Scott Adams' Blog

Big Red Flag for Cognitive Dissonance

Posted April 20th, 2017 @ 10:49am in #climate science #climate change #cognitive dissonance

When I see an obvious case of cognitive dissonance in the news, I like to point it out so you can see reality through what I call the Persuasion Filter. Today’s example comes from an article in SLATE about climate change.

The author, Tim Requarth, correctly points out that facts and logic have limited value in changing anyone’s mind about climate science, or anything else. He speaks from experience because he teaches workshops on how to better communicate science. I like this guy. He’s on the right path.

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Two More Movies on One Screen

Posted March 13th, 2017 @ 2:02pm in #climate science #cognitive dissonance

Recently, one of my millions of critics left a message on social media about my writings on the topic of climate science. I pasted the critic’s comment below, as well as a response from a third party who explains to her that she is watching the wrong movie.

I present the exchange here as an example of how two people can look at the same screen and see completely different movies.

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Am I Predicting or Influencing?

Posted March 4th, 2017 @ 11:51am in #cognitive dissonance #whenhub

People keep asking me whether I predicted the Trump presidency or influenced it. There’s no way to know.

Or is there?

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Sam Harris Induces Cognitive Dissonance in Ben Affleck

Posted February 5th, 2017 @ 2:48pm in #real time with bill maher #sam harris #Ben Affleck #cognitive dissonance

Ignoring the politics of it for the moment, check out this video of Sam Harris debating Ben Affleck on Bill Maher’s Real Time show. I’ll teach you how to spot cognitive dissonance in the clip.

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Tells for Cognitive Dissonance (with some Trump flavoring)

Posted October 9th, 2015 @ 12:36pm in #cognitive dissonance #trump

When a skilled persuader exerts influence on a large group, people will generally react in one of three ways.

20% Will be heavily influenced right away, and be happy about it.

60% Will be mildly influenced, over time, with repetition.

20% Will be unusually angry, comparing the persuader to evil dictators and the like.

Under the Master Wizard Hypothesis, the folks who are the angriest are having a reaction to the persuasion that violates their self-image, throwing them into cognitive dissonance. The 20% who are easily influenced without anger had no skin in the game, in the sense that they had not yet picked sides.

The tells for Cognitive Dissonance are many. Here are some I haven’t before mentioned.

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