“Liberals and conservatives not only have different views of the world – their brains process information differently,” reports The Week (September 28th, 2007). In a scientific study New York psychologist David Amodio, reporting in Scientific American, showed in brain scans that liberals showed more activity in the anterior cingulated cortex, an area of the brain which allows people to break habits of thought and be flexible, altering views according to evidence. Conservatives, on the other hand, have styles of thought that are more structured and persistent and block out irrelevant or “distracting” information. They have more difficulty changing an established mode of thought. This does not mean either group is smarter than the other, David Amodio is careful to say! It is all a matter of the brain you are born with.
Epicureans, it has been shown by a quick check of the brain of the writer, are never hidebound by habit of thought, always ready to accept new evidence and are always ready to be adaptive and fair. I always knew it, I hear you cry!
Epicureans should be calm, tolerant and should listen to others.
Ah, listening! Everyone is shouting at one another in America! Epicureans should enjoy the Autumn weather (unless they are in the South West) and go for a nice walk.
Are you a tad skeptical of putative connections between personality and politics on one hand and images of brain sections fizzing-up during scans on the other? That part of my brain which lights up while doubting something is flashing energetically at that kind of leap.
I’m a bit skeptical of most things I am told by medics. I’m particularly skeptical when a doctor encourages you to increase doses of pharmaceuticals and infer that you won’t be cured/feel better until you do. Everyone has a different tolerance to drugs. I know this has nothing to do with brain operations (or does it?) , but it does feed into the suspicion that some GPs are in the pockets of big pharma and others are desperate to make their names using research that maybe is a tad dubious or hurried.