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From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: Re: stupid reply
Message-ID: <2043@pyuxd.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 5-Nov-85 14:05:46 EST
Article-I.D.: pyuxd.2043
Posted: Tue Nov  5 14:05:46 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 8-Nov-85 06:25:37 EST
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> Unfortunately, I can only point this out, I don't expect my evaluation
> to be believed, for it is incrediable the stubborn will of people to
> maintain a belief in something *even when they know better*!!
> (For a good example of this I suggest reading a study by Barry Singer
> and Victor A. Benassi of the Department of Psychology C.S.U. at
> Long Beach .Their study was on the stubborness of people to beleive
> the contradictory over reality. The best report is in the Winter 1980/81
> issue of the Skeptical Inquirer,under the title of "Fooling some of the
> people all of the time." A synopsis of their study, and another at
> Southern Illinois University by Scott Morris, is in Douglas Hofstader's
> Metamagical Themas - section 2,"Worlds in Collision",pp.91-114.)
> 		P.M.Pincha-Wagener

Don't mean to quibble (I think Worlds in Collision is a title due to
Velikovsky, and Hofstadter was satirizing this), but the full title
is "World Views in Collision:  National Enquirer vs. Skeptical Inquirer"
(I may have gotten the publication names reversed), and it was originally
found in the Feb. 1982 issue of Scientific American.  It is positively
EXCELLENT reading and should be REQUIRED reading for school children of
sufficient age, ESPECIALLY for those who hold inane wishful thinking
positions.  (Not that, as the article points out, it is likely to help...)
Hofstadter talks about some examples of how such silly mindsets develop,
and how successful debunking occurs (as found in the studies you mention).
-- 
Anything's possible, but only a few things actually happen.
					Rich Rosen    pyuxd!rlr