From demagogy to stupefaction: the side effects of the information age
A Life / / December 19, 2019
Demagogues and agitators always had success in the political arena. Using the prejudices and ignorance of the masses, they easily conquer the location of a large number of people who are not even based on confirmed facts. The article - why now, when our life is replete with information, demagogues even easier to go unpunished.
It is not only a steady stream of letters and messages on social networks and hundreds of TV channels. Even a simple trip to the store can cause brain overload. At the end of the last century in stores were about 9000 products, now their number has soared to 40,000. And this despite the fact that most of us are buying is usually stacked in the range of 150 products.
In addition to all this information and the decisions that we have taken, our brains have to work in a mode multitaskingAlthough, according to neuroscientists, he has to do is not created.
When we think that we multitask, we are actually just very quickly switch from one case to another. And each time it affects our ability to perceive information.
Furthermore, it has been found that work in multitasking mode and increases the production of adrenaline Cortisol, a stress hormone, which can lead to over-stimulation of the brain and even cause dizziness consciousness.
End of professional competence
How, then, able to listen to the professionals aberration? Moreover, in an era of information overload any layman becomes a so-called expert.
Let's say you read an article astrophysicist Neil Degrassi Tyson. If you do something it does not like it or you do not understand it, nothing prevents you to go to the author's page on Facebook and write to him that he is wrong. It does not matter that you do not have a degree in physics. After all, your emotional reaction to the facts presented in the article is much more important.
Even doctors no longer have such an authority as before. Now many do pose a diagnosis, read the description of the disease on the Internet. This has led to the emergence of such a thing as Cyberchondria.
Only that you have found your symptoms online, does not mean that you have determined that you have for the disease, and what you can do to appoint a treatment. Nevertheless, many do.
It is much easier to stick with what we already know
We all like to feel they are right. If we have a definite opinion on the issue to some, even contrary to the opinion of the facts have little to change.
researchers foundFriesen, Justin P.; Campbell, Troy H.; Kay, Aaron C.The psychological advantage of unfalsifiability: The appeal of untestable religious and political ideologies. That person's world includes such a thing as unfalsifiable. We use it for defense and to attack. The protective function is to maintain the integrity of our identity and our outlook on life. How do I use the attack, guess everyone who ever came in comments to any post to Facebook.
According to researchers from Dartmouth College, correct only reinforce our delusions. This is manifested in the following way. After hearing the arguments of both parties to the dispute, we usually take the side of one whose opinion coincides with ours, and ignore all the evidence proving us wrong.
Demagoguery and fear
No matter how many scientists and psychologists say that someone or something is, if you still do not believe them. When the facts are too many, it is very easy to stay in state of obscuration. And operate these demagogues.
In order to achieve the desired action of the masses, they have resorted to the old world as a tactic - to cause fear. Enough to frighten people, make them believe that everything is going wrong, and promised to defend, and that's already leading position in the offing.
Our brain is considered dangerous all he seems unfamiliar, inconsistent or incomprehensible.
Demagogues are able to use it. In their mouths anything, whether immigrants, foreign countries, people with a different skin color or Representatives of sexual minorities, can turn into something unknown and incomprehensible, what we fear.
People who create news programs, too, are aware of this property of the brain. How many of us are interested in the transmission of how the world works around? And show us the story about the new threats, and we do not change the channel.