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[–] Genghis_Khan 0 points 11 points (+11|-0) ago 

I think the short answer is that most of the population simply lacks the intellect to really question anything they're told in any meaningful way apart from the most obvious of untruths. For example, "Greeks are lazy," while clearly false for being too broad and sweeping, feeds into people's natural desire to label things they don't know or understand, i.e. Greeks.

The people that feed us the information know this.

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[–] Frak 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

Exactly I feel as though most of the population has lost the ability to critically analyze information, or at least don't care enough about world events to analyze any further than what the media reports

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[–] Evarett 0 points 3 points (+3|-0) ago 

Lots of people just dont have the time to critically think. Work is about 8 hours if not more. after you have to drive home most of the time. relationships like SO's which take a good amount of time. friendships need some time if you want it to continue. family obligations. getting food and other needless chores like changing car oil. just so many things take peoples time away that it leaves most people not wanting to critically think about helping the world. They have only enough time to help themselves. now if only work life didnt take up so much life, thats when I can see people, the modern people having the ability to think more often with full energy.

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[–] Trypter 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

To build on that, the world and the life we live are often so busy and packed with events, decisions, circumstances, trials, and responsibilities that fact checking seems trivial when the facts don't directly affect your life.

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[–] KiloJuliet 0 points 5 points (+5|-0) ago 

People would much rather believe what is popular than to know the truth. It's about vanity, fitting in, etc. They are just lonely people who are willing to forsake reality for a feeling of fitting in.

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[–] Konran [S] 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

Yes - the problems of vanity and fitting in I can agree with.

In respect to them all being 'lonely people' - I'd like to believe that, but I have found that family and friends of mine are also guilty of this phenomena. To be honest I think this all comes down to choice. If people really want to take responsibilty for the information they receive then there are many alternative sources that they can go to nowadays for a more wide-ranging set of views. In a way I think it more likely suggests laziness rather than loneliness, with many people citing that they are too busy trying to 'win' in life to be able to research the news for themselves.

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[–] wonkifier 0 points 4 points (+4|-0) ago  (edited ago)

This is /v/criticalthinking, right?

Why aren't we discussing whether the original statement is actually true... Do the majority of people take comments they hear as gospel?

What comments? If someone uncritically accepts a single comment, but not others, do the fall into that category?

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[–] Konran [S] ago 

Nice.

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[–] nine4dnine 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

I know a guy who verbatim tends to repeat things that he has heard other people say as though they are his original thoughts. It is the most annoying thing on the planet!

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[–] TalkingAnimal 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

We use heuristics to determine whether or not something is valid. One of those things is polished appearance. One teenager I knew who I thought was intelligent was convinced Obama wanted to brand HIV+ people because a link was shared with her on Facebook. It looked polished. It looked like a news site similar to CNN or FoxNews. I asked her to click on their home page, and it became clear these were prank news articles (celebrity deaths for living celebrities, and so on).

The other is the transitive property of trustworthiness. I trust my cousin. If my cousin tells me something, I generally believe it to be true. If someone he trusts told him something untrue, and he relayed it to me as true, I would likely believe it if it did not set off any warning bells. This is the basic mechanism by which people take things they read as "gospel".

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[–] Confusion 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

All our lives, we are assaulted by information, far more than we can totally comprehend. If we were to truly critically analysis every piece of knowledge we read, learn and see, we would be driven insane. There are limitations on the human brain, and parroting the opinions of others is a "shortcut" we all learn to get by through daily life. Rather than calculate every thought, we just copy the pre-calculated thoughts of others, and store them away for later.

This isn't to be shamed, it is a fundamental flaw of our biology that can't be helped. What is, is people who VOICE these parroted thoughts. We can't help absorb bias knowledge from the media, especially on subject we know nothing about, so we sort it for later, but sadly people are lazy, so when they bring up this knowledge from storage they don't use critical thought, they just repeat it. They should be asking where they learned it, how and why, and if they can't be bothered to do this, just be quiet, but sadly people just want to speak their opinion, even on things they know nothing about. Could be many factors for this, but I believe people aren't properly taught to do this. Schools teach to parrot knowledge, critical thought is taught in college, and really only in STEM. Most people never get the training.

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[–] Salsashark717 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago 

I know a lot of people like this. I think a lot of it is just Cognitive Dissonance. A lot of it is just being too lazy to research it themselves. My mom is uber Conservative, and she's real bad about it. Causes a lot of arguments. I'm not even on a team, but I read when things catch my eye and I ask questions. She was so mad the day I explained to her that Obama-phones started under Regan and expanded to cell phones under Bush.

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[–] Konran [S] ago 

It's funny how angry people can get when they are presented with evidence that contradicts their beliefs. It's also funny how some people respond by saying that those who do point out the fallacies are just being argumentative and negative.

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[–] selpai 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago  (edited ago)

There are some comments here about a general lack of intelligence and discernment, but they fall short of the truth. The people who do this are stupid and lazy. They perceive these outlets as generally popular and trusted, so it becomes an easy and conforming act to profess the views that they experience on them. There exists a large segment of the population, who go to these media outlets with the express desire of being told what to think and say next. This is also part of why corporate/national media outlets have become so binary/paradigmatic. The format allows people who might otherwise be inclined towards critical thought to feel less conflicted about buying into the game. Because there are camps, and it is perceived as a choice.

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