1. Your mind is great at finding reasons for decisions you've already made (Ben Franklin's Gambit, via John Kay).

2. When a scientist finds something that's too far from accepted, they look for "problems" in their methods, and as soon as the deviation becomes tolerable, *they stop looking* (Feynman on Millikan oil drop experiment).

3. The unconscious mind is really good at making decisions & the conscious mind has evolved to be very good at explaining random things in the world (Aaron Brown).

@22 Here is my fav quote/sentence /life modo

''You see what you believe in''

let that sink in.

@Imanoctopus I love it. Terry Pratchett has a bit in one of his Discworld novels where he's talking about Susan, the granddaughter of Dᴇᴀᴛʜ, who can see things that are really there—“which is really hard, since any fool can see things that are *not* there” (paraphrased).

@22 it's such an interesting topic. I could talk about it for hours. There's so much to it. The human brain really is a incredible machine.
I also think that just because you don't see something that someone else sees, it doesn't mean it's not real. It just...doesn't necessarily exist in YOUR reality.

@Imanoctopus Daniel Everett—the linguist ex-missionary author of *Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes* and researcher of the Pirahã people—forced to confront the reality of what you say:

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121515579

“Even I could tell that there was nothing on that white, sandy beach no more than one hundred yards away. And yet as certain as I was about this, the Pirahas were equally certain that there was something there.”

He goes on to describe the more nuanced view of objectivity he was forced into.

@22 What an interesting article, thank you for sharing! So fascinating when two or more drastically different culture live together. We may never understand certain things or how reality works but we definitely can respect and accept the differences that shape our world.

@Imanoctopus And that is a sometimes-impossibly hard thing for some to accept. "If we could just try harder, I once thought, surely we could each see the world as others see it and learn to respect one another's views more readily." Many today haven't had Dan Everett's experiences to move them past this. It might not be hyperbole to say that this is the critical challenge of our post-Enlightenment world—how to get everyone to be ok with this permanent chasm between perspectives.

@Imanoctopus And I can see why this is hard! Asking Person X to be ok with Pirahã seeing a spirit when X can't is like asking X to allow the gods-fearing to experience gods (if X is atheist), or to allow that atheism is valid (if X is gods-fearing). To allow creationism if into scientism. Letting go of objectivity, allowing that others' perspectives might be irreconcilable with ours—this requires a huge shift in values. We have to be ok with evaluating people's actions & practical contributions.

@22 Very true. I think understanding you can't understand everything is the hardest thing to do. Because it's scary not to understand something. And as human being we always thrive to be ''right'' all the time. So we tend to want to ''correct'' people's opinion or point of view bc we thing we're right.
I think being interested & curious about other culture without judging is one of the keys to accept a different way of thinking or living. But it does require an open mind.

@Imanoctopus It also takes SO MUCH time and energy and clear thinking. It's easy to be open towards weird foreigners, but then someone has to sort out their feelings about the drug-haters, the drug-lovers, the gun-lovers, the gay-haters, the trans-haters, the Jew-haters, etc., in their own neighborhoods. "I'm open to the notion that you see angels and I don't, but I'm not open to you wanting to do ___." The differences between releasing objectivity & being a good person has to be clear to you.