In a word, untrustworthy. Political biases even hurt our ability to do math! Chris Mooney reports on a new study:
Everybody knows that our political views can sometimes get in the way of thinking clearly. But perhaps we don't realize how bad the problem actually is. According to a new psychology paper, our political passions can even undermine our very basic reasoning skills. More specifically, the study finds that people who are otherwise very good at math may totally flunk a problem that they would otherwise probably be able to solve, simply because giving the right answer goes against their political beliefs. ...
For study author [Yale law professor Dan] Kahan, these results are a fairly strong refutation of what is called the "deficit model" in the field of science and technology studies—the idea that if people just had more knowledge, or more reasoning ability, then they would be better able to come to consensus with scientists and experts on issues like climate change, evolution, the safety of vaccines, and pretty much anything else involving science or data (for instance, whether concealed weapons bans work). Kahan's data suggest the opposite—that political biases skew our reasoning abilities, and this problem seems to be worse for people with advanced capacities like scientific literacy and numeracy.
The Scottish Enlightenment philosopher David Hume famously described reason as a "slave of the passions." Today's political scientists and political psychologists, like Kahan, are now affirming Hume's statement with reams of new data. This new study is just one out of many in this respect, but it provides perhaps the most striking demonstration yet of just how motivated, just how biased, reasoning can be—especially about politics.(h/t Political Wire)
