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The Republican Brain: The Science Of Why They Deny Science--and Reality (2012)

by Chris C. Mooney(Favorite Author)

3.88 of 5 Votes: 2

ISBN

1118094514 (ISBN13: 9781118094518)

languge

English

genre

Nonfiction

publisher

Wiley

review 1: I was really disappointed in this book. I was hoping for enlightenment that would help me peacefully coexist and agree to disagree. Like many liberals I want to understand them. They’re my neighbors and coworkers and relatives and I don’t like having the same unwinnable arguments. That’s time wasted that we could spend focusing on where we agree. And I certainly believe in tolerance and free speech and not allowing the majority to tyrannize the minority. BUT: The consequences of their beliefs are not benign. Failing to act on global warming and other ecologically harmful acts could be our doom. Pushing for disproven economic theories in spite of clear evidence causes extreme pain for the people who lose their jobs and pensions and health insurance because of it. P... morereventing gays from having equal rights because “the Bible says so” is wrong. Teaching kids “scientists are wrong, just believe whatever makes you happy and helps you fit in” will make us as ignorant and backward as the people who persecuted galileo and martin luther---even worse because we know better! They have every right to believe what they choose to believe but when they make them laws that we all have to live with then the damage they are doing is unacceptable and accommodating them makes us just as wrong as they are.I agree that we could get more done if we worked together but not if the price is accepting Guatanamo and drones and lack of oversight on Wall Street. We cannot be the party of “ My president right or wrong”. The Founding Fathers wanted us to hold our elected officials to the highest standards. And in these days when the media is not doing that job it’s more critical than ever. But of course our leaders exploit our inability to organize to ignore us, just as their leaders exploit their loyalty to enshrine their beliefs as laws.He says maybe FOX doesn’t have some kind of evil agenda to fill their heads with nonsense. Maybe their minds are already made up and they go looking for the network that reinforces what they already think. Maybe so. But what if FOX does have an evil agenda and their admirable loyalty to the tribe is being exploited by a bunch of greedy rich guys who want to be even richer? Don’t we have a responsibility to take off the kid gloves and say “hey, wake up! You’re voting for things that hurt you because it lines some rich guy’s pockets! And he’s convinced you to support him by exploiting the very things about you that are admirable – your faith, your loyalty, your stick to your guns in the face of any evidence mentality.” Here’s another angle I don’t remember him exploring: Their need to be part of the tribe and defend their tribal leaders at all costs is fine, until they use it to demonize people who don’t agree. They unite together against a common enemy – women, minorities, immigrants, gays – and use their power to keep them out of office, out of our schools, from marrying and having the same rights and privileges and full citizenship they have. They’re entitled to believe whatever they like but they’re not entitled to make those beliefs into laws to hold people down and ram their morals down our throats. When they use their “you’re either with us or you’re the enemy” to paralyze the government and openly declare “we will do everything possible to defeat this legally elected President from succeeding” then it’s time to stop . And here’s another angle I wonder about: When some “expert” claims to have facts or opinions about an issue most liberals not only question how logical and provable they are, we also ask ourselves “does this person have an agenda? Do they have something to gain by espousing these ideas? Are they bought and paid for?” Just having a title or degree is not enough. Why don’t conservatives ask themselves these questions? Or do they and do they get different answers? It seems to be heretical that they would even think of questioning their leaders, and that seems so un-American. We’re the descendants of people who refused to bow down to kings and tyrants or blindly follow church leaders or accept the stations in life we were born into. The tribe mentality works in highly populated places like China or Japan. How do people who came to this country to escape religious persecution become persecutors? Who fled tyranny become tyrants? Who love a book that exhorts them to Love Thy Neighbor want to screw him over and keep him down and use that book to justify it?I also have a real problem with their whole “we’re the real americans and you communists and socialists need to move” attitudes. We try to respect and tolerate their ideas. I don’t tell them they need to move to another country if they don’t like Obama. But I can’t tolerate the hypocrisy of them saying “I believe in telling other people what they can think and forcing schoolkids to pray and making my religious beliefs into laws and My Country Right Or Wrong and I only uphold the Constitution when it agrees with me and therefore I’m the True American and if you disagree you’re un-American.”I give him credit for your sincerity and for not wanting to demonize them. he bent over backwards to be nice and understanding. So have I. I’ve bitten my tongue a thousand times when they spout their racist and wrong opinions. I’m all for free speech. But I have to draw the line when they start legislating their ideas and using their tribal power to hurt innocent people. We don’t need more books that polarize us and reinforce what we already think, but we also don’t need books that say “yea, they believe a bunch of lies but they’re harmless and we believe dumb stuff too and we should be more like them”. The stakes are too high. There’s a huge opportunity to unite them behind someone who really does have his or her heart in the right place and some realistic answers to the problems we face, and the sooner they demand that this person display their Christian values of kindness and honesty and helping your neighbor and doing the right thing, the better off we’ll all be.
review 2: I'm not sure I've done a 5 star review before but I am now. It's not from poetic artistry but rather personal impact. It's very frustrating not knowing why people make certain choices (or lack of choices in some cases) and even though the Republican Brain is political science (the scientific study of politics) it has a lot of insight into WHY people are they way they are. Why do liberals waffle when it comes time to making decisions? Why do conservatives ignore empirical evidence (the point of the book)? Why do most people make a decision then go looking for data to back it up as apposed to the opposite? Why do some people stick to their decision even after new conflicting data from the very same source shows up? Are people born liberals and conservatives or is it taught? Any open minded person who believes science is a good way to test ideas and validate them with reproducible results will get a great deal out of this book. If you are however, one of the people who thinks scientific testing bears no merit then you should probably read something else that makes you feel good.I kid you not, my blood pressure has gone down because of what I learned reading this. less

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