Not Born Yesterday

by Hugo Mercier

  prob lem with threat information, since, if we take the threat se-

  riously, we should avoid it, and thus never figure out if it was a

  genuine threat: I’ve never found out whether or not any “Dan-

  ger High Voltage” sign was accurate. The attribution of compe-

  tence to people who circulate threats is—as was suggested in

  chapter 10— one of the main reasons people spread false rumors,

  many of which mention some threat.

  Besides threats, there are other types of information that can

  be deemed useful without ever being seriously tested, such as

  justifications. Someone who provides justifications for actions

  people want to engage in anyway can be rewarded by being seen

  as more competent. However, this reputation credit can be ex-

  tended in defi nitely if the actions are never seriously questioned,

  and the justifications never tested.

  This loophole in the way we attribute competence is, in the

  vast majority of cases, of little import. Maybe we will think

  a friend who warns us about the dangers of such and such

  exotic food a bit more competent than they actually are, but we

  have other ways of more accurately estimating our friend’s

  228 ch ap t er 14

  competence. The real prob lem dawns with the rise of special-

  ists: people whom we don’t know personally but through their

  communications in a specific domain.

  Nowadays, some news sources specialize in the provision of

  threatening information. A prime example is the media network

  of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones: the InfoWars website, radio

  show, YouTube channel, and so forth. Most stories on the

  InfoWars front page are about threats. Some are pretty generic

  threats: a lethal pig virus in China that could strike humans,

  a plane pi lot on a murder- suicide mission.23 Many stories are

  targeted: mi grants from Islamic countries are responsible for

  most sex crimes in Finland, Turkey “announces launch of

  worldwide Jihad,” Eu rope is committing suicide by accepting

  Muslim mi grants.24 Even a non- directly threat- related piece on

  George Soros’s fight with the Hungarian government is accom-

  panied by a video warning against the dangers of power ful

  communists such as Barack Obama (!), Richard Branson (?!),

  and Jeff Bezos (??!!).25

  Presumably, few in Jones’s audience live in Finland, or in close

  proximity to sick Chinese pigs. As a result, the readers are un-

  likely to find out whether the threats are real, and Jones can keep

  the reputation credit he earned from all these warnings. He is

  then able to leverage this perception of competence in a variety

  of ways, for instance, by sel ing expensive yet useless nutritional

  supplements whose very names remind the reader of constant

  threats— “Survival Shield X-2 - Nascent Iodine”—or a variety of

  “preparedness” products, from emergency survival food (one-

  year supply!) to radiation filters.26

  Turning to justifications, we observe a similar dynamic in the

  case of Galen. The Roman physician provided a complex theo-

  retical apparatus as a rationale for the relatively intuitive prac-

  tice of bloodletting. Doing so made him appear more competent

  sh a l l o w g ur us 229

  (note that there were other, better reasons to deem Galen com-

  petent). As a result, physicians might have heeded Galen’s ad-

  vice even when it departed from the most intuitive forms of

  bloodletting. For instance, he advocated bloodletting for a far

  wider range of ailments than was usual.27 He also had rather id-

  iosyncratic views on which veins should be cut open— the

  thumb of the left hand to cure the spleen, say— when in most

  cultures bloodletting is practiced near the ailing body part (e.g.,

  on the temple for headaches).28 On one point Galen appears to

  have been particularly influential: the quantity of blood drained.

  My reading of the anthropological and historical lit er a ture sug-

  gests that, in most times and places, only a tiny amount of blood

  was removed through bloodletting. By contrast, Galen boasts of

  sometimes draining two liters of blood from his patients, bleed-

  ing them until they faint.29 More or less directly, Galen’s recom-

  mendation may well have precipitated an untold number of

  deaths, including that of George Washington, who was bled 2.5

  liters (84 ounces) before he died.30

  On a much larger scale, there may be a similar dynamic af-

  fecting religious creeds, with the search for justification bringing

  in its wake an assortment of weird beliefs. Cognitive scientist

  Nicolas Baumard and his colleagues have argued that many

  of the teachings of the great world religions are intuitively ap-

  pealing, at least for people in the right environment.31 In their

  model, as the material environment becomes less of a constant

  and immediate threat, people start yearning for diff er ent moral

  norms that emphasize “moderation, self- discipline, and with-

  drawal from excessive greed and ambition.”32 Leaders emerge who

  promote religious justifications for these new norms, with god(s)

  that care about human morality, and a world imbued with cos-

  mic justice. This is a remarkable departure from previous religious

  worldviews where, for instance, Zeus and his ilk displayed no

  230 ch ap t er 14

  superior sense of morality. The leaders who are able to articu-

  late religious creeds fitting these changing moral intuitions are

  rewarded with deference. One of the effects of this deference,

  arguably, is to help spread other ideas, ideas born of the reli-

  gious specialists’ striving for a more intellectually coherent

  system. These ideas don’t have to be particularly intuitive, or

  to be of any use as justifications for most of the flock. For ex-

  ample, few Christians care deeply about what happens to the

  soul of people who lived before Jesus and thus couldn’t be

  saved by the sacraments (the unlearned). Yet theologians had

  to ponder the issue, and made this part of the official creed:

  for example, in Catholicism the unlearned are stuck in the

  “limbo of the fathers” until the Second Coming.33 More sig-

  nificantly, the theologically correct version of the Christian

  god— the omni- everything version—is the result of a slow

  elaboration over the ages of scholars attempting to reconcile

  vari ous doctrines.34

  This account distinguishes two broad sets of beliefs within

  the creeds of world religions. The first set comprises beliefs that

  many people find intuitively compelling— for example, re-

  wards and punishments in the afterlife for good and bad deeds.

  The second comprises beliefs that are relevant only to the theo-

  logians’ attempts at doctrinal coherence. We find both catego-

  ries in world religions besides Chris tian ity. Crucially, the first set

  of beliefs is quite similar in every world religion, while the sec-

  ond varies widely. For example, in Buddhism the concept of

  merit plays a central role, so that those who do good deeds have


  better luck in their next lives. But we also find in Buddhism

  counterintuitive ideas that play little useful justificatory role

  and have no parallel in Chris tian ity, such as the precise status

  of the Buddha in relation to humans and gods, or the cycle of

  reincarnation.

  sh a l l o w g ur us 231

  Trickle- Down Science

  Being wil ing to give people the benefit of the doubt and grant

  them a good reputation on credit, because they warn us about

  threats we will never face or provide justifications that will

  never get tested, cannot explain the widespread ac cep tance of

  counterintuitive scientific theories. For one thing, scientific

  theories are nearly all counterintuitive, so scientists can’t surf

  on a wave of easily accepted theories to make the public swallow

  the rest.

  Frankly, I’m not quite sure why so many people accept coun-

  terintuitive scientific theories. I’m not saying they shouldn’t,

  obviously, merely pointing out that the popularity of such coun-

  terintuitive ideas, even if they are right, is on the face of it quite

  puzzling. It is true that people accept scientific beliefs only re-

  flectively, so the beliefs interact little with other cognitive mech-

  anisms. But, stil , why accept these beliefs at all? Very few people

  can properly evaluate scientists’ claims, especially when it

  comes to novel discoveries. A small group of specialists under-

  stands the content of new results, can interpret them in light of

  the lit er a ture, and knows the team that produced them. Every-

  body else is bound to rely on relatively coarse cues. The further

  removed we are from the group of relevant experts, the coarser

  the cues.

  There are numerous cues people use to ascertain how “scien-

  tific” something is. One is mathematizing: if math is used, then

  the outcome is more likely to be thought of as good science. In

  an experiment conducted by psychologist Kimmo Eriksson, par-

  ticipants, all with postgraduate degrees, had to evaluate some

  social science results. Half of the participants read abstracts in

  which a sentence with mathematical symbols had been in-

  serted.35 The sentence itself made no sense, yet it boosted the

  232 ch ap t er 14

  positive evaluations of the abstract. Another coarse cue is prox-

  imity to the hard sciences. Psychologist Deena Weisberg and

  her colleagues asked participants to evaluate explanations of wel -

  established psychological phenomena.36 Some explanations

  were purposefully circular, but some of these poor explanations

  were supplemented with useless information about the brain

  areas involved. The addition of irrelevant neuroscience data made

  participants less critical of the useless explanations. Reassuringly,

  genuine experts weren’t fooled either by the fancy math or by the

  neuroanatomical babble.

  An even coarser cue is the prestige of a university. A jour-

  nalist reporting on two studies, one conducted at Harvard

  and the other at Bismarck State College, would likely stress

  the former affiliation more than the latter.37 The effect of uni-

  versity prestige is even vis i ble in that most dramatic demon-

  stration of deference toward science: the Milgram obedience

  experiments.

  The standard narrative surrounding these experiments is

  that Milgram showed how two- thirds of U.S. participants were

  wil ing to shock someone almost to death, if ordered to do so.38

  These results have been taken as support for Hannah Arendt’s

  contention, based on the be hav ior of many Germans in World

  War II, that “in certain circumstances the most ordinary decent

  person can become a criminal,” suggesting that people would

  obey just about any orders from any person in a position of

  authority.39 However, this narrative ought to be substantially

  revised in two ways.

  First, the two- thirds figure is inflated. It was only obtained in

  one variant of the experiment. Other versions, with minor

  changes such as a new experimenter, yielded lower rates of com-

  pliance.40 More impor tant, many of the participants— nearly

  half of them— expressed doubts about the real ity of the whole

  sh a l l o w g ur us 233

  setup.41 Those who didn’t express such doubts, who presumably

  really thought they were shocking someone, were vastly less

  likely to comply: only a quarter of them went all the way to the

  highest voltage.42

  Second, Milgram’s experiments demonstrate only that people

  defer to science, not to anyone barking orders at them. The par-

  ticipants, most of whom had quite modest backgrounds, were

  invited to the prestigious Yale University, welcomed by a lab

  coat– wearing scientist, and given an elaborate scientific rationale

  for the experiment. Participants followed the experimenter’s re-

  quest only when they believed in the study’s scientific goal.43 By

  contrast, straight-up orders, such as “You have no other choice,

  you must go on” tended to have the opposite effect, prompting

  participants to rebel and refuse to take further part in the experi-

  ment.44 Removing some of the cues that made the experiment

  appear more scientifically respectable— for instance, carry ing it

  out in a generic town rather than at Yale— decreased the com-

  pliance rate.45

  The Milgram experiment illustrates the dangers of an overreli-

  ance on coarse cues to evaluate scientific value. Other examples

  abound. Pseudoscientists, from creationists to homeopaths, use

  credentials to their advantage, touting PhDs and university ac-

  creditations they gained by professing diff er ent beliefs.46 Stil , on

  the whole coarse cues play a positive role. After all, they do re-

  flect reasonable trends: mathematization vastly improves sci-

  ence; the hard sciences have progressed much further than the

  social sciences; someone with a PhD and university accredita-

  tion is likely to be more knowledgeable in their field of exper-

  tise than a layperson.

  234 ch ap t er 14

  The Guru Effect

  Jacques Lacan relied on these coarse cues to boost his stature.

  He had the proper credentials. He made extensive use of math-

  ematical symbols.47 Stil , even knowing this, I suspect few are able

  to plow through his seminars, and those who do, instead of being

  impressed by Lacan’s depth, are more likely stunned by his ab-

  struseness. How could prose so opaque become so respected?

  More obscure statements require more effort to be under-

  stood; as a result, every thing else being equal, obscurity makes

  statements less relevant.48 Take the following example: instead of

  reading, “In the event of an impact where the airbag is deployed,

  the inflator part of the airbag may ignite in such a manner that

  it creates excessive internal pressure. As a result the metal infla-

  tor casing may rupture, causing metal fragments to be propelled

  through the airbag and into the vehicle,” people would rather be

  told, “Your airbag might expl
ode and kill you with shrapnel” (yes,

  this is a real example).49 As a rule, when hard- to- understand con-

  tent spreads, it is not because it is obscure but in spite of being

  obscure, when there is no easier way to get the content across.

  Yet the success of Lacan, and other intellectuals of his ilk,

  suggests that obscurity sometimes helps, to the point that

  people end up devoting a lot of energy to deciphering nonsensi-

  cal statements. Dan Sperber has suggested that, in unusual cir-

  cumstances, obscurity can become a strength through a “guru

  effect.”50

  Imagine Lacan in 1932. He has attended the best schools; has

  been mentored by the best psychiatrists; and his noted doctoral

  dissertation reflects a broad mastery of the psychiatric, psycho-

  analytic, and philosophical lit er a tures. He promotes the idea

  that mental illnesses are not necessarily deficiencies but merely

  diff er ent ways of thinking, which should be understood in their

  sh a l l o w g ur us 235

  own terms.51 His thesis might be right or wrong, but it is under-

  standable, controversial, and in ter est ing. Lacan makes a name

  for himself in Pa ri sian intellectual circles, where he is, for broadly

  justifiable reasons, perceived as an expert on the affairs of the

  mind.

  To maintain his status, Lacan should keep developing new and

  in ter est ing theories about the mind. But this is rather difficult

  (believe me on this). Fortunately, there is a way out. He can rely

  on increasingly vague concepts, concepts that were already part

  of the zeitgeist. Here is an excerpt from a pre sen ta tion Lacan gave

  in 1938: “The first case [a patient] shows how the symptoms were

  resolved as soon as the oedipal episodes were elucidated, thanks

  to a nearly purely anamnestic evocation.”52 It takes a bit of effort,

  and some familiarity with psychoanalytic jargon, but it is pos-

  si ble to make sense of this statement, which broadly says, “The

  patient’s symptom subsided when he was able to remember hav-

  ing sexual desire for his mother” (a likely mistaken conclusion,

  but that’s another issue).

  Lacan’s work confirms his mastery of the most complex psy-

  choanalytic theory and suggests that decoding his dense prose

  is worth people’s while. Because they assume Lacan to be an ex-

  pert, his followers devote growing amounts of energy and imag-