The Psychology of Cognitive Dissonance

[jakell]

Indeed, it seems to be at the core of any marketing/political initiative: appropriating a mouthpiece that can best influence a given demographic or swath of humans.

Given the amount of money funneled into such efforts over the years -- and the results tallied so far -- it's been quite effective.

Looking back through human history, it seems that neither money nor centralised effort are essential to produce the will to submit to singular figures or groups.

It might even be modern hubris to think that we have recently established a degree of control over this tendency.

[Belligerent Savant]

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Of course, though there was no such strict connotation of "recently established" control in my prior comment.

The reference to 'money' may be a nod to more contemporary efforts, but Man's attempts to influence fellow Man has surely been ongoing since the advent of Fire, pre-dating the onset of spoken word.

[Lord Balto]

I have plenty to read that deals with real facts.

Just curious.... like what?

Other than the occasional SF novel and much too much time reading sites like this, I concentrate on sources for my chronology of the Holocene Period, mainly old school printed books, but also the odd tome at Google Books:

http://neros.lordbalto.com/default.htm

My bibliography includes the following: http://neros.lordbalto.com/Biblio.htm And no, I have not read all of these all the way through. I tend to mine books for relevant data rather than read them.

[Sounder]

Lord Balto wrote...

The real problem with the breakdown of authoritarian social structures is that you end up, as you have with the internet, with all manner of bizarre alternative belief systems, some of which have existed for centuries, like antisemitism, and some of which have been newly minted. Just take a look at some of the characters at Project Camelot and you will understand how far over the edge people are capable of climbing.

Alternative belief systems show themselves to be derivative when they try to replace one imperative with another.

And against this you have newly created authority structures like Wikipedia that refuse to link to the Fletcher Prouty Reference Site when discussing Fletcher Prouty, and then beg for your hard earned money. Wikipedia remains the major purveyor of cognitive dissonance-proof "information" on the internet.

The two concepts of "cognitive dissonance" and "consensus reality" are closely linked, in that anything that violates consensus reality produces dissonance. Keep in mind that the majority doesn't necessarily rule here. While 70-80% of the American population believe there was a conspiracy in the murder of John Kennedy, the consensus reality, reinforced by the media and by Wikipedia, is still that Lee Oswald shot Kennedy from the 6th floor at the same time that he was eating his lunch on the 2nd floor.

Yes, anything that violates consensus reality produces dissonance.

But the result of what is implied is that any attempt to integrate sub-conscious knowing into ones (inherently more limiting) conscious model will produce dissonance. Surely an inhibition to deep thinking.

Then add to this the dissonance that resides within the dominant narrative itself.

System breaks might occur when the narrative generated dissonance becomes greater than the dissonance felt from examining the system. The breakup of the USSR could serve as an example of this.

In our current case we have rhetoric of freedom loving westerners contrasted with what is actually done. This generates dissonance in the general population between what they sub-consciously know and what they are able to consciously formulate or acknowledge.

As in the following case.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/debunking- ... da/5375886


Also alternative belief sets are built around ‘events’ that the dominant narrative does not deal with. Dissonance is created with violations of these models also. Often more so, because they also are limited and usually rigid models.

So in a more general sense, violations of any modeling, not only consensus reality models, will produce dissonance.

The question then becomes; can we model reality in a way that resolves more dissonance than it creates?

Or alternatively, can we learn to cultivate a more engaging and thereby useful relationship to dissonance?

[jakell]

That last sentence seems to me a more mature way of relating to the world as it requires growth, anything else seems an attempt to maintain the comfort zone of the younger mind, and sometimes these attempts become shrill and defensive.

[Sounder]

Yes, I added that on a quick edit, as while the submit button was hit, the thought grabbed me that a useful relationship to dissonance comes before any kind of authentic resolutions.

Besides which dissonance is (potentially) a learning tool and quite possibly there is no ultimate resolution.

[jakell]

Well, there is no resolution in the either/or sense, which is unfortunately the binary mode that informs a large degree of human cogniscence at this stage in our evolution.

However, the acceptance of dissonance can be regarded as a resoution when we move beyond that binary mode.

[brainpanhandler]

colorless green facts sleep furiously

[Lord Balto]

Well, there is no resolution in the either/or sense, which is unfortunately the binary mode that informs a large degree of human cogniscence at this stage in our evolution.

However, the acceptance of dissonance can be regarded as a resolution when we move beyond that binary mode.

Despite his many faults, my father's insistence that there were often what he called "gray areas" (a metaphor he undoubtedly got from his employment in the printing industry) between the black and white positions of most people was a quite perceptive way of seeing the world.

[beeblebrox]

I'm pretty sure that Chomsky decided fairly early on that the 9/11 issue was something that he wasn't going to get entangled with. A fairly wise route IMO, although, with external pressures, you are going to end up looking a fool either way, and he chose the sort of fool he was going to be.

I've been in a similar situation, and had to make similar choices. It takes a certain level of maturity to make that choice and not give yourself wholly up to manipulation.

What you are describing with that last paragraph is the beginning of CD. You made an instinctive decision to go along with a lie to protect your position in society. You then tried to rationalize this decision by labeling it as "maturity" in much the same way that others here are attempting to rationalize Chomsky's behavior with regard to the same situation.


Bill Maher takes the low road......




Later on in the very same show he interviewed Garry Kasparov.....




In both instances Maher was wrong and full of shit. In the first case, when dealing with an anonymous audience member, Maher wigged out and ran into the audience to throw the guy out. In the second video, when dealing with a world renown chess master, he had little choice but to humble himself and admit defeat.

Which tact do you believe he would take in an interview with Noam Chomsky if Chomsky were to come out in opposition to the official version of 911?

[jakell]

I'm pretty sure that Chomsky decided fairly early on that the 9/11 issue was something that he wasn't going to get entangled with. A fairly wise route IMO, although, with external pressures, you are going to end up looking a fool either way, and he chose the sort of fool he was going to be.

I've been in a similar situation, and had to make similar choices. It takes a certain level of maturity to make that choice and not give yourself wholly up to manipulation.

What you are describing with that last paragraph is the beginning of CD. You made an instinctive decision to go along with a lie to protect your position in society. You then tried to rationalize this decision by labeling it as "maturity" in much the same way that others here are attempting to rationalize Chomsky's behavior with regard to the same situation......

I'm pretty sure that you don't know of any lies I have 'gone along with', nor of any position in society I hold that I have tried to protect.

In all, not a great set of opening remarks to initiate a dialogue with.

[justdrew]

RIIIIGHT.... Chomskey should have just burned and ruined what little credibility and infulance he has for a hopeless battle. Does anyone really really think his wading into that cesspool of lies and mis/dis information and manipulation that was the "truth movement" would have made one iota of difference? I don't. He did the right thing.

and he did it in such a way that anyone can see through his renunciation of it, if it matters to them.

[jakell]

RIIIIGHT.... Chomskey should have just burned and ruined what little credibility and infulance he has for a hopeless battle. Does anyone really really think his wading into that cesspool of lies and mis/dis information and manipulation that was the "truth movement" would have made one iota of difference? I don't. He did the right thing.

and he did it in such a way that anyone can see through his renunciation of it, if it matters to them.

He has been quite deft about it too. He couldn't really take Hitchens' path and refuse point blank to address it, it is within his sphere, he had to address the different angles on it, and I think he got the balance fairly right without getting hopelessly entangled with the nuttier side.

[Belligerent Savant]

.

Re: Hitchens --

Unsure if this will be available outside of Canada, but a strong interview yesterday with Hedges remembering Hitchens:

http://www.cbc.ca/day6/2011/12/16/chris ... -hitchens/

I found him, when he was on the left, a bully. I didn't like the way he would frame debates. It always became personal, and we saw that when he switched sides and he began to tear into figures he once revered.... There was a viciousness that was very much part of his public persona on the left and the right that made me uncomfortable.

I don't want to take away from...his immense talents. For me, the tragedy of his life is that deep down inside there was a kind of amoral core, and much of those talents were put in the service of his own advancement, rather than to where I think they should have gone, which is against agents and systems of injustice.

And:

http://gawker.com/5868761/christopher-h ... istake/all

[Sounder]

The framing that the anti-critics propose is that Chomsky’s response to 911 ideation is responsible, given all the variables and whatnot.

That may well be, but my comment was more about the dissonance suppressing tenor (and shallowness) of his comments in that particular video. No my issues with Chomsky have more to do with his primary work in removing emotional markers so as to create more efficient command and control systems. (What he professes and says, and what he does do not seem to match up) That and his role in steering culpability away from Israel in regard to its crimes against the original Semitic Palestinian population. OK, well, those things and a few others; might as well mention his happy to be a fascist if that will ‘cure’ climate change.

Chomsky is a regular consensus making machine.