2016-10-09 16:44:45
Do you think that what you believe cannot be studied by science because it is part of an immaterial world? Do you think that your beliefs are not influenced by your hormones, by your genes, and that they only depend on your intelligence and your will? If so, don’t listen to this podcast, because you’re going to have to stop believing it.
The beliefs that we harbor, particularly the false ones, those of which everyone has some, pose a problem from the point of view of the evolution of the human being. It seems reasonable to assume that true beliefs about reality would favor survival and the probability of reproduction, while false beliefs would favor the opposite. There are extreme examples of false beliefs that can lead to immediate death, such as believing that if we jump out of the window we will fly like Dumbo just by flapping our ears.
Some scientists and philosophers have studied this matter, and have come to the conclusion that the false beliefs that can be useful for survival are only positive ideas. Now, a group of researchers has explored this possibility by administering a hormone involved in our social interaction: oxytocin. Researchers find that oxytocin increases optimism by facilitating the incorporation into the belief system of those evidences that reinforce the positive ones, and by making it more difficult to incorporate into the belief system those negative evidences that contradict them. Interestingly, this decrease in the effect of negative evidence caused by oxytocin is greater in depressed and anxious people, so this hormone could have a greater positive effect on them than normal.
More information on Jorge Laborda’s Blog: Molecular biology of optimism.
References:
Yina Maa et al. (2016). Distinct oxytocin effects on belief updating in response to desirable and undesirable feedback. www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1604285113
Popular works by Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume I. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume II. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume III. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume IV. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume V. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume VI. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume VII. Jorge Laborda
Kilo of Science Volume VIII. Jorge Laborda
Chained circumstances. Ed.Lulu
One moon, one civilization. Why the Moon tells us that we are alone in the Universe
One Moon one civilization why the Moon tells us we are alone in the universe
The intelligence funnel and other essays
#Cienciaes.com #Molecular #biology #optimism