Lots of people believe in Bigfoot and other pseudoscience claims – this course examines why

Summary

This article by Craig A. Foster, writing for The Conversation, makes the following points:

• The course explores some of the common scientific reasoning failures that pseudoscience exploits.
• People use motivated reasoning to process information in a way that helps them confirm what they want to believe.
• Group polarization is where individuals develop more extreme positions after interacting with similarly-minded people.

References

Recent Runway Posts related to this topic:

• People Who Fall for Pseudoscience Use Less Evidence to Reach Conclusions | The Runway (airforce.gov.au)

References from the Web:

• DEC 2021 Group Polarization—Simply Psychology  
• MAY 2022 4 categories of pseudoscience — and how to talk to people who believe in them—Big Think

Source Information:

• Article Source: https://theconversation.com/au
• Media Check: The Conversation - Media Bias Fact Check (mediabiasfactcheck.com)
• RAAF RUNWAY: RATIONALE, GUIDELINES, LEARNING OUTCOMES, ETC.