I think the cause behind that, those people are unable to change their minds easily.

Simple not only political it is overall !!! We grow up having an idea and belief about how things should work why would I change it ...

"Rational" is defined by me so why would I consider something that is not for my workings . Now , are there people or systems that do good for all (universally ) then I will accept it , please show me such people or such cases ...

A presumed mindset based on either thinking only positively or negatively but not ready to consider both.

With thanks

This is due to the political mind set. People tend to have one of two fundamentally different political mind sets: the fixed mindset and the growth mindset.

The characteristics of "Fixed Political Mindset"

• Views past experiences as either successes or failures
• Views situations, issues, people as good or bad
• Solutions enhance the good and eliminate the bad
• Fear of failure limits the receptivity for new information
• New solutions forfeited in favor of restoring what was once successful

Where as people of "Growth Political Mindset" -

• Views past experiences as learning experiences regardless of outcome
• Views situations, issues, people as opportunities to learn
• Solutions involve integrating different perspectives and new information
• Desire to learn enhances persistence in the face of difficulties
• New solutions are created from the belief that change and growth are inevitable

(Source: What's Your Political Mindset? - A article by Dr.Tara Well) https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-clarity/201611/whats-your-political-mindset)

Everyone has their own point of view

But ... why limit this to politics, Kirk? People get stuck on religious matters too, not to mention any number of other topics. I mention religion because it is one of your areas of expertise.

Why? I don't know. Some people, many people, seem to prefer to swear their loyalty to a given ideology, and then they will repeat the standard formulae, often using exactly the same words and phrases as other like-minded. As if reciting something they memorized together.

I suppose it's a comfort zone thing, you know, like preferring to eat familiar food? Although my cynical self thinks maybe also a question of laziness. Is it easier to repeat what others around you are saying, rather than spending time doing some critical thinking, to see if the truisms make any sense? Honestly, in this regard, just how are politics and religion any different?

Parenthetically, probably of little interest to most RG readers, if you are specifically referring to US politics of the past decade or two, I think the phenomenon is in part a consequence of the Reagan years. Before the 1980s, many of the most inflexible conservatives in the US were a strange faction of the Democratic Party. The Southern Democrats. Ideologically almost totally opposite the majority of Democrats, and yet they found themselves unable to join the "party of Lincoln." Reagan managed to bring those ultra conservatives into the Republican Party, which resulted, over time, in a far more polarized political environment, I think. Now, what used to be the Southern Democrats dominate the Republican Party, and in the Democratic Party, any amount of counterbalacing conservative thought has vanished.

It's a sad state of affairs. Both parties have a whole lot to answer for, in my opinion. Small wonder that the approval ratings for Congress are so extremely abysmal. Too much closed-minded formula-think.

I've come across this article: "Neural correlates of maintaining one’s political beliefs in the face of counterevidence"

"People often discount evidence that contradicts their firmly held beliefs. However, little is known about the neural mechanisms that govern this behavior. We used neuroimaging to investigate the neural systems involved in maintaining belief in the face of counterevidence, presenting 40 liberals with arguments that contradicted their strongly held political and non-political views. Challenges to political beliefs produced increased activity in the default mode network—a set of interconnected structures associated with self-representation and disengagement from the external world. Trials with greater belief resistance showed increased response in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex and decreased activity in the orbitofrontal cortex. We also found that participants who changed their minds more showed less BOLD signal in the insula and the amygdala when evaluating counterevidence. These results highlight the role of emotion in belief-change resistance and offer insight into the neural systems involved in belief maintenance, motivated reasoning, and related phenomena."

https://www.nature.com/articles/srep39589

Psychological

The views are influenced by the way they are formed

They may be for ethnic, racial, religious or tribal reasons or deep personal interests.

So even if the opinioner is convinced that he is wrong, he remains stubborn on the point of view

To avoid getting him two things:

  The first being criticized by others and the second fear of losing personal interests.

dear sir

i agree with Aparna Sathya Murthy

so thanks with best regards

Philadelphia, PA

Dear MacGregor,

I think you have several interesting answers, above.

Generally, I tend to think that rigidities of belief are a function of their association with rigid group or collective identities--or that is one way to see the matter. A question or statement or claim under discussion or an on-going dispute comes to be treated less as a matter of how things factually stand in the world, or how they might be improved, say, and more as a matter cementing (or perhaps threatening) actual or potential (supportive) social, institutional or political relationships. In that way, emotional influences, often beside the point of the discussion or dispute of overt or apparent interest, become overly engaged and operative.

People will sometimes simply become fearful of ending up on the wrong side of a dispute or conflict. They may, then, wait, as we say, to "see which way the wind is blowing." This is a related phenomenon, though it results in temporizing passivity. On the other hand, when important elements of belief are under challenge, a person may feel that in defending prior belief they are fighting for their own "existence," as the point is sometimes put. It is as though they are saying, "No, we are not like that!" Or, "If that were true it would be bad for us, or reflect poorly on us." The actual claim or question may then get lost in a cloud of emotional reaction.

Sometimes even our important or central beliefs need to change; and none of this should be taken to imply that we can possibly avoid emotional attachment to beliefs. It requires self-discipline to resist their emotional influence, and one looks as well to supportive social environments--which better tolerate development and criticism. New ideas often require newly formed supportive groups.

H.G.Callaway

I don not agree.

If it is true, then how the political parties running a Government become defeated in elections in the democratic countries?

But problem is there in another area. In most of the time, people are practically almost forced to select one among two, the ruling or the opposition.

If none of them are up to the standard of expectation of any person, he/she have to cast vote to the neutral candidate or to avoid voting. Result of both is almost same.

Dear Kirk,do not know much about politics, but the answer you have got seems very reasonable to me.

Greetings,

Janusheva

Philadelphia, PA

Dear Pattanayak & readers,

I do not know if you intended to reply to my prior note on this thread, specifically. But, if so, then I would say that you seem to assume that rigidies of belief are an all or nothing matter. What is more reasonable is to see rigidity and association with systems of social, political, institutional or economic support (any analysis of "identity") as a matter of degree. Just as beliefs may be more or less rigidly held, the person holding particular beliefs may be more or less governed by their personal (or collective) emotional significance and their relation to reference groups --as contrasted with their public or overt, apparent import.

In a similar way, voters may be more or less governed by their understanding of the personal (or "identity") import of an issue or party as contrasted with estimates of the import of an issue or party for the public good. The overt terms of a public debate, may in consequence, have a weaker or stronger hold and influence on change of prior belief. These are sorts of parameters which change over time. Sometimes a country may be caught up in apparently intolerable divides and divisiveness, and at another point this will fade away.

A good political example is the political divisiveness in the U.S. in the 1790's --especially the late 1790s. This was partly a function of association between the two major political parties (the Federalists and the Jeffersonian Republicans) and foreign political association and affiliation: the Federalists (e.g. Washington, John Adams and Hamilton), tended toward the Anglophile, while the Republicans (e.g., Jefferson and Madison) tended toward the Francophile. Britain and France were then at war.

A generation later, after the War of 1812 and the end of the Napoleonic wars, the U.S. entered into what is traditionally called "the era of good feeling," when political divisions were much less prominent. Beliefs are sometimes more flexible and sometimes more rigid and less flexible --as a general tendency of particular periods.

H.G.Callaway

Stephen your response about the article in Nature supports the research by Jonathan Haidt in his writings on the righteous mind. It is interesting how the insula is a mechanisms identified in this article that you mentioned because it is often the area associated with experiences of disgust. Thanks for sharing this article.

I will review to get a better understanding of the neural systems involved when firm beliefs are contradicted by evidence. The extent to which disgust is triggered when in group beliefs are challenged may trigger an interaction between sensations of threat or fear located in the amygdala with a form of disdain in the insula that results in a form of neurophysiological arousal that contains a mix of feelings of threat to oneself and disdain towards others presenting the evidence. This is a major leap, but I want to see more in the article about what the authors are saying about the insula.

I concur with Haidt that when the evidence contradicts valued bonds with groups such as political parties in which one was socialized that the emotional bonds to the group can outweigh the rational evidence, but how this is manifested in the neural systems is an interesting empirical question definitely warranting closer empirical scrutiny. .

This also for the Psychological cause in plain and simple as they people are fixed on their motivation based on the Psychology they have in minds.

Philadelphia, PA

Dear Cheung & readers,

I wonder how it might be that a neurological approach to our question could interact with various normative, epistemological strictures. I would not want to discourage your interest or study of neurological approaches, but I have my doubt that this will be fruitful --leastwise not in the short run.

You wrote:

People often discount evidence that contradicts their firmly held beliefs. However, little is known about the neural mechanisms that govern this behavior. We used neuroimaging to investigate the neural systems involved in maintaining belief in the face of counterevidence, presenting 40 liberals with arguments that contradicted their strongly held political and non-political views. ...

---end quotation

What seems to me quite relevant is that in some cases, at least, researchers are quite correct to "discount evidence that contradicts their firmly held belief." In such cases, the contrary evidence or phenomenon will often count as "anomalous" or problematic, but still not sufficient to overthrow prior, well-established belief or theory. This is often because the contrary evidence appears incapable of any reasonable construal or interpretation--in such a way as to firmly establish an alternative approach or theory--also taking in the evidence supporting prior established belief.

Of course, one reasonably desires an overall account which encompasses all available evidence, but often times no such account will be easily available, and in such cases, it is often more reasonable to cling to prior generalization while admitting some anomaly. For example, before the discovery of the outer planets, Neptune and Uranus, there were known anomalies of the orbits of planets further in, left unaccounted for by Newtonian physics, which was the best account available. One might imagine, then, modifications of Newtonian gravity as a response. But this kind of approach was generally avoided. The prefered approach was to hold onto Newtonian gravity and seek instead for planets further out which would account for the anomalies within the Newtonian framework.

My point is that if it is sometimes correct to hold onto prior belief in the face of contrary evidence and sometimes not, then a neurological approach may appear to be a pretty blunt instrument for purposes of our present question. I doubt that we will find neurological correlates of such fine details of cognitive processes.

How do you see the matter?

H.G. Callaway