Why are some beliefs impervious to all evidence and reason?

ehcks said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6j8Babr_n4w

"What, if anything, would ever change your mind?"

"Evidence"
"Nothing"

I don't think we know what causes that. It's just... stuck there
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That's not a very useful model for the general question, though, because people who are "stuck" on an idea seldom say anything like that. They more often say that they've reached the logical, evidence-supported conclusion and present what they say is logic & evidence to support it.
 
Lowpro said:
What about the other saying "it's easier to fool someone than to convince them they were fooled"
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There is an old saying in Texas.... or is it Tennessee
Fool me once ..... ummm.... shame on you
ummm....Fool me twice..... ummm... a fool can't be fooled again!
 
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Puppycow said:
Not sure exactly which forum this goes in but I guess it fits here just as well as any of the others.

I'm not talking specifically about religious beliefs, although religious beliefs are a good example of this.

What got me thinking about this question was a recent news story which is discussed in this thread. This is an example other than religion. The man is a biologist who apparently doesn't believe that viruses exist.[...]
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Great topic PC.

I think I've posted before about a friend who is otherwise quite reasonable, but in the case of human nutrition has come to some odd conclusions. It's not that his views are technically anti-factual, but that he accepts data that agrees with his beliefs, and rejects data that contradicts his beliefs. He says things like "all the pro-statin cholesterol studies are funded by drug companies" (therefore biased), or claims that journals are generally biased against these anti-expectation conclusions. And yes technically that's partially true, but it doesn't support the 'anti' thesis. He seems to not have a problem with journal papers that support his views.

So it's somehow about creating a filter of closed-mindedness that protects these treasured ideas. The contrary evidence is rejected without fair consideration. The "why" question is about psychology & motivation.

Snacking on religious views is IMO a cheap-shot. Those folks have bought into a social system that says the world is 6k yo or that pi = 3 or whatever, and even if they recognize it's false they are socially imperiled to say so. So their rejections and rebuttals are not a matter of reason but social pressure

Let's consider instead things like the "not a virus" case, or the 9-11 "government must have planned it" truther stuff, or the myriad of ppl who believe in some sort of miraculous health POV to extend life and do all good stuff. These people have motives (like the personal benefit of health and life extension) but they should be motivated to make a rational assessment of the issue. Yet they are not. They don't want to question the system or view they have chosen - but why ?

Clearly b/c they have some emotional investment in the view. Economist Bryan Caplan recites his reading experience of ppl entering communism with high hopes and ideals, and coming out of communism after recognizing it has failed and they invariably are filled with pain and regret that their beautiful ideology had failed, rather than relief that they finally understood that it doesn't work. Few of us and only on a few subjects can be dispassionate rationalists. We are generally swayed by our emotions to the detriment of rationality.

It helps to not have too many emotional attachments to fixed ideas.
 
Navigator said:
Why does evidence and reason cause people to believe?
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Evidence and reason cause people (rational and logical ones that is) to KNOW and therefore go on to believe....not to just believe....to KNOW and thus believe!

The crux of it is the evidence part combined with rational logical evaluation of the evidence.

If the evidence is correct and true and sound and relevant and not manipulated or deceptive according to reasoned and logical and rational standards for evaluating the evidence then it becomes knowledge.

Once someone knows something to be correct according to the evidence which has been subjected to all manner of verification to make sure it has not fooled anyone and that it is rational and logical and reasonable then one can go on to believe it.

Also there is another avenue of Reason which is logical and rational. This is called Probability combined with Practicality as well as reason and logic and rationality.

One can believe something is most likely true for all practical and realistic purposes within reason and logic and rationality.

Example... one can believe the sun will rise in the east tomorrow or that a ball tossed up in the air will come back down or that it is safe to go for a walk because an asteroid is not going to come down and hit one on the head.

The other side of the coin (get it) of this is that I am also not going to give up my job because I bought a lottery ticket and I am sure Tuesday I am going to win despite many people having won it. Nor does one jump off a building thinking that one will survive even though some have.

The problem is when people believe without any evidence at all or what they think is evidence despite not having passed any rational and logical standards of evaluation.

An example is believing that putting a rabbit's foot in one's pocket will help one pass an exam or that making a bloody human sacrifice of the son of god will cause the world to become better but only after it becomes worse for an untold number of millennia and the sacrificed god-son comes in a cacophony of trumpets riding upon clouds to snatch away pilots in mid flight and drivers on the move and doctors just after they removed someone's kidney and just before replacing it..... unfortunately though no judge or lawyer will ever disappear in mid trial ....but some jurors will.
 
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Well for one thing it could be that they are ideologically convinced about something and anything that they feel negates, disproves or otherwise makes their beliefs seem untenable must be wrong because what they believe in is true.

For example lets say that, hypothetically, there's strong empirical evidence for something that is usually connected with or comes off as "racist", "sexist", or something similar. A person who strongly disproves and/or opposes "racism", "sexism" and etc is thus very likely to put the amount and quality of evidence extremely high, perhaps so high that such standards are impossible to honor in practice.

Also look up anosognosia which is a lack of insight into, sometimes extremely obvious, diseases and disabilities that one are afflicted with. It's relatively common with stroke victims and cases where people, who are partially paralyzed, wont realize and acknowledge that they can't move their body like they could do before aren't all too uncommon.
 
To a zeroth approximation, all beliefs are impervious to reason.

That's because of something basic about the brain. Beliefs aren't made from reason. They're made from Hebbian connections resulted from repeated firings of different parts of the brain.

On the extremely rare occasions that reason affects beliefs at all, it is purely because reasoning about something over and over fires different parts of the brain at the same time, and connections form between them.

That doesn't mean that you can't come up with reasons for or against beliefs, but that's secondary at best and usually mere rationalization. In either case, it's not even secondary but way down the hierarchy (or up, depending on which metaphor you want to use).

And for them to work, an individual needs to enjoy reason well enough to do it over and over again. Which enjoyment, again, is structured by Hebbian learning. It requires previously getting pleasure from doing reasoning, and it doesn't matter much what the reasoning is about. Repeated reasoning itself happens only when that behavior has been reinforced over and over again.
 
Lowpro said:
What about the other saying "it's easier to fool someone than to convince them they were fooled"
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I think you just hit the nail on the head. There's a human tendency to identify with our beliefs, if they're wrong, we're wrong. And if we're wrong, that implies that we're gullible or dim.

I'd say that the kind of person who can easily admit it when they're wrong has achieved some degree of detachment between their ego and their opinions.

In my case, my memory has been shot for years, and I know it, so I rarely assume that I'm the one who is right when someone disagrees with me on a matter of fact. I know there's a good chance I'm not remembering it right. Matters of logic, on the other hand, I consider myself strong on, and it might take some convincing to get me to capitulate.
 
Hey delvo I used to e in a historical reenactment group and one of our members was a head steward of stirling castle-trust me they know its from a couple of hundred yrs later. Yep a lot of folk over here think Wallace is better than sliced bread. You just try and tell them he fought to put balliol-who completely disowned him-back on the throne or that the one pitched battle(Falkirk 1298)he had sole command in was a utter disaster or that most of what we know came from a propaganda tract written over a hundred years after he died and they will call you a liar.
Irrationality seems to be a hard thing to remove from people. Still you have to try I just tell myself if I can get one person to see reality in all its wonder is more magnificent than any myth or religion the bother would be worthwhile.
 
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