Your Lifestyle Might Be Getting You Nowhere - The Secret Behind Human's Behaviour With Contradictions (Cognitive Dissonance)

A Zen Master was asked to explain the difference between a human being and an animal. 

The Zen Master smiled and started to explain:
“If you put a rat into a labirynth that has 4 tubes, and you always put some cheese into the 4th tube, the rat will learn to always go through the 4th tube in order to get the cheese.  

So now you put the cheese into another tube. The rat will run to the 4th tube, there’s no cheese there, she comes out of the tube.
Next time, she runs to the 4th tube again, there’s no cheese there, she comes out of the tube. Again and again. But at some point, the rat will stop going through the 4th tube and look for the cheese elsewhere. 

And exactly this is what differentiates human beings from rats. 

Humans will always go through the 4th tube. For ever. Humans are convinced by the 4th tube.
The rats are convinced by nothing, they are only interested in getting cheese. But a human develops a conviction: a belief for the 4th tube. Humans begin to think that it is simply “the right thing” to go through the 4 tube – whether there’s cheese there or not. Just because they’ve done it so many times that it has become a habit. Humans would rather have a point than have a cheese.   

So humans rather have a point than be happy. And that’s exactly why they haven’t gotten to the cheese for a long time. God is putting the cheese in another tube all the time. But humans simply have too many beliefs about too many 4th tubes.   "

“From all the people that I know, Only 2 kinds are happy.  
The one who explores the world’s secrets deeply,  
And the one, who doesn’t understand one bit of them."  
- Omar Khayyam   

Leon Festinger, a psychologist, analyzed that humans are continuously trying to get their life in order. Whenever men follow very strict beliefs and then suddenly gets confronted with counterevidence, they begin to totter.  This state is labeled as “cognitive dissonance” by Festinger. 

A counterargument can lead to a thought disorder.   
Accepting a counterargument leads tH a contradiction between our old and our new beliefs.
Now instead of letting go of those old beliefs completely, humans always tend to find a compromise between their old and new beliefs.
So in conclusion this means: A human being with strong beliefs is unlikely to change.   

Humans try to avoid contradictions as much as possible. To achieve that, they are even forming routines and habits. If a routine or habit gets interrupted, we feel uncomfortable.
So in conclusion: When a strong belief gets disproven, it creates an uncomfortable contradiction.
And Festinger noticed that this is also true for certain habits and paradigms.   

Let’s look at an example.
In a newspaper article, Festinger read that a certain cult believed they had received a warning about a coming flood from aliens. Only the ones who believed and prayed enough would be spared with their lives.
Festinger interviewed the people before and after the day of the supposed flood (which obviously did not happen). 

Now instead of thinking logically, one day later the people of the cult stated the following: They had receives another message from aliens, saying they would not destroy the world because of the cult’s strong prayers.   
So with this example you can see: if the people of the cult had accepted the counterevidence, their inner contradiction would have grown.
So from this, we can conclude that avoiding to accept a counterevidence makes men blind for analyzing a situation rationally.   

“Tell someone you don’t agree with him, and he’ll walk away.
Show him facts or numbers, and he will question the sources.
And if you try to convince him with logic he will not understand what you’re trying to tell him.“
– Leon Festinger    

So in conclusion, what have we learned about humans and their way to deal with contradictions? 

- Humans feel uncomfortable when their belief is confronted wit a counterevidence.
- Accepting that counterevidence would lead to a contradiction.
- To avoid these contradictions, humans form habits.
- They also feel uncomfrtoble when a habit is interrupted.
- They start believing that a habit is the right thing to do, just because they’ve been doing it so many times.     

What would a solution for this dilemma be? 

- Accepting counterevidence, and completely letting go of your former beliefs to avoid inner contradiction
- Constantly questioning if you are still following your habits because they bring you progress or joy, or just because you have gotten so used to them.                        

Do you have another solution? Leave it in the comments