Today on the Cognitive Dissidents Podcast we talk about the backfire effect. The backfire effect is a cognitive bias that causes people who encounter evidence that challenges their beliefs to reject that evidence, and to strengthen their support of their original stance. Essentially, the backfire effect means that showing people evidence which proves that they are wrong is often ineffective, and can actually end up backfiring, by causing them to support their original stance more strongly than they previously did. As such, the backfire effect is a subtype of the confirmation bias, which is a cognitive bias that can cause people to reject information which contradicts their beliefs, or to interpret information in a way that confirms those beliefs.

The Backfire Effect: Why Facts Don’t Always Change Minds

The Backfire Effect

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Today on the Cognitive Dissidents Podcast, we discuss Jesus’ parable of the sower and the seed and the various types of soil.  The idea that each ground represents the context in which we are developing and have the space and resources to accept new truth and to develop and grow.

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Today on the Cognitive Dissidents Podcast, we discuss “belief Persistence”.  The idea that each of us even when confronted with contradictory evidence continue to hold our current beliefs making a real changing of the mind difficult.

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Today on the Cognitive Dissidents Podcast, we discuss “Confirmation Bias”.  The idea that each of us is out looking for data and evidence that confirms our present beliefs.

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Today we introduce a NEW PODCAST , the “Cognitive Dissidents” Podcast.   Hosted by Bill Reel this podcast will tend to focus more on the psychology of religious belief and the mechanisms in place that encourage us to hold that belief.  We also want to spend time placing these mechanisms in the context of cognitive and faith development.  Once we see how these mechanisms work, we can begin to open our eyes more to truth and to the reality

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