Rationalizing; not Rational

It used to be a giant mystery how many people could be just so completely wrong without ever realizing it. Surely a fact is a fact, and when confronted with contradictory information, a rational person must necessarily change their opinion.

Sadly, it seems that such confrontation appears to only further polarize their opposition. We are not in fact a rational people at all. It also mean that arguing with anyone who holds an opinion, especially when it's not face-to-face where we might hesitate from becoming overly aggressive, is a hopeless waste of time and in fact damaging to your original objective.

So where does that leave us as an "intelligent" race? Are we doomed to forever peer at ourselves from across a chasm of disjoint reality?