What my decade long foray into the creation-evolution debate taught me about the human condition (and how it applies today) – Part 5: Psychology

This is the 5th post in the What my decade long foray into the creation-evolution debate taught me about the human condition (and how it applies today) series.

I still remember the event - it was at a large church in Cary, NC, on a Saturday morning - a special event open to the general public, concerning creation and the origins of life on Earth.  I took the students in my creation/evolution course to the event.  We had just finished an overview of how people think - cognition, biases, and other aspects of social psychology, along with common logical fallacies people commit when arguing for their position.  I tasked the students to watch out for cognitive biases and logical fallacies, and to write about them in their course journal.  The event did not disappoint.  It was an eye-opening experience for the students.  It’s one thing to read about, and discuss the business model and evangelistic efforts of the professional young earth creationists - it’s much better to experience it.  None of the students had attended an event like this, even though the vast majority grew up as, and identified as Christian.  Some of those raised with conservative Christian beliefs were profoundly disappointed to witness what they did.  I’ve been to a number of these events, and it is always disappointing to see Christian “authorities” misuse and misrepresent information to declare a “truth”.  It actually has become a sort of lament for me.

My study of the creation/evolution debate resulted in a deep dive into social psychology, and trying to better understand how people end up taking the positions on issues that they do.  Nothing I am about to say will be novel - there is ample published research on human cognition and beliefs, and there are many people who have commented on how quickly people tend to develop firm opinions on matters, the troubling issue with poor information literacy, and the difficulties with discerning valid information from misinformation.

For every major issue, we find very passionate people involved, attempting to persuade others of their beliefs and truths, as if they possess universal truths which apply to everyone.  Multiple events of the past year (2020) reminded me of how so many people quickly take sides on an issue, regardless of the data (evidence), or lack thereof, and remain steadfast in support of their identified position, regardless of what other information comes to light.  The year 2020 was an amazing year to witness social psychology concepts in action.  It got me reminiscing about the creation/evolution course I used to teach, and how fun it would have been to be in the classroom in 2020, talking to students about cognitive biases, logical fallacies, and other information related to thinking and knowing.

So what did the creation/evolution debate teach me about psychology?

• Dogmatism and belief superiority exists among proponents of both sides of the issue.
• Self-righteousness, or more accurately, egocentric righteousness, is a predominant characteristic of individuals who perceive they have the truth;
• Motivated reasoning fuels multiple cognitive biases so that people can preserve their established beliefs, and dismiss conflicting information quickly in order to relieve cognitive dissonance; 
• Flawed reasoning and rhetorical errors are widely employed, either intentionally or unintentionally, in an attempt to either promote one’s positions, or refute opposing ideas;
• Groupthink functions to suppress beneficial dialogue, and tends to promote dualism rather than a diversity of ideas and positions on a topic;
• Simple repetition, even of false or incorrect information, promotes belief in its truth;
• Significant fear of knowing and not knowing hinders deep thinking on complex issues, as both present risk to pre-established and confidently held truths.

Just like with the last topic (authority), I could write an entire separate blog series on various aspects of social psychology and the many cognitive biases our minds fall victim to.  I could detail out dozens of examples of common logical fallacies used in support of specific positions related to several contemporary issues.  I’m not going to take the effort to do so.  The curious reader can visit social psychology sites describing motivated reasoning, groupthink, the illusory truth effect and other cognitive biases, and many sites which describe common logical fallacies. Instead, I’ll share a few key insights, including an exhortation to the Christian reader.

Humans are biased

Everyone is biased in their thinking.  We are biased because we feel what we believe is true, and challenges to that truth give us “bad” feelings.  Affirmation of our truth gives us “good” feelings.  So we seek out those who share our beliefs, especially any persons we view as an authority or expert (appeal to authority), or a person we trust concerning some other matter (appeal to trust).  We feel good when we know others believe like we do, and we tend to believe that what we believe is very common (false consensus bias).  There’s power in numbers, and if I know or think others believe what I believe, I’m less likely to be wrong.  We tend to notice information which supports what we believe and ignore or dismiss information which doesn’t.  We tend to interpret new information in a way which supports what we believe (confirmation bias).  Heck, many people don’t even bother to search for information which might refute an existing position and beliefs - why would they?  How is that helpful to maintaining existing beliefs?  How does searching for good arguments for any other position alleviate cognitive dissonance?  It doesn’t!  People don’t go around looking to be cognitively uncomfortable, searching for uncertainty, when they can comfortably exist in the certainty of their existing positions!  Most people don’t want to change what they believe - doing so would indicate a person actually held a wrong belief!  What would this suggest about other cherished beliefs?

Humans are emotional

As I mentioned earlier, humans love to feel right - it feels good to feel right.  Feelings tend to drive people’s behavior and thinking more than logic and rational thought does.  This is well known - it’s not a revelation to state the obvious.  This is what underpins the concept of motivated reasoning - people use emotionally biased reasoning to produce desired outcomes, regardless of evidence or truth.  People are persuaded by appeals to emotion rather than appeals to facts.  Fear is a great motivator.  We saw fear utilized frequently during the political and cultural battles of 2020 (and continue to see it used).  It’s used by creationists to frame evolutionary thought as evil and dangerous.  It’s used in sermons to keep congregations “in line” - to separate and distinguish “them” from “us”.  There are many topics addressed in Christian communities framed around appeals to fear.  Feeling good and feeling fearful are the two primary motivators in how many people adopt and maintain their beliefs.  It’s not really about seeking the truth, but about feeling good and comfortable, and avoiding things that produce fear.  Now, you ask any person if they value the truth, and they will of course agree.  Everyone likes to think they uphold the truth, so long as it feels good, isn’t terribly uncomfortable, and doesn’t promote fear and anxiety.

Many issues are unresolvable due to dualistic thinking combined with egocentric righteousness, belief superiority, and motivated reasoning

I consider the creation/evolution debate to be an unresolvable issue.  I consider many of the large issues American society faces to be unresolvable.  When a person defaults to a dualistic mindset (and many people do), considering issues from an “us vs. them” mentality, and is convinced of the “rightness” of their position, and it has been repeatedly reinforced through motivated reasoning, there’s no real opportunity to find common ground; there’s no real interest in understanding other viewpoints.  It simply comes down to who is right and who is wrong.  This fits many of the complex issues we face - issues much more significant to people’s lives than the creation/evolution debate.  

I know there’s many quiet people who hold middle of the road positions - people who are thoughtful, reflective, and seek good information sources to form tentative and adjustable positions on issues.  The problem is that the vocal minorities holding the more extreme viewpoints (dualistic thinking) tend to display the greatest belief superiority while significantly overestimating their knowledge on the issue.  In other words, they hold the strongest beliefs based on a limited amount of information, and tend to be very selective (biased cherry picking) about the information they consume (motivated reasoning).  This has been well documented concerning political beliefs and religious views - the two primary areas which seem to continually battle over the right and wrong of various issues.   

Jesus calls us to love God with our minds

My greatest concern pertains to Christian belief and Christian practice.  For me, it simply comes down to the question - what does belief in God, and in salvation through Jesus Christ mean for how I think, behave and interact with others?  Those of us who profess Christian belief have two reliable guides - the written word of God and the leading of the Holy Spirit.  There’s a number of Bible passages speaking to the importance of the human mind in the life of the believer.  The overarching theme is to have a renewed mind (Romans 12:2) so that one may gain in wisdom and knowledge pertaining to God.  Loving God with your mind is included in the greatest commandment, as the recorded words of Jesus declare in the Book of Matthew, chapter 22:

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”37 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 

There are plenty of reflections, devotionals, and entire books written on loving God with one’s mind. For me, part of loving God with one’s mind involves sound thinking, and guarding one’s thoughts so that one is not easily persuaded by enticing but erroneous arguments and reasoning.  After all, the story of the Fall of Man in the Book of Genesis is really about humans being persuaded to not believe what God said, and instead became persuaded by an alternate view of reality.  It involved a change of mind, followed by a change in behavior.  It’s what we think in our minds which determines our behavior.

Right now, there’s a lot of angry and conspiracy-minded Christians out there - their minds persuaded of an alternate truth pertaining to political power, which really has nothing to do with being a follower of Jesus Christ.  There’s fearful Christians distrustful of science persuaded by pastors, prophets, and various social media personalities, who are entertaining conspiracies related to the COVID-19 pandemic, COVID-19 vaccines, Q-Anon, Bill Gates, and a worldwide pedophilia ring involving democratic leaders and Hollywood stars.  None of these things are worth the attention of a Christian focused on what God has called His people to be and do.

We can spend our time seeking knowledge about a lot of different things, but how we go about doing that and why, should be foremost on our minds.  If we are to be people who produce spiritual fruit (Galatians 5:22-26), is it appropriate for us to display egotistic righteousness?  Should our viewpoints be established using cognitive biases and logical fallacies in our reasoning?  Rather, we should remind ourselves that our calling is to not be like the world, and if we allow the Holy Spirit space to work on our minds, we can focus on what is profitable and worthy of our calling.

In conclusion, I’d like to recommend reading (or re-reading) Ephesians chapter 4.  Read it carefully.  Read it in multiple translations.  It is every bit as applicable today as it was so long ago.

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