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Why Facts Don T Change Our Minds, By Elizabeth Kolbert

826 Words4 Pages

In today’s hyperpolarized political climate where the controversial public figure, President Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election, Americans have become transfixed upon something that should in theory be nonnegotiable: the truth. The “truth”, defined by the Oxford Dictionary as “the quality or state of something being true”, or “in accordance with fact or reality”, is something that, by definition, is black and white. However, many individuals on all areas of the political spectrum today, fail to see the what is true even when “fact or reality” is readily accessible and present, raising questions as to whether the truth is a concept as plain as it once was viewed to be. In the article, “Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds” (2017), written in The New Yorker by Elizabeth Kolbert, an award-winning columnist who has also written for the New York Times and …show more content…

In “Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds”, through describing different studies and discussing modern-day connections, Kolbert asserts that the general public’s misunderstanding of what is fact and what is fiction stems from an evolutionary adaptation for survival that has now backfired onto society as it surges forward into a world of new technologies, innovations, and ideas. Kolbert cites scientific studies to confirm her point that society has lost its ability to determine the truth. However, not only does she reference studies done about the current day human psyche, confirming society’s lack of understanding regarding the truth, but also, she describes evolutionary studies to confirm a more intrinsic reality of her idea—she references scientific examples of people

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