Why is it difficult for us to change our mind about something or someone?
Even when we show our wrong position, we insist on our opinion as an unquestionable truth. Physical data or evidence actually convince less than emotional data.
"That's Luis over there, he's a good-for-nothing, he doesn't work, he's lazy." Once we make an opinion of someone it's very difficult to change it. Opinion sometimes seems like a stain, once you establish it, it never goes away. The stain says a lot about how we see the world. It should be said that the world is not as it is, the world is as everyone wants to see it.
Human reason is limited and we tend to ignore facts or evidence when they do not fit in with what we think. An example of this is the following image.
Which photo can you see more people in?
The photo on the left is of Donald Trump's inauguration, with few people seen, much less than on the right, which is Barack Obama's inauguration, which is very crowded. The amazing thing about it is that 15% of the people who voted for Donald Trump said there were more people in picture A. It seems they had vision problems but their reasons are different: When we argue we don't really care about the facts, we care about our emotions. If voters say that photo A is the least crowded, that means they are recognizing that the president they elected is a liar, and no one wants to be judged for supporting a liar.
Each of us comes to our own conclusions and creates our own map to move around the world. We defend our vision by taking data and discarding others, whether they are valid or not, until we get where we want them.
Another example would be that of my country Venezuela, where similar cases happen. I know people who defend the government with all their might, they say to themselves and to the rest that this is the government that we should all support, they say that the state has helped them, etc.... They are eliminating the data that is obvious because they do not want to accept the real president, they are not willing to accept that they are not right.
From this point of view, they may appear to be unreasonable, uncoherent and weak. But the other side of the coin says; it is a protective shield to save you from manipulation. Everything has to fit with what we know about the world. If we see someone flying, we would not doubt the gravity; we would doubt the person who is doing that.
We have too much information and it cannot be processed rationally, reasoning takes time. If we don't have time to think when we defend a point of view, our answers and arguments will always be purely emotional.
Thanks for your time, I'll be waiting for your opinion on why.
