Cognitive Dissonance Theory – What Do You Think?

Only the bravest, not strong, brave, have the courage it takes to hold two different contrary major beliefs in his mind and acknowledge both are true.
When he holds a number of such contradictions the courage is not really his.

An example is the many tens and tens of millions of Americans
who are "single issue " voters using one of two basic concepts
to explain everything and anything that ever was and ever will be.
They are not always stupid, but are almost always cowardly.

Oops, I meant one or two, not one of two.
Most of this is held by different cog. dissonance theorists.

I think it is pretty clear that we experience this desire to resolve cognitive dissonance. One sees it in science, one sees it in theology, and one sees it in everyday life as Schubert points out. It is interesting that we also experience in music a desire to resolve dissonance of a different type. But the pressure to seek resolution is similar. People also tend to prefer visual experiences that are symmetrical. Consequently, symmetry is a principle of landscape design. The desire for symmetry extends well beyond visual experiences into the would of reason. Why do certain colors seem to go together in pleasing or displeasing ways?

There are interesting questions around these desires. Are these desires cross cultural? Inherent or learned? If learned, can they be unlearned?

At the end of the day, reason is the servant of wisdom, not its master. One needs to know when to suspend our seemingly incessant desire to resolve what can't be resolved and fix what isn't really broken.

Do we behave as we believe or believe as we behave? Clearly both occur. The pricked conscience (or its absence) is evidence that there is an innate pressure to operate according to the former. Many times the later is accompanied by rationalization.

Its not hard to see the folly of others. If only it were as easy for me to see my own!