Sorry about the length of the post, there was just a lot to say.
I believe disagreements are easier to unpack if we stop presuming they are about difference in belief. Posts like this seem to confirm my own experience that the strongest factor in convincing people of something is not any notion of truth or plausibility but whether there are common allegiances with the other side. This seems to explain a number of puzzles of disagreement, including: (list incomplete to save space)
Why do people who aren’t sure about Elizer’s posts about physics/comp science/biology etc wonder what famous names have to say? (hypothesis: you could create names by creating a person who reliably agreed with some subset of public speakers. you could stretch allegiances by stretching the subset after the followers are established)
Why is Ray Kurzweil more convincing than code and credentials? (hypothesis: PZ Myers’s support would be really convincing to Scienceblog readers)
Why does good grammar and spelling help convince? (hypothesis: with younger crowds and faster communication, poor spelling/grammar would help convince)
Why do some lies work better than others? (hypothesis: psychics are more likely to be believed when they agree with the person they are working)
Why do uninformed supporters of Barack Obama rationalize their reasons for supporting him? (hypothesis: X’s supporters would do it too, where X is a mainstream public figure, but would not do it if questioned by someone perceived to be on the Other Side)
When people say “Why don’t you have a PhD?” they have executed a search for a piece of evidence that, if someone had, would help convince them that he was on Their Side. However, (like someone who objects to Objectivism and reads Ayn Rand in response to the reaction he gets) even when he returns with a PhD, they still don’t wear his colors. In a conversation with a person on the side of science who has not yet heard of it, a creationist mentioning that there is a $250,000 prize for anyone who can give convincing proof of evolution meets an automatic (and in my case, curiously confused) skepticism not from knowing the specifics of the prize but rather a gut reaction “Kent Hovind is a creationist, he must be doing something wrong.”
The same thing applies with SIAI. It meets automatic skepticism and people want evidence that the organization’s ideas are on their side. Famous names worked where code and credentials don’t because the famous names share strong common allegiances. Code and credentials appeal to the “does it work?” mentality which would convince a lot of people allied to engineering and science if not for the fact that these are also signals used by impostors. The support of PZ Myers, on the other hand, would be an incredibly difficult signal to fake, making it a strong signal that would communicate a great deal of common allegiance with people who are scientifically minded and internet savvy. Same with a positive mention in the New York times for liberally minded people.
Sorry about the length of the post, there was just a lot to say.
I believe disagreements are easier to unpack if we stop presuming they are about difference in belief. Posts like this seem to confirm my own experience that the strongest factor in convincing people of something is not any notion of truth or plausibility but whether there are common allegiances with the other side. This seems to explain a number of puzzles of disagreement, including: (list incomplete to save space)
Why do people who aren’t sure about Elizer’s posts about physics/comp science/biology etc wonder what famous names have to say? (hypothesis: you could create names by creating a person who reliably agreed with some subset of public speakers. you could stretch allegiances by stretching the subset after the followers are established)
Why is Ray Kurzweil more convincing than code and credentials? (hypothesis: PZ Myers’s support would be really convincing to Scienceblog readers)
Why does good grammar and spelling help convince? (hypothesis: with younger crowds and faster communication, poor spelling/grammar would help convince)
Why do some lies work better than others? (hypothesis: psychics are more likely to be believed when they agree with the person they are working)
Why do uninformed supporters of Barack Obama rationalize their reasons for supporting him? (hypothesis: X’s supporters would do it too, where X is a mainstream public figure, but would not do it if questioned by someone perceived to be on the Other Side)
When people say “Why don’t you have a PhD?” they have executed a search for a piece of evidence that, if someone had, would help convince them that he was on Their Side. However, (like someone who objects to Objectivism and reads Ayn Rand in response to the reaction he gets) even when he returns with a PhD, they still don’t wear his colors. In a conversation with a person on the side of science who has not yet heard of it, a creationist mentioning that there is a $250,000 prize for anyone who can give convincing proof of evolution meets an automatic (and in my case, curiously confused) skepticism not from knowing the specifics of the prize but rather a gut reaction “Kent Hovind is a creationist, he must be doing something wrong.”
The same thing applies with SIAI. It meets automatic skepticism and people want evidence that the organization’s ideas are on their side. Famous names worked where code and credentials don’t because the famous names share strong common allegiances. Code and credentials appeal to the “does it work?” mentality which would convince a lot of people allied to engineering and science if not for the fact that these are also signals used by impostors. The support of PZ Myers, on the other hand, would be an incredibly difficult signal to fake, making it a strong signal that would communicate a great deal of common allegiance with people who are scientifically minded and internet savvy. Same with a positive mention in the New York times for liberally minded people.