On Wednesday 09 May 2012 12:35:06 am Deepa Mohan wrote: > Thoughts? Cognitive dissonance is the inability or reluctance to accept and believe new information that contradicts existing knowledge.
This might be an evolutionary survival trait. If your mother teaches you that fire is dangerous, you will later be reluctant to believe that it's not dangerous and refuse to walk on glowing coals. This is definitely necessary for survival. On the other hand, people can be indoctrinated to believe a lie, after which the truth sends them into denial. The classic case if that is the son of a criminal who is constantly on the run from the police who grows up and meets a policmen socially and finds it hard to believe that a policeman is trustworthy. I have stated for years that the population of Pakistan is going through massive cognitive dissonance as they face up to truths that they were taught to dismiss while they were encouraged to believe delusions. For their part, old surviving cold warriors in the US administration are having their own cognitive dissonance and denial about ally Pakistan. shiv
