Maybe living under liberal rule for a while creates fear of disaster in anyone with some intelligence, thus resulting in growth of that part of your brain. Stupid people stay liberal.

Maybe Liberals are just naive and retain the moral rigidity of a wet noodle. Maybe Conservative "fear" is hoping for the best while planning for the worst. Always prepared.

More pseudo-science.
Is phrenology making a comeback?
I thought this kind of thing died around April, 1945.
The basic premise is drivel.
It's progressives who live in fear, as manifested by their belief in any number of theories about how the world is ending tomorrow: global warming, GM crops, ozone holes, etc.

And just maybe...the whole bloody thing is a waste of money, space and time. But, then what can expect in the Vancouver Sun?

It's less of a premise than it is a convenient overlay by a "reporter" looking for an election angle.

"...people who identified themselves as liberal tended to have larger anterior cingulate cortexes (ACC), a region of the brain that monitors uncertainty and conflict."

In other words, they're irrational bleeding hearts.

"Among other things, the almond-shaped amygdala processes emotions related to fear."

And who in their right mind wouldn't be afraid of bleeding heart liberals and the damage they can do?

If:

"It's very unlikely that actual political orientation is directly encoded in these brain regions...."

Then:

Why write the article in the first place?

"Is phrenology making a comeback?"
That was my first impression. ...and the researchers were desperate to make headlines.

The amygdala is the primitive part of the brain that takes over when you are too stupid or slow to react to survive. It's an autopilot for survival and supersedes other brain functions when they do not react.

Most of the people who occupy prisons are liberal oriented people who should have been a bit more selective of their activities and a more FEARFUL of the potential outcomes.

If the Liberal mind use some fear also knows as caution and awareness of potential dangers, we would not have rushed into so much of the big spending that is killing us.

Fools rush in where the fearful know better than to tread.

Eskimo: "Why write the article in the first place?"

Because while political orientations per se very likely aren't directly encoded in various brain regions, an individual's cognitive and affective predispositions (responses to uncertainty, threat, etc.) very likely ARE encoded to some extent in the brain, and those various psychological predispositions may in turn socially predispose them to different small-p political orientations.

Winston Churchill pegged it on age.

'If you are 20 years old and are not a liberal, you don't have a heart.
If you are 40 years old and not a conservative, you don't have a brain'.

Still true today, as recent Liberal election comments have proven. heh

For those readers outside of BC, please note the Vancouver Sun is not part of the Sun chain of newspapers. The Vancouver Sun may be more left than the TorStar. They are currently pulling out all the stops for their beloved Liberals. They were huge Coalition boosters in 2008 (which caused me to cancel my subscription) and will be again on May 3.

On a side note the CBC ran the 2 hour anti-development, pro-liberal, David Suzuki movie on the weekend. More free anti-conservative advertising from our betters in the press.

rockyt, Old Winnie had it right.

Yes, this sure sounds like modern-day phrenology:

In his book on the subject of phrenology, Gall suggested that:

Moral and intellectual faculties were innate.
The exercise or manifestation of these faculties depended upon their organization.
The brain controled all of the propensities, sentiments and faculties.

( http://psychology.about.com/od/historyofpsychology/f/phrenology.htm )

That's progress for you: bumps on the surface of the skull have been replaced by analysis of soft-tissue organization within the brain.

But it's still attempting to link behaviour to specific physiological structures. Given the extremely poor state of knowledge on how cognitive functions actually work at the bio-physical level (be thankful for that), these researchers attempts to define behaviour based on the relative sizes of the ACC and amygdata are laughable, superstitious pseudo-science.

Cue Monty Python:

"My brain HURTS!"

The Vancouver Sun is left left left. Nothing new for them to make up un-stories. The Vancouver Sun newspaper is awful. At least the Vancouver Province starts their sports pages from the back. You pick it up, turn it over, and stop reading when you get to the want ads. The Vancouver Sun does not even do a good sports section.

Is that article drivel? Or is it BS? or both?
We need an on-line poll.

"But the researchers concede they don't know whether one's political world view is the result of nature or nurture"

They just admitted the whole thing was a waste of money!

I've done years of research into this subject,and have found that people who vote socialist usually have suffered a trauma to the cranium.

"Using MRI results, they correctly predicted the political orientation of volunteers more than 70 per cent of the time."

Strangely enough the CBC and their super cool Vote Compass tell us we're "Liberal" 70% per cent of the time.
Probably has something to do with why Philadelphia has more MRI's than all of Canada, but further research funds are required to prove it.

Are liberal academics and journalists (is there any other kind?) so keen on proving that voting anything other than liberal is the result of inferior/defective biology that they will believe any junk science. 70 young adults in the initial study and 28 volunteers to "verify" the results. You have got to be kidding me. The number is not only too small to be statistically significant but there has been no attempt to get an accurate age distribution (or any other representative sample).

Where is the control group who have no political leanings?
What about the people who change their vote over time? Fluctuating amygdalas?
How does this explain the role of culture and media in promoting fashionable candidates almost exclusively on the left? Trudeau-mania and Obama-mania. Sudden anterior cingulate cortex syndrome?

If this study is an example of high-level thinking then I can see how soft science academics always end up on the wrong side of history. The book Liberal Fascism details this tragic history.

I expect to see quite a few more of these "conservatives are stupid" article as the Liberals fail to make gains on the CPC lead.

There are people who are equally intelligent on both sides. I've tried to discuss the difference in worldview with folks who think differently than I do, and have actually found a few who think deeper than "conservatives are evil". In my limited experience, it is the relative weighting given to experience versus theoretical outcomes. Conservatives tend to think that there's nothing new under the sun, and if you look at history and see how similar things have turned out in the past, you'll get a guide to how it's likely to turn out this time. Liberals are more likely to look at the theoretical outcomes and use their own judgement to determine the likelihood of what will happen. That's part of why those who are sheltered from "the real world" in educational settings can stay liberal for so long, their experience highlights theory over practice.

"That's progress for you: bumps on the surface of the skull have been replaced by analysis of soft-tissue organization within the brain.

But it's still attempting to link behaviour to specific physiological structures."

Bang on target, Fred. An MRI is a very sophisticated machine, but give it to idiots and garbage is still the result. Next thing you know we'll be back to Hollow Earth, vital fluids, and magnetic mesmerism.

We've already made a good start with global warming, naturopathy, second hand smoke and radiophobia.

What utter BS. I slowly became Conservative at 20 when I started paying my own way through school and paying taxes. Seeing the juvenile behavior of college socialist activists was also an eye opener.

Did anyone catch the article yesterday whereby a group of archeologists and researchers came to the conclusion that a 5000 year old skeleton recently uncovered was...(are you ready ?)...

Most likely a homosexual...beeecause of the way it was positioned in its grave and also that it was buried with three pottery vessels supposedly placed in a specific sequence around the body.

The article gave few specifics and much conjecture,such as the absence of weapons and direction the corpse was positioned in.

I mentioned this article to my wife this morning as we walked our dogs.
Her comment was that perhaps he was a scribe, early shaman or such.

My point being that modern seudo science by the progressive crowd will reach to any heights to forward a pet theory (AGW) or social cause (normalicy of alternate sexual orientation / voting preference)...as to make it societaly acceptable to everyday life.

Take the posted case above of progressive v/s conservative mindset being influenced from birth.

A fine excuse to dictate who should be master or slave should the group with whom control of the masses deem it pertinent.

How do they have tha Gall to say that?

Another ridiculous "scientific" hypothesis. Are people actually paid to do this sort of research -- do they actually defend their PhD theses on it? If so, then we've got a whole new generation of "Doctors" who are buffoons. And what happens when we start allowing their "professional scientific" opinion to be used as expert testimony in court cases?

Lemme see, your brain is "wired" for political orientation. So I guess that explains why the majority of the political dissidents in Communist Cuba today are former Communists? Nope, actually it explains that since their brains are supposedly "wired", why the Communist government persecutes them and justifies forcibly re-educating them to return to Communism.

Here is a brilliant, obscene and scatological thread from Ace of Spades HQ on the subject of this very study.

"If you're keeping track, socialism is now a 160 year old novelty of an idea."

heh.. it appears this was dredged up from a 4 month old article in The Telegraph.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/8228192/Political-views-hard-wired-into-your-brain.html

Exactly, ChrisinMB.

Wonder why they bring this up now, eh? Hmmmm.....

The Luddites are winning.

Liberalism is a mental disorder.... Michael Savage has been saying this for years.

This is Woody Allen's premise in Everybody Says I Love You, a corny 1996 movie I can't help liking! 'Teen son (Lukas Haas) of wealthy, Upper East-side Manhattan family is a Republican -- horrors! Three-quarters of the way through the film he bumps his head and, voila!, becomes a left-lib Democrat, like his father (Alan Alda) and his mother (Goldie Hawn). Alda is greatly relieved ...

If you ask me, Woody Allen is a mental disorder.

Vancouver Sun Headline:
Latest study says 6 out of 7 dwarves are not happy.

No, jess, certainly there has never been "a single right-wing songwriter, artist, comedian or respected intellectual of note." Nope, not one.

Don't respond to this idiot. She compared Gitmo to a Nazi concentration camp a few threads down. Ignore her. As trolls go, she's not fit to floss Alex' toe-lint.

Right.

There is a scientific reason for why one votes Tory or Liberal.

Right.

An absence of a brain who indicate an NDP supporter, per chance?

Utter craziness!

Peggy Atwood's and Graeme Gibson's daughter is Eleanor Jess Atwood Gibson ... If she shares her mother's visceral hatred of all things c/Conservative, I wonder if she'd be hanging around the #1 C/conservative blog in the country.

As much as I like many songwriters -- or, at least, their songs -- artists, comedians (Bob Hope's wife was a devout, pro-life Roman Catholic) or "respected intellectuals of note" (who would they be?), I'm more interested in historical figures of gravitas, many of whom fit into none of these categories.

If "artists" include actors, how about Kelsey Grammer, Tom Sellick, Gary Sinese, Bing Crosby, Ronald Reagan (also one of the most loved U.S. presidents), etc., etc.?

What have Leftist songwriters, "artists," comedians, intellectuals contributed to our civilization? Perhaps a little levity and controversy, some nice verbal and visual imagery, but, beyond that ...?

Many of them have been/are scumbags whose morals and ethics I would never hold up to my children -- or anyone -- as paragons of virtue or examples to emulate.

So, why Jess thinks we give a **it that there's never been "a single right-wing songwriter, artist, comedian or respected intellectual of note" is a mystery to me.

SO WHAT? BIG DEAL? LIKE, I CARE.

And, one other thing: Jess just doesn't know any history: There are no conservative "respected intellectuals of note" -- what, in the last two years?

'Deep as a mud puddle.

Uh, how about "There are no conservative 'respected intellectuals of note'" -- what, in the last two minutes?

More to the point.

"But then, there is the "progressive" class ... that aimless mass of Western humanity so burdened by cultural self-loathing that it is to Islam, as ungulates are to lions."

... too stupid to get off the tracks.

Bingo! Cjunk.

"Intellectualism" hasn't gone so well for about 100 million dead since the first "intellectual' .
Politically speaking.

Vaclav Havel said that politics and intellectuals can be linked, but that responsibility for their ideas, even when advocated by a politician, remains with the intellectual. Therefore, it's best to avoid utopian intellectuals, for offering ‘universal insights’ that might, and have, harmed society.

LC Bennett wrote:

"If this study is an example of high-level thinking..."

A "high-level" programming language is one with which the programmer has to do less original thinking and actual work. Machine code, the lowest level of programming, requires that the programmer know EXACTLY what s/he is doing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-level_programming_language

Perhaps there is a follow-on conclusion.

Cjunk: Then there's that old phrase: "Lead, follow, or get out of the way".

Seems like there are a lot of people getting in the way these days, almost like it's a career choice or something.

PiperPaul: "Lead, follow, or get out of the way".

It's sort of like: F%^k, fight, or hold the light!" ... or "Makers, takers, and fakers!"

Getting in the way pays good money, though ... it's a "progressive" lifestyle choice with job security, benefits, and so many out-of-scope restrictions that actually working is almost optional.

Davenport spake: "...an individual's cognitive and affective predispositions (responses to uncertainty, threat, etc.) very likely ARE encoded to some extent in the brain..."

Behold the limits of the Lefty outlook. Hardwired to your party, eh? I'm sure you'd like that Davenport, but it just ain't the case. Where's ET when we need her?

You should go a read some neurology, Davenport. The brain is a plastic structure. It changes with experience, diet, learning, even exercise. The whole basis of modern neuro physical therapy is brain plasticity. Cognition and affect can not only be changed by all of the above, they can be deliberately changed by the individual themselves.

That's what meditation does, or if its not too corny maybe you could check out "The Power of Positive Thinking". MRI, PET and SPECT studies show neurological changes from a variety of meditation techniques, biofeedback, etc. Then there's the whole realm of recovery from stroke, where new pathways are formed to route around ischemic destruction of brain tissue.

Evidence abounds. Interesting that you're ignorant of it. You'd have to try pretty hard to ignore that mountain, unless you're an English major.

Why not admit that you're just another socialist partisan grasping at straws, Davenport? It isn't like we can't tell, you know. You may as well be wearing a neon sign that says "Liberal Useful Idiot".

Maybe you should try defending your party over at the Giant Fan thread. I could use a laugh this afternoon, its raining in the desert.

The Phantom: "Hardwired to your party, eh?"

Um, no, which is why I specifically wrote, "those various psychological predispositions *may* *in turn* *socially* predispose them to different small-p political orientations."

"The brain is a plastic structure. It changes with experience, diet, learning, even exercise."

Yeah, I know, which is why I specifically wrote, "an individual's cognitive and affective *predispositions* (responses to uncertainty, threat, etc.) very likely ARE encoded *to some extent* in the brain."

I.e., set-point theory, and it goes hand-in-hand with brain plasticity, modern neurology, epigenetics, the sociology of emotions and thought, etc.

The notion that brain structure and function change with experience is not incompatible with the notion that affective states have some (but not total) basis in neurostructure.