One thing I thought the article didn't discuss was belief about empirical facts, mathematical or logical truths
People typically are dispassionate about those kind of beliefs. I believe that Helsinki is the capital of Finland, and I'm not aware of any emotion associated with that belief at all.
or say, quantum mysticism (viz the thread in Pseudo), that is to say, about subjects like dinosaur fossils, although it does touch on the "shibboleth" of climate change, conservatives and liberals with opposing views (i.e. beliefs) about it.
Quantum mysticism speaks to the emotions by insisting what the universe is a very different kind of place than most people take it to be, which appeals to people who aren't satisfied with conventional 'classical' reality and who feel somehow oppressed by it.
Climate change isn't a dispassionate scientific thesis, it's a grand social change cause intended to mobilize the planet. That's obviously going to speak to the emotions of those who dream of grand social changes, many of them former Marxists who sought a new cause after 1990. There's an obvious tone of moral judgement to it, where opponents aren't merely judged to be factually wrong, they are morally evil "deniers" as well. And there's the apocalyptic 'end-times' aspect, which speaks to the emotions just as apocalyptic rhetoric always has.
Evolution seems to many people to directly subvert their view of mankind's place in the universe, the idea that humans are created in god's image and contain a spark of divinity within them.
What did the announcement of the discovery of the Higgs field do to belief systems, conservative or liberal or anywhere in between, would you say?
The popular media certainly tried to give it an emotional hook, with all of the "God-particle" talk. But I don't think that the average layperson cared very much.
It seems to me that physics has lost contact with laypeople over the last century. In the 19th century, laypeople could still gain a pretty good intuitive understanding of classical mechanics, in its Newtonian form (probably not Hamiltonians or Lagrangians). They knew enough thermodynamics to have an intuitive feeling for what was happening in steam engines. That's no longer the case when it comes to pretty much anything after relativity and quantum mechanics. It's isn't intuitive any longer and laypeople can't follow the justifications without the mathematics.
My guess would be it affected a very small group of people whose political and moral views had very little to do with what they now believe is true about the Standard Model.
I don't know what the standard model is. I've read a little about it in the popular media, but I wouldn't call that understanding. (I can't follow all the advanced mathematics of the professional version.) I have no way of knowing what doubtful assumptions are hidden in this exceedingly technical stuff, so I have no way of judging its plausibility for myself. It basically just seems really deep and cosmic and I have little choice but to take it on faith. (I feel a little like a medieval villager visiting a grand Gothic cathedral, hearing the teachings of the saints and theologians from on high.)
Quantum mechanics is a subject that would affect very few moral decisions even amongst scientists;
A certain kind of metaphysical interpretation of QM appeals to a certain kind of layperson (and a few scientists as well) because it claims that mind creates reality, so that reality can potentially be whatever we want it to be. I don't think that has very much to do with quantum mechanics as it is used by scientists every day, but the essence of quantum mechanics in the minds of many and perhaps most laypeople is "conventional science has been proven wrong and now anything-goes". Any speculation, no matter how outlandish, can be justified by uttering the magic words 'quantum mechanics'.
That might not have a lot of direct relevance to morality, but it does speak to how people conceptualize the universe around them and to their deepest hopes and dreams are baked into that.
science is emotional because it's elegant, or symmetric, discoveries about the symmetries in nature evoke joy and congratulations all round amongst the small group of discoverers and theorists
I think that oftentimes these super-technical issues are emotional to scientists because they stake their careers on particular theories and approaches being true. It's the difference between being known as a pioneer in an historic break-through, and becoming a mere footnote who wasted his or her best years exploring a blind alley.
we enjoy such things but most people don't enjoy studying mathematics.
I simply have no talent at it. I kind of like it, intellectually. But I will never have the easy familiarity with it that's needed to be successful in physics.
Perhaps they develop a sense of disgust, or boredom. Whatever, I would say most of the population has little interest in the mathematical structure of the Standard Model.
I agree.
No, our "important" beliefs orbit around notions of self-interest, religion or spirituality, communalism and fairness, according to the authors of the New Scientist article.
The beliefs that we care most about are the beliefs that we care about most. There's usually going to be an emotional aspect to that. Our most passionate beliefs are typically going to be about things that seem to us to support or challenge our deepest hopes, dreams, world-views and sense of self identity.
