If someone you know, like, and trust believes a radical idea, you are more likely6

The Logic of False Beliefs
Humans need a reasonably accurate view of the world in order to survive. If your model of reality is wildly different from the actual world, then you struggle to take effective actions each day.

However, truth and accuracy are not the only things that matter to the human mind. Humans also seem to have a deep desire to belong.

In Atomic Habits, I wrote, “Humans are herd animals. We want to fit in, to bond with others, and to earn the respect and approval of our peers. Such inclinations are essential to our survival. For most of our evolutionary history, our ancestors lived in tribes. Becoming separated from the tribe—or worse, being cast out—was a death sentence.”

Understanding the truth of a situation is important, but so is remaining part of a tribe. While these two desires often work well together, they occasionally come into conflict.

In many circumstances, social connection is actually more helpful to your daily life than understanding the truth of a particular fact or idea. The Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker put it this way, “People are embraced or condemned according to their beliefs, so one function of the mind may be to hold beliefs that bring the belief-holder the greatest number of allies, protectors, or disciples, rather than beliefs that are most likely to be true.”

We don’t always believe things because they are correct. Sometimes we believe things because they make us look good to the people we care about.

I thought Kevin Simler put it well when he wrote, “If a brain anticipates that it will be rewarded for adopting a particular belief, it’s perfectly happy to do so, and doesn’t much care where the reward comes from — whether it’s pragmatic (better outcomes resulting from better decisions), social (better treatment from one’s peers), or some mix of the two.”

False beliefs can be useful in a social sense even if they are not useful in a factual sense. For lack of a better phrase, we might call this approach “factually false, but socially accurate.” When we have to choose between the two, people often select friends and family over facts.

This insight not only explains why we might hold our tongue at a dinner party or look the other way when our parents say something offensive, but also reveals a better way to change the minds of others.

Facts Don’t Change Our Minds. Friendship Does.
Convincing someone to change their mind is really the process of convincing them to change their tribe. If they abandon their beliefs, they run the risk of losing social ties. You can’t expect someone to change their mind if you take away their community too. You have to give them somewhere to go. Nobody wants their worldview torn apart if loneliness is the outcome.

The way to change people’s minds is to become friends with them, to integrate them into your tribe, to bring them into your circle. Now, they can change their beliefs without the risk of being abandoned socially.

The British philosopher Alain de Botton suggests that we simply share meals with those who disagree with us:

“Sitting down at a table with a group of strangers has the incomparable and odd benefit of making it a little more difficult to hate them with impunity. Prejudice and ethnic strife feed off abstraction. However, the proximity required by a meal – something about handing dishes around, unfurling napkins at the same moment, even asking a stranger to pass the salt – disrupts our ability to cling to the belief that the outsiders who wear unusual clothes and speak in distinctive accents deserve to be sent home or assaulted. For all the large-scale political solutions which have been proposed to salve ethnic conflict, there are few more effective ways to promote tolerance between suspicious neighbours than to force them to eat supper together.”

Perhaps it is not difference, but distance that breeds tribalism and hostility. As proximity increases, so does understanding. I am reminded of Abraham Lincoln’s quote, “I don’t like that man. I must get to know him better.”

Facts don’t change our minds. Friendship does.

The Spectrum of Beliefs
Years ago, Ben Casnocha mentioned an idea to me that I haven’t been able to shake: The people who are most likely to change our minds are the ones we agree with on 98 percent of topics.

If someone you know, like, and trust believes a radical idea, you are more likely to give it merit, weight, or consideration. You already agree with them in most areas of life. Maybe you should change your mind on this one too. But if someone wildly different than you proposes the same radical idea, well, it’s easy to dismiss them as a crackpot.
False beliefs can be useful in a social sense even if they are not useful in a factual sense. For lack of a better phrase, we might call this approach “factually false, but socially accurate.” When we have to choose between the two, people often select friends and family over facts.

This insight not only explains why we might hold our tongue at a dinner party or look the other way when our parents say something offensive, but also reveals a better way to change the minds of others.

Facts Don’t Change Our Minds. Friendship Does.
Convincing someone to change their mind is really the process of convincing them to change their tribe. If they abandon their beliefs, they run the risk of losing social ties. You can’t expect someone to change their mind if you take away their community too. You have to give them somewhere to go. Nobody wants their worldview torn apart if loneliness is the outcome.

The way to change people’s minds is to become friends with them, to integrate them into your tribe, to bring them into your circle. Now, they can change their beliefs without the risk of being abandoned socially.

The British philosopher Alain de Botton suggests that we simply share meals with those who disagree with us:

Related Links:

https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-black-widow-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-girl-in-the-basement-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-four-good-days-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-tenet-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-skylines-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-the-courier-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-the-little-things-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-soul-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-judas-and-the-black-messiah-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-tom-and-jerry-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-news-of-the-world-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-another-round-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-chaos-walking-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-365-days-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-moxie-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-the-vault-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-voyagers-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-boss-level-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-concrete-cowboy-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-the-mauritanian-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-sas-red-notice-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-monster-hunter-2020-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-operation-varsity-blues-the-college-admissions-scandal-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-the-seventh-day-2021-online-full-movie-free/
https://yourdressage.org/advert/123movies-watch-joker-2019-online-full-movie-free/
https://steemkr.com/aovmoveihsd/@derolterang/3sxuz7-aovmoviehsd
https://cox.tribe.so/post/3sxuz7-aovmoviehsd-607e5a8df58eec0569ef63d9
https://paiza.io/projects/UXd_e7_toM4MJ843kG05wA
https://jsfiddle.net/kalopesafujer/suxrn120/
https://dumpz.org/cwkWWb3zXXsq
http://paste.jp/adaf2e90/
https://rentry.co/ysb3a
https://www.guest-articles.com/business/false-beliefs-can-be-useful-in-a-social-sense-even-if-they-are-not-useful-20-04-2021
https://www.guest-articles.com/business/false-beliefs-can-be-useful-in-a-social-sense-even-if-they-are-not-useful-1-20-04-2021
https://www.guest-articles.com/art-culture/false-beliefs-can-be-useful-in-a-social-sense-even-if-they-are-not-useful-2-20-04-2021
https://www.guest-articles.com/art-culture/false-beliefs-can-be-useful-in-a-social-sense-even-if-they-are-not-useful-3-20-04-2021
https://www.guest-articles.com/art-culture/false-beliefs-can-be-useful-in-a-social-sense-even-if-they-are-not-useful-5-20-04-2021
https://dreampirates.us/business/if-someone-you-know-like-and-trust-believes-a-radical-idea-you-are-more-likely-20-04-2021