WHY AWARENESS OF “COGNITIVE DISSONANCE” IS

SO ELUSIVEBY EARON S . DAVIS

4 /20 /2015

A key to understanding why human societies become corrupt and don’t self-correct, why democracy doesn’t work well, and how we are easily manipulated by those we trust with power.

David Sipress, The New Yorker

WARNING: THIS PRESENTATION MAY CAUSE MENTAL

DISCOMFORT AS YOU EXPERIENCE COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

IN PONDERING HUMAN NATUREThe information and images that follow may be inconsistent with some aspects of your religious, moral, scientific or “common sense” beliefs about human nature and the world around us.

Common reactions to dissonant cognitive situations may include:

Difficulty concentrating Anxiety and frustration Irritability Intermittent fascination Boredom and walking away Confusion and dissatisfaction Obliviousness – “so what?” Pondering and contemplation Or, all of the above . . .

FRANTZ FANON - 1925-1961 PSYCHIATRIST AND PHILOSOPHER

http://www.iep.utm.edu/fanon/

LEON FESTINGERPSYCHOLOGIST, 1919-1989

“According to Festinger, we hold many cognitions about the world and ourselves; when they clash, a discrepancy is evoked, resulting in a state of tension known as cognitive dissonance. As the experience of dissonance is unpleasant, we are motivated to reduce or eliminate it, and achieve consonance (i.e. agreement).”

“Cognitive dissonance was first investigated by Leon Festinger, arising out of a participant observation study of a cult which believed that the earth was going to be destroyed by a flood, and what happened to its members —particularly the really committed ones who had given up their homes and jobs to work for the cult — when the flood did not happen.

While fringe members were more inclined to recognize that they had made fools of themselves and to "put it down to experience", committed members were more likely to re-interpret the evidence to show that they were right all along (the earth was not destroyed because of the faithfulness of the cult members).”

Source: http://www.simplypsychology.org/cognitive-dissonance.html

accessed 4/19/2015.

CAN HUMANS GENERALLY GRASP THEIR OWN

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE?Cognitive dissonance refers to a quality in all human beings that gets triggered when we seem to need to choose between a wide range of competing realities, interests and worldviews. We may need to choose between :

which people to spend time with (e.g., family or friends).

which aspects of our lives or jobs will be the priority.

our moral views, our politics and our jobs.

our personal interests and the interests of society.

our present interests and our future interests.

our privileges in society vs. our sense of justice and equality.

two competing moral values or ethical considerations.

our love of country and our desire for world peace.

OBSERVATIONThe greater the dissonance between reality and our values, the more difficult it may be to comprehend/realize that the conflict even exists. We tend to evade conflicts between competing value systems and allegiances by using illogical rationalizations and reassurances. This tends to make us non-rational.

The ability we have to consciously choose our thoughts and attitudes like this, as beautifully described by Viktor Frankl, allows us to endure terrible experiences by focusing on meaning in our lives. However, our unconscious flexibility in dealing with cognitive dissonance may also permit us to deceive ourselves and fail to exercise our responsibilities towards others. Such is the human condition. . .

EXAMPLES

Therefore, for the American WWII generation, who fought a war to save democracy and create a better world, it was very difficult to see the Vietnam war as immoral, the Vietnamese government as corrupt and the conduct of the war being profit-motivated, inhuman and barbaric. Our government didn’t do those things.

With slavery in the U.S., it was impossible to see that half of the population of the Southern states was imprisoned in slave labor camps. It was easier to see a vast economic system led by noble intentions, for the good of even the slaves. After all, this is a democracy and a nation of “good” people, so horrific injustice would be impossible here. Cognitive dissonance puts blinders on people so that they cannot see the reality of what is going on. The blinders of slavery still exist.

In fact, there was little difference between the slave labor camps for black people in the South and slave labor camps for Jewish people in Germany and Poland. Neither could actually be happening, in the eyes of the local citizenry. The slaves must be happy. They sang songs. The concentration camp inmates played classical music concerts, after all. The illusion was fed by skilled sociopaths and propagandists. Those will the strongest moral values either became agitated and disturbed or, to survive, rationalized that everything was okay.

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE CLOUDS OUR JUDGMENT

MILGRAM’S EXPERIMENTWHAT HAPPENS WHEN HUMANS MUST CHOOSE

BETWEEN THEIR MORAL VALUES AND AN AUTHORITY FIGURE?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOYLCy5PVgM

OBSERVATION

So, what happened when steel mills were killing those who worked there? In the 1960’s, even the unions fought against environmental and occupational protections for steel mill workers and their neighborhoods.

To these people, the smoke and grit and stench were signs of jobs and people rising from poverty into the middle class. How could it be killing them? Obviously, that was not the case. The jobs were great jobs! Cognitive dissonance is often resolved in our short-term economic interests, ignoring competing concerns for long-term health and ethics.

There is also a devastating presumption among the population that if a chemical inflicted cancer on many people it would not be allowed. Most educated people understand that is a fantasy. However, it represents cognitive dissonance in which the strongly held value of our economic elites as responsible and humanitarian is pitted against the opposite reality, coupled with the need to see corporations as being law-abiding and contributing to a better future for everyone. Such is our working class mythology and it apparently is not going to change soon.

WHAT IS IT THAT AMERICANS CAN’T UNDERSTAND BECAUSE OF COGNITIVE

DISSONANCE?There is an awfully long list of things we have difficulty grasping due to our strong values for humanity, decency, fairness and democracy, which can provide us with rose-colored glasses:

President George W Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney approved torture, making them War Criminals. If the U.S. weren’t the most powerful and arrogant nation on earth, they would be on trial.

U.S. committed massive massacres and atrocities against civilians in North Korea and North Vietnam, again clear violations of international law and our basic moral values.

Corporations routinely behave as thugs, using the police and their economic power and clout to protect their interests and give them immunity from the most basic of criminal and ethical standards.

African Americans continue to be systematically oppressed and victimized today.

The United States committed a massive genocide against Native Americans, which continues today.

The United States has never allowed all Americans equal votes.

Many U.S. founders were slave owners. Some had babies with their slaves.

White slave owners in the South routinely forced sex on female slaves and later sold their own children at auction.

HAD ENOUGH?

IS THERE A CURE FOR COGNITIVE DISSONANCE?

Not as long as we have competing needs, interests and values !!! This is part of the human condition.

Cognitive dissonance appears to be a feature of our human nature. Keeping our lives relatively simple and un-stressful is helpful, but we still tend to jump to conclusions and rationalize more than we are aware. Understanding our emotions is one of the keys to thwarting the destructive impacts of the illusions created by cognitive dissonance. Mindfulness and Yoga practices are aimed at doing this. It is not coincidental that Yoga masters have described Yogic meditation as an attempt to “control the modifications [illusions] of the mind.” http://www.swamij.com/swami-rama-emotions-mind.htm

We need to come to terms with the fact of cognitive dissonance as a feature of humans that predisposes us to self-delusion, bias and blindness to our errors and biases. We can give up the struggle for truth and adopt the feel-good illusions that trap us in a matrix of lies and deceit. However, these illusions are dangerous.

FACTORS THAT COULD HELP SOCIETY RESIST ILLUSION?

A Free Press and a thriving profession of independent journalists with high ethical standards

Freedom of Speech and the Right to Peaceably Assemble Separation of Church and State and promotion of the civic values we have in common

Ethical constraints (regulations) on industry, government, science and technology

Transparency in Government and Private Sector Full Internet access to all users Configuration of media to allow for diversity and roll back current consolidation

Enforcement of fairness and accuracy requirements in the conduct of media outlets

Limits on the ability of individuals and groups to accumulate wealth and power

Cultivation of mindfulness and spirituality as civic virtues, separate from religion

Eliminate discrimination against gender/orientation, racial, religious and ethnic minorities

Civilian governmental control of all military and surveillance activities

AYN RAND AND HER “OBJECTIVISM”The “free marketplace” is a grand illusion for those in power to promote in order to justify dominance over those who are less privileged. Of course, it is based on greed being a virtue, which is quite a leap from our morality. This is why Rand didn’t become popular during her lifetime, while she freely revealed her views (see below). “Objectivism” is a fantasy that somehow a productive, rational and just future comes out of cultivating the darkest sociopathic inclinations of people, rather than kindness. Of course, it floats the boat of those in power. This makes it popular, to be sure, to those who are privileged, but not rational.

THE ILLUSION OF UNREGULATED CAPITALISM

TODAY’S NEO-CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL CORRECTNESS HOLDS THE “FREE MARKET” TO SOLVE ALL OF OUR PROBLEMS, AN INVISIBLE HAND

THAT GUIDES OUR LIVES AND PRESERVES OUR FUTURE.

THE TRANSCENDENT PARADOX OF SELF-AWARENESS

http://www.academia.edu/10083864/The_Transcendent_Paradox_of_Self-Awareness

It is a cruel paradox, indeed, that most people do not understand cognitive dissonance because, ironically, it causes great discomfort to admit that humans are irrational and prone to profound illusions. Cognitive dissonance is inconsistent with our strong values of intellectualism, rational science and free will. So self-awareness of our attachment to illusions continues to elude us.

I have hopes that slowing down our overstimulated culture is another key to allowing our conflicting realities to reveal themselves to us. Yoga, Mindfulness, and other forms of meditation, martial arts, simplicity and other stress reduction techniques can open the doors of reality. Yet, it is up to each of us to step out of our roles as consumers/worker drones and claim the role of citizen. We must walk through the doors of illusion and stand firm, spreading the new awareness and reinforcing and supporting thoughts and actions that affirm our humanity and work for a better future. For further reading on this concept, and how difficult it is for humans to reason out that we are irrational, here is an essay I’ve written on the topic:

COGNITIVE DISSONANCE IS WHY THE MOVIE, “THE MATRIX” RANG SO TRUE IN OUR CULTURE

AMONG TEENS AND YOUNG ADULTS, WHO MAY NOT BE AS ACCLIMATED TO THE DOMINANT

ILLUSIONS AS THEIR ELDERS

However, to resolve the dissonance, many have turned to the illusion of Ayn Rand and libertarianism.

AS POGO SAID, “WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY AND HE IS US.”

OUR ABILITY TO BELIEVE (OR BE CONVINCED) THAT WE ARE RATIONAL BEINGS LEAVES US OPEN

TO ALL SORTS OF MANIPULATION AND DECEPTION. LET’S SAFEGUARD OUR LIMITED REASONING

ABILITIES WITH CRITICAL THINKING, INSTITUTIONAL TRANSPARENCY, WI SE REGULATIONS,

POLITICAL COURAGE, ALTRUISM AND HUMILITY.

BUT MANY OF OUR BEST QUALITIES ARE A-LOGICAL, ALSO!

Sexual AttractionFriendships

LoyaltyCreativity

CommunityVisions for the Future

Enjoyment and PleasurePassions

The trick is to balance our passions so they fit into generally reasonable sets of boundaries, giving us a sense of freedom and a sense of security. This is the task of culture in humans. Culture needs to help us remain sustainable and safe in our environment and among social groupings such as nations, religions, ethnicity, gender, disability and group identities.

When we believe that we are fully rational, we can be easily manipulated into doing stupid things that undermine human society. Thus, science and technology must be balanced with cultural values in order to keep humanity safe and sane. And religion and belief must be balanced with scientific reality. Science must be set in a context of humility and reason, not hubris.

ONE FINAL CONUNDRUM

Do we finally become rational when we recognize that we are irrational? Nope!

We can be reasonable and intelligent, at times. We can have self-awareness and insight.

However, we will not become fully rational. This is why we need to live in diverse communities. Being consistently rational is simply not in our nature. No matter how wise, we will eventually stumble. Our ability to deal creatively with reality also opens the door to illusions and self-deception. No matter how humble we may be, something will slip past our awareness, or our deeds or words will mislead others. No matter how we study cognitive dissonance and define it clearly, we will not always be aware when it is undermining our ability to reason.

We are not computers or machines. We are human animals. Power and creativity both ennoble and corrupt us. We can’t consistently choose well, but we can try. We are each a work in progress, as are our cultures.

We are creatures who flourish in balance, but yet always tend to push the envelope. When our cultures promote transparency and resilience and remain within the changing constraints of our natural world, our natural environment, we seem to do well.

When our cultures allow excess and megalomania, and worship wealth, we can self-destruct, especially through false choices, “logic” and “reason” that are distorted -and empowered by cognitive dissonance.

DON’T WORRY, WE CAN MOVE FORWARD IN A GOOD WAY

Like the waves on the beach, the ebb and flow of our lives will continue to bring awareness of our dissonances and then sweep them away. There is a saying in sports, about statistical matchups and fantasy leagues. On any given day, anything can happen. That’s why we actually play the games. Seize the day!

EARON S. DAVIS, J.D., M.P.H. EARONDAVIS1@GMAIL.COM

Don’t be discouraged. When enough people become aware of the illusions our society operates under, we can use what remains of our democratic institutions to further change. As the illusions begin to crumble, more people will see the folly of allowing more and more power to the forces of tyranny and oppression. We must persist. When reason isn’t enough, contemplate a better future and, most importantly, have faith. We cannot allow ourselves to be oppressed by a privileged aristocracy once again. We need limits on the power of wealth and privilege to control our government