On Belief and Social Networks

Listen to the following podcast segments from Hidden Brain (approx 50 min), then respond to 2 classmates posts. (120 words each)

https://www.npr.org/transcripts/743195213?storyId=743195213?storyId=743195213

Post 1. By Alyssa
We come to believe what we believe by what people tell us. A lot of times we get our beliefs from our parents or other “mentor” figures. Even if the belief is wrong and we know it, we can train our brains to believe it’s true. As in hidden Brains M doesn’t believe in vaccines because something happened to her child after the vaccine. Which made Maranda start to believe the vaccines are bad. “ So it did not take me very long at all before I was solidly saying I will not vaccinate my child when she is born”. We really don’t know what we believe in is “true”, that’s just all we’ve ever believed in so to us it has to be true. Many people can support what they believe in with evidence while other things you can not.

Post 2. By Cynthia
In the podcast “Facts Aren’t Enough” , by hidden brain it showed how ideas are formed by people and the experiences around you. Though one may think somethings true, that could just be a belief and not an actual fact. For example in the podcast, Maranda, heard from a midwife that vaccines cause autism, and that it happened to her child. Maranda then googled the topic and went on Facebook to conclude that this information was true. Then Vedantam stated “…Maranda continued to say no to vaccines. Occasionally, when she encountered information that conflicted her decision, a pamphlet at the doctors office, a website, she dismissed it.” (4:30) showing how Maranda got her information from non scholarly sources that were proved to be incorrect by professionals. Therefore you don’t know if what you believe is true unless you research the topic on scholarly sources and listen to both sides of the argument. Also that you believe what you believe because of the people around you and what beliefs that you come across.