Posts Tagged ‘Confirmation bias’
Are you Blindly supporting Israel in Spite of the daily facts and reality? A few conjectures
Posted by: adonis49 on: May 30, 2018
5 Reasons We So Blindly Support Israel in Spite of the Truth or Biblical Ethics
Over the course of time I’ve noticed a troubling trend: it’s almost impossible to have a reasonable discussion with fellow “Christians” (Evangelical/Southern Baptist) who believe we are called to give unwavering support the modern secular (you mean sectarian?) state of Israel.
This has led me to try to figure out why this is the case.
Why do so many Christians reject basic facts about Israel?
Why do so many of us have an aversion to believing truth on this issue? (Truth or daily facts and racist/apartheid) behavior)
As your list-maker-in-chief, I have a few ideas as to why this seems to occur.
So, here are my 5 reasons so many of us irrationally support Israel– in spite of truth or biblical ethics:
1. Bad theology regarding Israel has led us to become victims of our own confirmation bias.
Confirmation bias is simply the logical fallacy where we only accept information that confirms what we believed at the onset.
Essentially, confirmation bias is an unwillingness to consider what’s true. I’ve rarely seen such a strong unwillingness to learn as I do when talking to people about the nation (State?) of Israel.
For those of us who grew up in pro-Zionist versions of Christianity, we begin with a strong bend toward confirmation bias. We’re taught a message of, “Israel is God’s chosen nation, and the whole world is trying to wipe them out,” and then flavor that up a bit with a threat that God will curse anyone who doesn’t stand with them.
As a result, we have a strong tendency to consume, accept, or interpret information, only in ways that further a narrative where Israel is the good guy.
(Fact is, Evangelical fundamentals preceded Hertzel Zionism ideology by 50 years in the USA)
Unfortunately, the world isn’t so neat and clean as to fit within these narratives– and using them causes us to overlook the reality that the state of Israel is engaged in some horrible, unjust, and oppressive behaviors.
In fact, some of those evil behaviors are even in defiance of international law– and yet we continually find ways to irrationally justify it.
2. We don’t listen to Palestinian voices– not even our Christian brothers and sisters in Palestine. (What do you mean by that? There are many Palestinian christian sects in Palestine and they are against the State of Israel)
I’ll be honest– I’ve never met a radically pro-Israel individual who has ever spent much time listening to the voices of average Palestinians. And, why would one need to? (They built the Wall of Shame so that Jews won’t have to reflect every day on the existence of the Palestinians across the wall)
To achieve our confirmation bias we have no need to listen to the other side. In fact, many are unaware that there are Christian Palestinians– let alone taken the time to actually listen to them talk about their own lives and their experiences living in occupied Palestine.
If one did, the stories they’d hear would challenge the Americanized version of the narrative we grew up with.
Stories of Israeli soldiers demolishing their crops at harvest season, stories of being denied access to basic water while Israelis across the street have enough to water their lawns, stories of being spat upon because they’re Christians, churches being set ablaze by Israelis, or their children being tear gassed on the way to school or terrorized in the night by Israeli soldiers. These are the stories you’ll hear from Palestinian Christians.
Why do so many American Christians dismiss these realities as bogus “propaganda”? It’s because they’ve never taken the time to listen to the Christian voices from Palestine. (But if you’d like to listen to a Christian voice from Palestine, I have an hour long interview you can listen to, here.)
3. Criticism of Israel is criticism of America.
In addition to overt reasons we blindly stand with Israel, I think there are subconscious reasons as well. Mainly, I believe that it’s impossible to condemn the behavior of Israel without condemning the behavior of America.
(Fact is, it was the Jewish US supreme court justice in 1915 who pressured President Wilson to put the squeeze on Balfour to issue his declaration on Palestine, before engaging in the WWI against Germany)
Think about it: an entire people group show up and take a land that already has people living there? The indigenous people are then displaced from their lands and homes, their resources are taken from them, and then are terrorized by a foreign army?
Sound remotely familiar? The story of Israel is the story of America. (Incremental genocide strategy of the Indians and military take over of lands from the Mexicans and Spanish settlements in the west and south west)
Perhaps that’s why so many love it, while so many find it inherently unjust. One cannot condemn the behavior of Israel without condemning our own– and that, I fear, is too often an unpardonable sin in America.
4. We’re afraid that critiquing the actions of a state makes us guilty of being “anti-semitic.
There’s good reason to fear this one– Christian Zionists will be quick to paint you out as being anti-semitic for expressing even the slightest critique of Israel. But let me be clear: condemning the actions of a nation or culture is not anti-semitic.
Condemning illegal Israeli settlements is no more anti-Jew than criticizing American drone warfare is anti-Christian. This is about the behavior of a government and culture, not about ethnicity or religion.
If it is, the entire Old Testament was written by a bunch of anti-semites. You know all those prophets?
Yeah– one of their main jobs was to rebuke Israel for evil and oppressive behavior. In fact, it’s one of the reasons so many of them (including Jesus) ended up dead.
Israel has a long history of twists and turns, sometimes behaving in alignment with God’s ways, and sometimes actively kicking against them.
During seasons of the latter, God would raise up prophets to call them to repent– and I believe God is doing the same thing today. Thus, calling on Israel to repent of evil is not anti-semitic– it’s actually the epitome of “biblical.”
5. Standing in solidarity with Muslims would be a big no-no in American Christian culture.
(At this time your honor, I would direct the court to Exhibit A: Wheaton College)
While there are Christian Palestinians, it’s certainly true that the bulk of Palestinians happen to be Muslims– and that I believe creates a major problem for many American Christians. I mean, after all, they are quite often seen as somehow being the “enemy.” (Labeling Palestinians as Arabs was the main propaganda strategy of the new State of Israel. Before that new creation, the immigrant Jews called the land Palestine)
Standing up for these Muslims? Acknowledging they are being oppressed and mistreated? And worse, acknowledging they are being oppressed and mistreated by the country that is supposedly God’s favorite?
Yeah, that’s just too much for most people to deal with. Far easier to stick with the good-guy-bad-guy cowboy narrative, where Muslims are always wearing black hats, than to contend with what may actually be true.
The issue of Israel and Palestine is no small issue– in many respects, the peace of an entire region could depend on whether or not Western influence takes a stand for justice and righteousness.
However, I see little hope of that happening until we become willing to recognize that we have blindly given one side our total loyalty– even in spite of facts, or biblical ethics.
Note 1: (Actually, the creation of this colonial State in the Near East is an existential threat to all the people in this region. Israel divided the normal trade among the neighboring States and all land transport and communication such as trains that linked all the States before Israel)
Note 2: Evangelical Zionists in USA and Europe believe that the Second Coming will take place after Jerusalem is completely Jewish
Special cases? Discarding evidences to fit your Confirmation biases model
Posted by: adonis49 on: October 10, 2014
Special cases? Discarding evidence to fit your Confirmation biases model
Confirmation bias maybe the mother of all misconceptions.
Once we believe that a program, a product, an idea… is successful, we refuse to let go, even if we are presented with tons of proofs to the contrary.
This is basically the paradigm shift problem with all disciplines
If we are unable to insert a new piece of intelligence or information in our existing worldview model as a compatible element, it is hard to accept the new addition or understand it. This is called the Disconfirming Evidence tendency.
Although facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored, “what the human is best at doing is interpreting all new information so that their prior conclusions remain intact” Warren Buffet
And Charles Darwin found a method to circumvent this confirmation bias: Any observation that contradicted his theory, he took it seriously and noted it down immediately. The more correct he judged his theory, the more actively he looked for contradicting aspects.
We deal with all kinds of assumptions. The more nebulous they are, the stronger the confirmation bias.
You may utter prophesies so vague that any event can substantiate them.
Religious and philosophical system of beliefs represent an excellent breeding ground for this bias.
Economists fall prey to this bias by predicting the economic trend.
Business journalists suffer most from this bias: rarely the journalist seeks out disconfirming evidences to what he formulated on a company’s cause for success or failure.
Self-help and Get-rich quickly books are excellent examples of blinkered storytelling.
Axing beliefs that feel like Old Friends is hard work, but it should be an imperative task.
When you hear “This is a special case”, you better tend your ears and be on your guard. Most probably, your consultant refuses to alter his model.
Actually, all laws are special cases. Why?
Laws are valid within certain restrictions, constraints, conditions and range of application.
If you neglect or ignore these limitations of the parameters that a law is supposed to function within, your solution is out of bound and erroneous.
This behavior is typical to most novices in any field of practice, and they keep falling into these traps and generate dire consequences until they learn to become professionals.
Most common of errors…Apophenia? Patternicity? Pareidolia?
Posted by: adonis49 on: September 27, 2012
Most common of errors…Apophenia? Patternicity? Pareidolia?
There are different types of mistakes and errors that people commit, like you and me, the little people, managers,“leaders” new and old”, scientists, researchers, politicians…
1. Mistakes “reserved” for management of people https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2012/09/24/13-mistakes-new-learders-makes-this-taboo-number-as-if-older-leaders-ever-diminish-this-number-of-mistakes/
2. Mistakes with complicated created “professional” terms attached to them (for this post)
3. Mistakes organized in taxonomies, or check lists…https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2008/10/04/whats-that-concept-of-human-factors-in-design/
4. Errors and mistakes in conducting controlled experiment, particularly on human subjects
5. Human and machines mistakes https://adonis49.wordpress.com/2008/10/19/whats-that-concept-of-human-factors-in-design-continue-21/
6. Mistakes never reminded of…and never accounted for…and never confronted with
Let’s read the second types of complicated mistakes. I think this list was posted by Graham Coghill on freshly pressed a while ago:
“Apophenia” leads you to believe, wrongly, that you have evidence to support a position when you don’t.
You believe you can continue to gamble because you’re on a winning streak, or that Mars is inhabited because some observers see canal-like patterns on its surface. It can lead you to ignore evidence that falsifies your position, or that supports a contrary position.
What to do when confronted by this tactic?
Since it’s usually wishful thinking that leads us to find non-existent patterns, we need to guard against it first. Look for the signs, and guard against the temptation to dismiss evidence that doesn’t support your wishes.
Beware of those who try to exploit your tendency for wishful thinking and discipline yourself to accept only conclusion that are supported by real-world evidence.
Variations and related tactics:
Michael Shermer calls this cognitive bias ‘patternicity‘. It comes in several forms:
- Pareidolia – finding shapes, such as faces, in things like clouds, geological features and slices of toast.
- The gambler’s fallacy – believing that past random events can influence the probability of future ones, for example, that a flipped coin is more likely to show heads after a run of tails.
- The clustering illusion – believing that the clusters that are always found in random data actually indicate something meaningful, for example, that a run of wins in a game of dice means you are on a winning streak.
In science, apophenia is related to what’s known as a Type I error, in which a test seems to show that two variables are related when, in fact, they are not.
It can also contribute to confirmation bias, in which an investigator deliberately looks for evidence which supports a favoured model and avoids evidence which refutes it.
Apophenia is also related to the Texas sharpshooter fallacy, in which a person zooms in on an apparent pattern in the midst of a sea of data, and claims that this is the key to a significant issue (as in the fable of the Texas sharpshooter who fires random shots at a wall, then draws the bullseye around the tightest cluster of bullet holes).
Examples:
- On the political side of the debate over climate change, many fall into the trap of using current weather patterns to support their positions – a cold spell, for instance, is quoted as evidence that the earth is not warming.
- Climate scientists are reluctant to claim that any particular event is due to global warming because they are aware of the dangers of the clustering illusion. Before any such pattern can be held up as real evidence, a convincing argument must be presented.
- James Hansen and colleagues have recently published an analysis (here and here) which, they claim, shows that recent weather events are consequences of global warming.
- Here’s how difficult it is to decide whether the clustering illusion is at work or not. In the early 200s, it became apparent that there was an unusually high occurrence of breast cancer among female employees at the ABC studios at Toowong in Queensland. In 2007, an expert panel found that the rate was 6 times higher than the rate of breast cancer in Queensland, and that there was only a 1 in 25 chance (estimated p value of 0.04) that this could have occurred by chance.
- It found a correlation between breast cancer occurrence and length of service at the studio, but could find no evidence that the cancer was due to any factor related to the site or to genetic or lifestyle factors of the employees.
- A 2009 study investigated breast cancer rates in ABC employees across Australia and found no increased rates in any other site. The ABC abandoned the Toowong studios and now operates from new facilities several kilometres away. Was the cancer cluster a statistical artefact or was there some yet unidentified cause?
- In the early 1900s, German meteorologist Alfred Wegener noticed a pattern in the earth’s continental shapes. The edges of the continents appeared to fit into each other, like pieces of a jigsaw. This led him to believe they had once been joined together and he proposed his model of continental drift.
- Although this model explained many observations, it was not accepted by earth scientists because Wegener was unable to come up with a mechanism that could account for continents moving. Discoveries in the 1950s and 1960s revealed a mechanism, and Wegener’s idea became incorporated into the Plate Tectonic model.
Note 1: Here is the link to Coghill’s post, at his polite request http://scienceornot.net/2012/08/14/perceiving-phoney-patterns-apophenia/.
Note 2: Fortunately, I don’t blog full-time or navigate the net to find out who have borrowed my ideas from the 3,100 articles that I posted: That would be a nightmare to keep track of and of no benefit, as far as I know. All that I am interested in is disseminate what is controversial and need to be discussed and reflected upon…
Am I biased? What are your cognitive models?
There is an interesting story behind these questions; the effort of answering as many as you can will generate satisfaction.
We function and decide along cognitive models of what we think we know of facts and reality.
1) You had an excellent grade on one of the courses. What is the main reason?
You are very intelligent; you studied hard; the course was pretty easy; the teacher was good in explaining the subject matter; the school environment is conducive to learning; the teaching method was appropriate to your temperament; your close community is supportive to learning.
2) You believe that your girl friend’s mental capabilities are below your mental potential. Is it because:
She asks many detailed questions that you consider should be taken for granted; she has this habit of going frequently on tangents instead of focusing on the main subject of the conversation; she is convinced that girls’ trump card is elegance and style; she is never satisfied how she looks; she is always one hour late for the date; she just starts dressing up and bathing on the date schedule and thus unable to plan ahead; she is not logical or rational in her thinking…
I don’t believe my girlfriend is less smarter than me but I don’t know why;
I have facts that my girlfriend is smarter than me.
3) You are convinced of the “evolution” theory of mankind. Why? Because:
I read the original book of Darwin and he convinced me; I read commentaries of scientists that I value their judgement and I got convinced; I observed mechanism of evolution; I read scientific peer-reviewed studies on that topic; I am a scientist working in that field; I don’t believe in The BOOK or religious Books describing creation of mankind and species; I don’t see any other alternatives but evolution;
I don’t believe in evolution but I don’t know why;
I believe in evolution but I am not convinced.
4) Small commercial airplanes are far more dangerous for traveling short distances (300 miles) than cars. I agree because:
the only consequences in crashes is certain death; I have no control over planes; weather conditions affect the maneuvering of airplanes far more than cars; there is a heavy density of birds at low altitudes; there is no co-pilots in small commercial planes;
I disagree.
5) Your schoolmate closest friend had a much better grade than you on one of the courses. What is the main reason?
Is he more intelligent than you? He studied harder; the teacher is biased to him and favor your friend; your friend’s parents have strong connection with the administration; he is more relaxed in the school environment; his close community is more supportive to learning.
6) People of developing countries are evidently less smart and not endowed with mental capabilities as people in developed nations. Because:
their brain size is smaller; they failed so far to reaching a social stage of development that is compatible with modern social standards; they are still in the tribal stage; they allow foreigners to exploit their resources; their leaders are willing to sell anything for bribes; civil wars are rampant in developing countries; political structures are unstable; democracy is lacking; Christianity is not predominant;
I disagree based on the above premises or observations but I believe the initial statesman;
The statesman is wrongly formulated and biased but it cannot be disproved;
The statement is not “politically correct” and thus it is wrong;
I have no opinion and care less;
I have facts to the contrary to the statesman.
7) In general, women are less capable of running big businesses or holding important political positions. The reasons are:
Women are rarely found in high positions; physical handicaps during pregnancy are not conducive to persistent work in becoming expert; women are emotionally less strong than men in critical events; women get bogged down in details; the temperament of women is less focused on business targets;
This is wrong statement;
The question is biased in its formulation;
Women are more capable than men in running big businesses and controlling personnel.
8) You have got a pretty lousy grade. The main reason is:
You have no inclination for the subject matter; you had urgent problems to taking care of; the teacher lacked the vocation; the classroom is crowded; the schedule for the course didn’t match the top performance period in your circadian body cycle.
A few subjective cognitive models we use to deciding without enough facts are the following:
One: We rely on simple heuristic strategies to avoiding complex computational judgement. This model is called “Attribute substitution”
Two: We tend not to acknowledge our biases in judgement and think that we are better than average in feeling the correct attitude; thus, we have “Bias blind spots“.
Three: We tend to attribute to our strong imaginative power pieces of memory that we have registered and had forgotten. The phenomena of False memory syndrome, Recovery memory therapies through hypnosis…and plagiarism are within the category of Cryptomnesia models.
Four: We tend to extend positive outcomes as relevant to our internal capabilities and potentials while negative outcomes are attributed to external factors. This “self-serving bias” is reversed when judging another person’s outcomes (grade results for example).
Five: We tend to ask more money for items we own than we are willing to pay for as market value. This “endowment effect” is related to our aversion to loss and sticking to the status quo biases.
Six: We search for bad actions and behavior of the victims based on our model of “Just-World phenomenon“. Somehow, the victim must have been bad to get this outcome.
Seven: “I can quit addiction at any time I decide to” is within the “Restraint bias” model and illusion of control when we will anything.
Eight: We tend to under-estimate task duration that is unknown to us. We use the “planning fallacy” model.
Nine: We estimate based on our most vivid memories. This is the “Availability heuristic” cognitive model.
Ten: We search for facts that support our hypothesis instead of the way around. We use the “Confirmation bias” model.
Send me more questions and option answers that generate examples of our subjective cognitive models
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