Why do we take peoples word for it?

This has to be the single stupidest thing we tend to do as a species. Some piece of 'information' comes into our heads from some source or another and we just accept it. What? I mean WHAT?!

That we have a tendency to do this is our biggest failing as a species. Are we really too damn lazy to check other sources? Are we really such sheep that we will blindly accept the prevailing point-of-view when we must know that facts don't attend to consensus.

The global warming/climate change fiasco is the one that drives me nutsest in this regard. It's Not True. All the actual science done in this area tells us clearly – I mean Very Clearly – that we are not effecting the temperature of the planet one iota. Yet the western world is attempting to bankrupt itself and strip us of civilization as though the myth were reality.

And aside from that, “..uk the polar bears. Do I look like a ...ing polar bear? Have you ever seen a ...ing polar bear wearing a Save The Children T-shirt? Why would I care about ...ing polar bears? If we met on the ice the ...ing polar bear would only be thinking about what a useful source of calories I was! Why the ...ing hell would I care about ...ing polar bears?!”