse crazy theories later in life, which is humourously referred to as the Nobel Disease.

    • localhost@beehaw.org
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      1 month ago

      That’s a 1 month old thread my man :P

      But sounds interesting, I haven’t heard of Dysrationalia before. Quick cursory search shows that it’s a term that has been coined mostly by a single psychologist in his book. I’ve been able to find only one study that used the term and it found that “different aspects of rational thought (i.e. rational thinking abilities and cognitive styles) and self-control, but not intelligence, significantly predicted the endorsement of epistemically suspect beliefs.”

      https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6396694/

      All in all, this seems to me more like a niche concept used by a handful of psychologists rather than something widely accepted in the field. Do you have anything that I could read to familiarize myself with this more? Preferably something evidence-based because we can ponder on non-verifiable explanations all day and not get anywhere.

      • luciole (he/him)@beehaw.org
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        1 month ago

        That’s a 1 month old thread my man :P

        Not sure what you mean. The thread was created August 16, my comment was made August 21, and now here you are replying on September 24. Some fediverse hiccup maybe.

        So anyways I don’t have anything a cursory search wouldn’t turn up.

        • localhost@beehaw.org
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          1 month ago

          Oh damn, you’re right, my bad. I got a new notification but didn’t check the date of the comment. Sorry about that.