Lots of People Believe in Bigfoot and Other Pseudoscience Claims – This Course Examines Why

C: Why is this course relevant now?
Foster: The internet has provided pseudoscience communities with the unprecedented ability to promote their false claims.

For instance, flat-Earthers have relied on YouTube to create doubt about Earth as a globe. The Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization uses Facebook to support Bigfoot belief. These platforms take advantage of people’s tendency to believe material posted by their friends or authoritative-sounding sources.

This course is also relevant now because the consequences of poor scientific reasoning are so significant. People who believe these sorts of false claims risk their own health and that of the planet, by avoiding helpful, safe vaccines or useful discussions about the problems presented by climate change.

C: What’s a critical lesson from the course?
Foster: It’s important for students to understand that reasonable, intelligent people promote pseudoscience. When people encounter pseudoscience they don’t personally believe, they sometimes conclude that the pseudoscience supporters are unintelligent or mentally unwell. This type of explanation is shortsighted.

Everyday people are drawn into believing pseudoscience because they have limited cognitive resources and they use cognitive strategies, like relying on anecdotes, that can lead to erroneous belief. Human scientific reasoning is particularly flawed when humans really want to reach a particular conclusion.

Belief in pseudoscience also develops out of social interactions. Friends and family members commonly share their reasons for believing in creationism, ghosts, fad diets and so forth. This type of social influence goes into overdrive when people join communities that collectively promote pseudoscience. I have attended Bigfoot and flat-Earth conferences. These conferences create powerful social experiences, because so many friendly people are available to explain that Bigfoot is alive or the Earth is flat, both of which are, clearly, false.

C: What materials does the course feature?
Foster: The “Defining Pseudoscience and Science” chapter by Sven Ove Hansson in “Philosophy of Pseudoscience: Reconsidering the Demarcation Problem” sets up what I call the psychological puzzle of pseudoscience: How do people convince themselves and others that an unreliable scientific claim is actually reliable?

We also have guest speakers, including philosophy of science scholar Massimo Pigliucci, journalist and folklorist Ben Radford, exposer of psychics Susan Gerbic, a local Bigfoot enthusiast, and Janyce Boynton, who discussed facilitated communication, a discredited communication technique in which some people physically assist nonverbal people with their communication, for example, by guiding their hands as they type.

C: What will the course prepare students to do?
Foster: The course prepares students to identify dubious scientific claims. In so doing, they should become less vulnerable to being drawn into pseudoscience. The course also enhances familiarity with specific forms of pseudoscience. I expect climate change denial, anti-vaccination and creationism to remain major points of contention in American society for decades. Educated people should understand the discussions that occur around these kind of social problems.

Craig A. Foster is Professor and Chair, Department of Psychology, State University of New York College at Cortland. This article is published courtesy of The Conversation.