NIKOS A. SALINGAROS
Cognitive Dissonance and Non-adaptive Architecture:
Seven Tactics for Denying the Truth
Doxa, Issue 11 (Norgunk Publishing House, Istanbul), January 2014, pages 100-117.
Earlier version published online by the P2P Foundation, February 2011
Cognitive Dissonance and Non-adaptive Architecture:
Seven Tactics for Denying the Truth
Doxa, Issue 11 (Norgunk Publishing House, Istanbul), January 2014, pages 100-117.
Earlier version published online by the P2P Foundation, February 2011
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Human physiology can lead people who have acquired false beliefs to stubbornly persist in holding them. Intelligent persons conform to irrational groupthink, employing a stock of tools to fight against any idea that conflicts with those already held. There is in fact a built-in resistance to new ideas that do not conform to accepted practices, even when such practices are demonstrated to be failures. We can understand this resistance to change within the framework of social learning and evolutionary adaptation. “Cognitive dissonance” is a state of physical anxiety to which we instinctively react in a defensive manner. We are programmed to counteract its occurrence. Studies in political science and psychology reveal strong innate mechanisms for preserving misinformation so as to avoid cognitive dissonance. Methods of handling contradictory information within settings requiring urgent action — while obviously appropriate at the evolutionary level of early humans — wreak havoc with our present-day rationality.
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Seven tactics for denying the truth:
1. The “Ostrich” technique — (Tuning Out, Selective Exposure). 2. The “Rhinoceros” technique — (Source Derogation). 3. The “Eel” technique — (Displacement, Disputing Rationality). 4. The “Squid” technique — (Irrational Counterarguing). 5. The “Lizard” technique — (Selective Support, Attitude Bolstering). 6. The “Chameleon” technique. 7. The “Self-justifying Prosecutor” technique — (Inferred Justification). |
Reducing Laboratory Dissonance
From genealogyreligion.net - January 21, 2015 As part of my research on extreme ritual practices I’ve been trying to reacquaint myself with the theories concerning ‘cognitive dissonance’ pioneered by Leon Festinger back in the 1950s. The basic concept of cognitive dissonance is that when we do or think things which contradict something else that we believe, we experience psychological discomfort and thus become motivated to reduce the dissonance. A classic illustration of these processes was provided in an experiment by Aronson & Mills (1956) in which they varied the ‘severity’ of initiation costs for joining a discussion group. |
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