{"id":167522,"date":"2026-01-31T21:27:45","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T05:27:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=167522"},"modified":"2026-02-01T17:17:50","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T01:17:50","slug":"not-born-yesterday-the-science-of-who-we-trust-and-what-we-believe-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=167522","title":{"rendered":"Not Born Yesterday: The Science of Who We Trust and What We Believe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Why do elites love the false contention that we evolved to be gullible with regard to our vital interests?<\/a><\/p>\n

Gemini says: Hugo Mercier\u2019s Not Born Yesterday<\/a> book provides the perfect foundation to use Alliance Theory<\/a> to dismantle the persistent cultural narrative that humans are “gullible sheep”. According to Mercier, humans are actually communication “omnivores”\u2014highly vigilant creatures endowed with “open vigilance mechanisms” that evaluate arguments and track source credibility to prevent being misled.<\/p>\n

If Mercier is correct, then the “enormous elite alliance” pushing the idea of universal gullibility is not based on a scientific truth, but is a strategic coordination designed to protect elite status and power.<\/p>\n

1. Gullibility as a Gatekeeping Signal<\/strong><\/p>\n

From an Alliance Theory perspective, the primary function of the “masses are gullible” narrative is to serve as a high-status signal. By labeling the general public as “ignorant” or “easily manipulated,” the elite coalition (academics, technocrats, and media figures) creates a boundary between the “rational” in-group and the “irrational” out-group. This allows them to dismiss populist movements\u2014such as Brexit or the election of Donald Trump\u2014not as legitimate disagreements over vital interests, but as the result of “uneducated plebs” being fooled by demagogues.<\/p>\n

2. The “Expert” Referees as Boundary Police<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mercier notes that mass persuasion attempts (like advertising or political propaganda) actually fail miserably. However, the elite alliance benefits from pretending these attempts are powerful. If the public is “super-gullible” , then a massive layer of credentialed mediators (fact-checkers, regulatory agencies, and social media censors) becomes “strictly necessary” to protect the “vulnerable” population. Alliance Theory predicts that fields supplying this gatekeeping expertise will gain disproportionate status, even if their actual power to influence minds is limited.<\/p>\n

3. Moralized Contempt vs. Strategic Defection<\/strong><\/p>\n

When individuals or groups “defect” from the elite consensus\u2014for example, by questioning the “efficiency” of free trade or the safety of a institutional standard\u2014the elite alliance responds with moralized contempt rather than calm disagreement. By framing these defectors as “anti-science” or “conspiracy theorists,” the alliance can punish them rhetorically without ever having to engage with their actual material interests.<\/p>\n

4. The “Gullibility Alibi”<\/strong><\/p>\n

The idea that people are “wired to seek consensus” over truth is used as a moral alibi by elites to explain why their own policies have failed to gain popular support. Instead of admitting that their alliance’s priorities (like global capital flow) may actually harm the “dignity” and “vital interests” of citizens, they claim the citizens are simply too gullible to understand what is “best for them”.<\/p>\n

5. Why the Myth Persists<\/strong><\/p>\n

If people aren’t actually gullible, why is the belief in gullibility so popular among the elite? Mercier explains that stories about gullibility are “mind-candy”. They are intuitively compelling because they often involve threats\u2014like “subliminal messages” or “Russian bots”\u2014that trigger our evolved curiosity about hidden dangers. For the elite alliance, spreading these stories is a low-cost way to coordinate their group’s identity as the “protectors of reality” against a sea of “misinformed” citizens.<\/p>\n

The Bottom Line: The push for universal gullibility is a strategic tool for alliance discipline. By defining the citizenry as cognitively “infirm,” the elite coalition justifies its own authority to rule, bypasses the need for hard material concessions, and converts what should be a democratic bargaining process into a technical “expert” oversight.<\/p>\n

ChatGPT says: Humans are not broadly gullible. We are selectively trusting. We evaluate claims based on incentives, group membership, accountability, and argument quality. Most persuasion fails. What looks like mass stupidity is usually strategic belief expression rather than sincere credulity. People profess beliefs to signal loyalty, identity, or defiance more than because they are fooled. That is the empirical baseline Not Born Yesterday establishes. <\/p>\n

Now ask the Alliance Theory question. If people are not especially gullible, why is there such a massive, cross-institutional alliance insisting that they are?<\/p>\n

Because \u201cthe public is gullible\u201d is an alliance-protective belief.<\/p>\n

The gullibility story justifies elite gatekeeping<\/strong><\/p>\n

If ordinary people are easily misled, then credentialed intermediaries are morally necessary. Journalists, platform moderators, public-health officials, national security agencies, economists, and NGO staff all gain authority from the premise that the public cannot reliably judge truth on its own. The gullibility narrative converts status into guardianship. Without it, their power looks self-interested rather than protective.<\/p>\n

It reframes elite failure as popular pathology<\/strong><\/p>\n

When policies fail, wars go badly, institutions lose trust, or forecasts collapse, Alliance Theory predicts blame displacement. \u201cThe people were misinformed\u201d is safer than \u201cour alliance miscalculated.\u201d Gullibility shifts responsibility downward. It turns elite error into mass irrationality and protects internal cohesion among decision-makers.<\/p>\n

It licenses asymmetric speech norms<\/strong><\/p>\n

If one side is gullible, then censorship becomes care rather than coercion. Content moderation, misinformation panels, and expert overrides can be framed as harm reduction. Alliance Theory notes that moral asymmetry is a classic dominance move. One group gets discretion. The other gets supervision.<\/p>\n

It delegitimizes rival alliance leaders<\/strong><\/p>\n

Populist figures succeed by bypassing elite mediation and speaking directly to mass audiences. Labeling their followers gullible strips those leaders of legitimacy without engaging their arguments. You are not defeating an alternative coalition. You are diagnosing a cognitive defect. That move avoids debate and preserves hierarchy.<\/p>\n

It creates a shared enemy across elite factions<\/strong><\/p>\n

The \u201cgullible masses\u201d story unites otherwise competing elites. Tech firms, media, academia, public health, and security agencies often disagree on policy but agree on this premise. Alliance Theory predicts exactly this. A common external threat stabilizes coalitions that would otherwise fragment. Here the threat is epistemic disorder supposedly caused by ordinary people.<\/p>\n

It converts dissent into a mental health issue<\/strong><\/p>\n

Once gullibility is assumed, disagreement no longer signals rational conflict of interest. It signals manipulation, radicalization, or pathology. This allows escalation without negotiation. You do not bargain with the confused. You manage them.<\/p>\n

It explains why Mercier is resisted, not debated<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mercier\u2019s work undermines the moral foundation of elite supervision. If people are broadly competent judges of trust and argument, then many paternalistic institutions lose their justification. Alliance Theory predicts suppression by neglect. The book is cited politely, then ignored in practice, because accepting it would force redistribution of epistemic authority.<\/p>\n

Bottom line.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The belief that people are gullible persists not because it is empirically strong but because it is alliance-functional. It protects elite status, legitimizes control, deflects blame, and weakens rivals. Mercier threatens the story by showing that belief is strategic and social, not naive. Alliance Theory explains why so many powerful actors quietly need him to be wrong.<\/p>\n

David Pinsof writes on Dec. 15, 2025 at his Substack Everything is Bullshit<\/a>: <\/p>\n

I spend a lot of time with intellectuals\u2014writers, thinkers, social scientists, etc. If I had to sum up their worldview in one sentence, I could hardly do better than this one:<\/p>\n

Everything that\u2019s wrong in the world is caused by misunderstanding.<\/p>\n

Political polarization? Misunderstanding. If only people could get over their primitive \u201ctribalism\u201d and \u201cconfirmation bias,\u201d they could have reasonable discourse and work together to solve humanity\u2019s problems.<\/p>\n

Misinformation? Misunderstanding. If only people knew how to \u201cvaccinate\u201d themselves against the \u201cvirus\u201d of fake news, they\u2019d stop being such gullible idiots and vote for the Democrats.<\/p>\n

Bigotry? Misunderstanding. If only people realized that members of other ethnic groups were normal, decent human beings like them, there would be no bigotry.<\/p>\n

Stereotypes? Misunderstanding. If only people knew that stereotypes were false and pernicious, there would be no stereotypes\u2014and no bigotry.<\/p>\n

War? Misunderstanding. If only people knew that war is pointless and evil, a product of bigotry and misinformation, there would be world peace.<\/p>\n

Capitalism? False consciousness. If only people knew how much greedy corporations were exploiting them, the workers of the world would unite.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The “Everything is Bullshit” critique<\/a> suggests that the modern professional-managerial class exists in a state of recursive self-delusion. They produce reports, metrics, and narratives that serve the internal needs of their own alliance rather than the reality of the world outside. When these elites claim the public is gullible, they are performing a high-status ritual. This ritual justifies the existence of a massive administrative and “expert” layer. If the public can be trusted to judge truth for themselves, the need for fact-checkers, narrative managers, and credentialed gatekeepers evaporates.<\/p>\n

What passes for elite discourse is actually a series of coordination signals. By agreeing that the public is cognitively infirm, various factions of the elite\u2014media, academia, and government\u2014can maintain a unified front. They use this premise to license asymmetric speech norms where they exercise discretion and everyone else receives supervision. This is a classic dominance move. It allows them to bypass democratic bargaining and replace it with technical oversight.<\/p>\n

Mercier\u2019s work is dangerous to these institutions because it proves that dissent is often a rational response to perceived untrustworthiness. People are not being “tricked” by populists; they are defecting from an alliance they no longer trust. The elite response is to ignore the material reasons for this defection and double down on the claim that the defectors are simply confused. This preserves the hierarchy but deepens the social divide.<\/p>\n

The belief in universal gullibility persists because it is functional for the people in power. It converts rational conflict into a mental health problem. It allows the governing class to treat the governed as patients rather than citizens. As long as this narrative remains the price of entry into elite circles, the actual science of human belief will be sidelined in favor of “bullshit” that protects the status quo.<\/p>\n

ChatGPT says: First, gullibility is a status-preserving error model.<\/p>\n

Elites prefer error models that imply people fail for cognitive reasons rather than incentive reasons. If citizens oppose a policy because it harms their material interests or status, then the elite alliance must negotiate or concede. If citizens oppose it because they are \u201cgullible,\u201d then elites merely need better messaging, more filters, or tighter control. AT predicts that dominant coalitions adopt error models that require no redistribution of power. Gullibility does that perfectly.<\/p>\n

Second, \u201cmisinformation\u201d replaces conflict of interest as the master variable.<\/p>\n

Mercier shows that people are good at tracking trustworthiness. Alliance Theory adds why elites resist this. If belief formation is driven by trust, then mass defection implies elites became untrustworthy. That is an alliance indictment. Calling dissent \u201cmisinformation\u201d recodes interest conflict as epistemic failure. It converts \u201cyou harmed us\u201d into \u201cyou were confused.\u201d<\/p>\n

Third, the gullibility story solves the elite coordination problem.<\/p>\n

Elites are internally divided. Academia, media, finance, tech, and bureaucracy compete constantly. The gullibility narrative is one of the few beliefs that unifies them. Everyone benefits from the claim that the public cannot be trusted to reason independently. AT predicts such beliefs will be overproduced because they stabilize cross-elite coalitions that would otherwise fracture.<\/p>\n

Fourth, it legitimizes procedural substitution for consent.<\/p>\n

Once the public is framed as cognitively unreliable, consent becomes optional. Elections, referenda, and public debate are downgraded in favor of process. Panels, models, expert committees, and algorithmic governance replace persuasion. This is not technocracy by accident. It is technocracy justified by a psychology myth.<\/p>\n

Fifth, gullibility narratives scale better than truth.<\/p>\n

Mercier\u2019s account is nuanced. It requires effort to understand selective trust, source evaluation, and argumentative vigilance. \u201cPeople are dumb\u201d is cognitively cheap. Alliance Theory predicts that coalitions adopt explanations that are cheap to transmit, emotionally satisfying, and morally flattering. The gullibility myth wins on all three.<\/p>\n

Sixth, it converts elite moral failure into elite virtue.<\/p>\n

If people are gullible, then overriding them is compassionate. Censorship becomes care. Paternalism becomes protection. Elite overreach is rebranded as sacrifice. This is an alliance laundering mechanism. Power exercised for self-interest is reframed as moral duty.<\/p>\n

Seventh, Mercier threatens epistemic rent-seeking.<\/p>\n

Many modern professions extract status and income from adjudicating truth claims. Fact-checking, narrative risk, misinformation research, trust and safety, public communication strategy. If humans are already competent judges of trust, much of this becomes redundant. AT predicts resistance not through rebuttal but through omission, dilution, and ritual citation without operational change.<\/p>\n

Eighth, gullibility is weaponized asymmetrically.<\/p>\n

Note the pattern. When elites believe something false, it is called \u201ccomplexity,\u201d \u201ctradeoffs,\u201d or \u201cunintended consequences.\u201d When non-elites believe something false, it is called gullibility. AT predicts asymmetrical error attribution in hierarchical systems. High-status actors get situational explanations. Low-status actors get dispositional ones.<\/p>\n

Ninth, the narrative collapses under one simple test.<\/p>\n

If people were broadly gullible about their vital interests, mass persuasion would be easy. It is not. Advertising mostly fails. Political campaigns mostly reinforce priors. Propaganda works best where exit is blocked or punishment is real. This empirical reality is quietly known by elites. The persistence of the myth despite this knowledge is itself evidence of alliance function.<\/p>\n

Tenth, the real danger Mercier exposes.<\/p>\n

The threat is not that elites are wrong about psychology. It is that they are wrong in a way that licenses domination. Once disagreement is treated as cognitive defect, the path to coercion is open. Alliance Theory predicts escalation. First nudges. Then filters. Then mandates. All justified by the same false premise.<\/p>\n

The myth of mass gullibility is not a mistake about human cognition. It is a solution to an elite coordination problem. It allows power to be exercised without bargaining, failure to be externalized without accountability, and dissent to be neutralized without persuasion. Mercier explains why it is false. Alliance Theory explains why it persists.<\/p>\n

Gemini says: Evolutionary biologists and social scientists often argue that gullibility appears as a byproduct of a highly successful survival strategy: social learning. Humans depend on the transfer of information from others to navigate the world. A child who demands a proof for why a snake is dangerous likely dies before they learn the lesson. We develop a default setting of trust because the cost of verifying every piece of data exceeds the benefit of the information itself. This creates a vulnerability where bad actors exploit the system, but the overall advantage of rapid cultural transmission outweighs the occasional loss from being deceived.<\/p>\n

Natural selection does not produce perfection. It produces what works well enough to pass on genes. While it seems counterintuitive that we would evolve to be easily tricked about our vital interests, deception and self-deception often serve strategic purposes. If an individual believes a lie, they project more sincerity than a conscious liar. This helps them recruit allies or avoid conflict. In the context of alliance theory, gullibility acts as a signal of loyalty. Adopting the group’s narrative, even if that narrative is false or harmful to one’s objective interests, secures a place within the protection of the collective. The risk of being wrong about a specific fact often pales in comparison to the risk of being cast out by the tribe.<\/p>\n

Cognitive science suggests we possess a set of epistemic vigilante mechanisms designed to filter out blatant lies. We are not indiscriminately gullible. We track reputations and look for cues of competence and benevolence in others. However, these filters fail when the stakes involve complex social dynamics where the truth is less important than social cohesion. Survival frequently depends more on the strength of your alliances than on the accuracy of your private map of reality. Therefore, we did not evolve to be gullible in a vacuum; we evolved to prioritize social belonging, which sometimes requires us to surrender our skepticism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Why do elites love the false contention that we evolved to be gullible with regard to our vital interests? Gemini says: Hugo Mercier\u2019s Not Born Yesterday book provides the perfect foundation to use Alliance Theory to dismantle the persistent cultural … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42911,12745],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-167522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-elites","category-evolution"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t