Blog #2

Out of all the aspects we have recently examined, confirmation bias definitely affected my thoughts on critical thinking the most. Confirmation bias, also known as the tendency to interpret evidence based on confirmation of one’s existing beliefs or theories, actually plays a large role in society. The decisions that we make are often influenced by biases that we have already created. As we discussed in class, confirmation bias affects all people of any age all day long. It can be as simple as a mother believing her child did nothing wrong or a teacher treating a student unfairly after overhearing another teacher bash this particular student.

My thinking hero is Nelson Mandela. After learning about confirmation bias and how it influences our decisions, he might not be as much of a hero as I had once envisioned. Mandela was a South African activist and fought for rights, but the media could have played a large role in my previous thought processes. I assumed that he made of all his decisions himself and he always did the right thing to better the lives of others. This, however, I thought due to the idea of confirmation bias and previous thoughts that I had. The news, newspapers, articles and media as a whole portray Nelson Mandela as an exceptionally important man, so I based my opinion on thoughts that I heard and grew up on. Nelson Mandela himself was most likely affected by confirmation bias and it ended up altering his decisions. I believe he was good at constructing arguments because he was passionate and educated on his beliefs, although they might have been affected by confirmation bias as well. Confirmation bias significantly narrows down your thoughts and your ability to critical think. Like the Dunning Kruger affect for example, it is something hard to stop and consistently present in everyday life.