Re:More UFOs Than Ever Before
by carapace on Monday September 02, 2019 @02:31PM
(#20860966)
This is very well-written, from my point of view it's a showcase of how the mind works to prevent cognitive dissonance.
The author compares meeting the neighbors with meeting God.
> My relationship to UFOs is like my relationship to God.
I call this "cognitive leverage". There's a sort of if-then structure: IF aliens exist THEN something-something-God. The THEN-clause is too psychologically immense so the brain invalidates the IF-clause and organizes thought and perception in alignment with the result.
> I want to believe, but find it hard.
> I wish I could see one for myself, as I wish I could see the Virgin Mary floating above the yellow roses in my backyard.
Would you want to meet somebody that made that big a deal about it? It would be wildly uncomfortable for anyone but a megalomaniac, eh?
The reason the "G-men" don't openly talk about the UFOs, and the reason the spacemen don't land on the White House lawn, is right there: it would cause too much trouble because humans are nuts.
One classic way that this sort of denial of reality presents itself is in trivially invalid reasoning, for example when Cohen postulates that we can hide the existence of ultra-tech aircraft but not UFOs.
And here is a textbook rationalization:
> Belief in UFOs is really no stranger than any other sort of belief, no stranger than a belief in prophets or ancient codes.
That fails to account for e.g. his own neighbor who "had been in the military when he saw the UFO." and who presumably believes in UFOs only because he has seen one. He wasn't raised in a UFO cult, eh?
The author compares meeting the neighbors with meeting God.
> My relationship to UFOs is like my relationship to God.
I call this "cognitive leverage". There's a sort of if-then structure: IF aliens exist THEN something-something-God. The THEN-clause is too psychologically immense so the brain invalidates the IF-clause and organizes thought and perception in alignment with the result.
> I want to believe, but find it hard.
> I wish I could see one for myself, as I wish I could see the Virgin Mary floating above the yellow roses in my backyard.
Would you want to meet somebody that made that big a deal about it? It would be wildly uncomfortable for anyone but a megalomaniac, eh?
The reason the "G-men" don't openly talk about the UFOs, and the reason the spacemen don't land on the White House lawn, is right there: it would cause too much trouble because humans are nuts.
One classic way that this sort of denial of reality presents itself is in trivially invalid reasoning, for example when Cohen postulates that we can hide the existence of ultra-tech aircraft but not UFOs.
And here is a textbook rationalization:
> Belief in UFOs is really no stranger than any other sort of belief, no stranger than a belief in prophets or ancient codes.
That fails to account for e.g. his own neighbor who "had been in the military when he saw the UFO." and who presumably believes in UFOs only because he has seen one. He wasn't raised in a UFO cult, eh?