Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Denialism or Insanity

  Denialism or "disbelief" is where you will not accept what is reality. Denialism plays a major role in science because some people believe that scientifically proven data is incorrect. For instance, not accepting a vaccination that can help prevent women from contracting a virus that has been proven to lead to cervical cancer.So why wouldn't people vaccinate their young girls? Is it because they don't love them? Or is it because they have heard  that the vaccine may cause some unfavorable, non-life threatening side effects?  There is a fine line between denying something and just being irrational or irresponsible. In my opinion from living around non science majors, people just don't want to hear the facts about science. People will hear one side of the story and not listen to the other side. As human beings this is natural for us. Everyone has heard something that they believed was true, but it turned out to be false. The feeling that you get when someone says no you are wrong leaves a sour taste. No one wants to be proven wrong. People just ignore facts and think irrationally to make their situation better for themselves. As with the two Ivy league schools that watched controversial calls in a rivalry game, each college favored the calls that helped their team the most. People believe what is convenient for them and not always what is true. Whether its denialism or irrationality, people can be stubborn and accept what they have heard as truth even when data clearly shows their truth is inaccurate.

3 comments:

  1. Fiesty!
    In all seriousness though, the Guardisil shot (as I've heard) hurts really bad. One girl I taught from high school had a bruise and swelling that looked like half a baseball coming out of her humerus. I'd hate that.

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  2. Is there anything that we as scientists can do to make science more understandable and relevant? Is this possible? Or will human nature always lean towards the more comfortable belief and set of explanations?

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  3. I think the best way to further the public's opinion on science is to lead by example. Not everyone will welcome the facts and truths about certain subjects of science but maybe they are just hard headed? Majority of it is the misinformation out there on the internet. I think it is possible for people to understand the subject of science, but not by tomorrow.

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