How Did Confirmation Bias Evolve?

[Mr. Scott]

Well, I read that article snipett, uh, there are very strong reasons that a biological bias could exist towards excluding a food choice of a certain color.

there are many mechanism where that could happen. I think further testing would be needed to decide what factors inflence the choice.

I have a more detailed article in print in the Nov 6 New York Times.

What is important about the phenomenon is how once the monkey makes his choice, it's incredibly hard for him to change his mind.

The example they use M&Ms, is interesting to me because it played a role in one of my earliest skeptical exercises.

On a long car trip where one of the only remedies for boredom was candy, I wondered if M&Ms of different colors actually had different tastes. Are yellow M&Ms lemon? Red cherry? We really believed they did. So, I put one of each color in my hand, closed my eyes, and tasted them one by one. There was no difference!

Yet, you can convince a monkey that one color M&M is better than another by forcing him to choose. He then, afterwards, develops a distinct preference for the color he chose, seemingly to save face.

Confirmation bias comes into play if a person who believes a yellow M&M is superior unknowningly sets himself up to prove it against evidence and unconsciously sabotoges attempts to prove him wrong.

From this, I see different colored M&M's like different religions. After an early "choice" there's no shaking one from their chosen faith, no evidence they picked the wrong faith matters, and there seems to be some weird emotional process involved in the process of rejecting evidence against one's belief. Whether the choice is M&M color, religion, or political affiliation, the psychological process is the same.

That monkeys do this is fascinating.

It also alerts me to the importance of making a good "first impression."

 

[Jeff Corey]

I think they are closely related. Confirmation bias is a behavior we use to cope with cognitive dissonance, no?

Not that I know of. Confirmation bias is a known phenomenon as demonstrated by Wason's various problem solving tasks, while cognitive dissonance is a theory of motivation that has been criticized as not being falsifiable. Google for Bem+cognitive dissonance for another viewpoint.
In any case, even if one accepts dissonance as a negative drive state that people are motivated to reduce by various strategies, then how does that explain behavior when testing emotionally neutral statements such as, "All cards with a vowel on one side have an even number on the other"?

 

[Dancing David]

I have a more detailed article in print in the Nov 6 New York Times.

What is important about the phenomenon is how once the monkey makes his choice, it's incredibly hard for him to change his mind.

The example they use M&Ms, is interesting to me because it played a role in one of my earliest skeptical exercises.

On a long car trip where one of the only remedies for boredom was candy, I wondered if M&Ms of different colors actually had different tastes. Are yellow M&Ms lemon? Red cherry? We really believed they did. So, I put one of each color in my hand, closed my eyes, and tasted them one by one. There was no difference!

Yet, you can convince a monkey that one color M&M is better than another by forcing him to choose. He then, afterwards, develops a distinct preference for the color he chose, seemingly to save face.

Confirmation bias comes into play if a person who believes a yellow M&M is superior unknowningly sets himself up to prove it against evidence and unconsciously sabotoges attempts to prove him wrong.

From this, I see different colored M&M's like different religions. After an early "choice" there's no shaking one from their chosen faith, no evidence they picked the wrong faith matters, and there seems to be some weird emotional process involved in the process of rejecting evidence against one's belief. Whether the choice is M&M color, religion, or political affiliation, the psychological process is the same.

That monkeys do this is fascinating.

It also alerts me to the importance of making a good "first impression."

Again you are extrapolating a lot and adding a lot.

Color bias and taste bias has some strong mechanisms at work potentially that have little to do with confimation bias.

So to extend this one experiment to religion is a little extreme.

Whether the choice is M&M color, religion, or political affiliation, the psychological process is the same.

this is an unsupported assertion.

 

[Jeff Corey]

Captain, Mr. Scott has left the bridge. The last I saw him, he was muttering, "Tha fookin antimatter doont matter anymore and fookin Sulu snorted all tha dilithium crystals."

 

[Mr. Scott]

Captain, Mr. Scott has left the bridge. The last I saw him, he was muttering, "Tha fookin antimatter doont matter anymore and fookin Sulu snorted all tha dilithium crystals."

Well, if he says "not enough evidence" and I say "enough evidence for me" and it's repeated ad nauseum, what more is there to say?

 

[Dancing David]

Evidence is evidence, conclusions are conclusions. Extrapolatrion from different sets is unwarranted.

And Sulu warped out when he sneezed.