In what ways is factual evidence sometimes used, abused, dismissed and ignored in politics?

 

https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2020/06/political-economy-of-economic-policy-jeff-frieden.htm

In what ways is factual evidence sometimes used, abused, dismissed and ignored in politics?

Our ability to think logically did not evolve just to assist us in discovering the truth. Instead, thinking developed to perform essentially social roles like group cooperation and communication. This is one of the claims made in "The Enigma of Reason," a book written by cognitive scientists Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber. According to their reasoning theory, reason's major strengths are explaining ideas we already have and crafting arguments to persuade others. While this type of thinking allows us to collaborate in social situations, it does not make us particularly adept at pursuing the truth. It also causes us to succumb to a variety of cognitive biases, such as confirmation bias, or the inclination to seek information that supports what we already think. Their arguments also assist to explain why politics appears to make us less capable of reasoning. If the majority of our thinking is for social cohesiveness rather than truth-seeking, then belonging to a certain political party should corrupt our reasoning and make us poor at finding the truth. Several studies have been conducted to examine the various ways in which our political affiliation influences our reasoning. According to one research, those with great math abilities were only competent at solving a math issue provided the result agreed to their political ideas. Liberals were only adept at arithmetic problems, for example, if the result demonstrated that gun restriction lowered crime. Conservatives were only capable of resolving this issue if the answer demonstrated that gun restriction increased crime. Another research discovered that the greater an individual's IQ, the better they are at coming up with reasons to defend a stance—but only when they agree with the position.