Interbane wrote:
Sometimes I wonder what amount of untruth(or cognitive dissonance?) people are willing to accept. I think that large swaths of belief within someone's worldview can withstand a decent amount of dissonance. Sort of like the slow buildup of contrary evidence in a scientific paradigm before it changes, there usually isn't any single piece of evidence or argument that changes minds. Rather, it's constant exposure to reasonable criticism.
As I recall, Kuhn took it even further than this, noting that the new scholars got on with the new paradigm but the old ones stuck to theirs until they died. Obviously that isn't 100 percent, but I have known a few scholars and the momentum embodied in their research skills is formidable. They find it very, very difficult to think about the world with a different set of questions.
In my own life I find I tolerate tremendous dissonance. I may conclude that so-and-so at work is a jerk, but there is more profit in finding the levers to get so-and-so to cooperate than in collecting examples to prove my case against them. One track of my mind is convinced that civilization is at stake if we don't all quit carbonizing the atmosphere, but another track is busy accommodating my wife and other near ones, who are not as clear on this point. I am in awe, actually, of people who are able to act single-mindedly on their convictions.
Interbane wrote:Unfortunately, it's also uncommon for webs of belief to change at all. With respect to social media, I think the social groups keep people from being exposed to enough reasonable criticism to meet the critical mass of contrary evidence. And the feeling of social acceptance and belonging prevent people from seeking or accepting it, as you mention.
The feedback loops between central media and social media are moving way beyond our experience and ability to predict. People have had the ability to search out sources they resonate with for a long time now. But the rate of exponential expansion of a hot take or meme is just not something we know how to reckon with.
And you are not wrong about the algorithms. I guess we all need to start questioning any one-sided narratives we hear, as part of the resistance to motivated reasoning and the tyranny of the flaming echo chambers. But riddle me this: how well would a website do that specialized in giving both sides of controversies? Real Clear Politics, which Ant likes, is about the only one I know who does this, and they don't do it in a very thoughtful way. Just a flame thrower from one wing and then another flame thrower from the other wing. I do appreciate the thoughtful conservative voices on the NY Times Op-ed, but I would never hear what the MAGA crowd thinks by reading them.
Interbane wrote:A few recent conversations I've had reminded me of inner turmoil I had perhaps two decades ago, when I first joined booktalk. I remember plenty of conversation with a personality named MadArchitect, and he was frustratingly brilliant. It wasn't any one thing he said, but over time, after calling me out repeatedly, he helped me identify when I was defending a belief based on emotion rather than reason. Naturally, most any belief is defended with a mixture of the two, but sometimes it's held together more by emotion than reason. The epiphany was that it hurts to admit when a belief is held together more by emotion than reason. In a sense, the emotion is a shield as well as a glue for that belief.
So you are saying that if I recognize that my belief is based mainly on emotion, and defended mainly by emotion, I should question it extra heavily and look for motivated reasoning in my ways of justifying it to myself? That actually makes sense to me. Now I am curious what beliefs you were defending for emotional reasons against MadArchitect's acid skepticism.
Interbane wrote:The crucible test, I mentioned, was to consider instantly and wholeheartedly changing his mind. If there was a pang of some mysterious, hard to identify, negative emotion... as if something is lost or he's committing some sort of minor betrayal to something nebulous, then emotion is obviously involved in that belief. And if the scaffolding of reason was systematically removed through our conversation, then emotion could be the only thing holding him to that belief. Often when emotion is recognized as a shield, a person can then see through that shield to contemplate whether the glue for that belief is reason or emotion. A glimpse into metacognition. In my experience, that's often just the seed for change, and only germinates when many such seeds are planted across the swath.
There is a very large Facebook group, open only by invitation, for people who are going through "deconstruction" of literalist, evangelical Christianity. Or have gone through it. It is chock full of clergy and ex-clergy members. Schools of theology are notorious for cutting off literalism at the knees, and trying to reconstruct something more solid in its wake. The sense of betrayal is real and tangible, and many find it devastating to face.
Remember that, as with Kuhn's scientific paradigms, the cognitive structures are there to do things. They are there for purposes that often have very little to do with their truth or lack thereof. In the case of clergy members, it might include reassuring dying people, and reminding parents that their children will get less crazy when their pre-frontal cortex finishes filling in, and all kinds of such tricky social problems. There is an old saying in the church that "Love without Truth is mush, but Truth without Love is mush." These tensions, these antinomies, are the stuff of living, and for some people they are easier to negotiate without having to be correct about everything from a rational perspective.
