What if self-deception helps us be happy? What if just running out and overcoming bias will make us—gasp! - unhappy?
You are aware, I’m sure, of studies that connect depression and freedom from bias, notably overconfidence in one’s ability to control outcome.
You’ve already given one answer: to deliberately choose to believe what our best judgement tells us isn’t so would be lunacy. Many people are psychologically able to fool themselves subtly, but fewer are able to deliberately, knowingly fool themselves.
Another answer is that even though depression leads to freedom from some biases and illusions, the converse doesn’t seem to apply. Overcoming bias doesn’t seem to lead to depression. I don’t get the impression that a disproportionate number of people on this list are depressed. In my own experience, losing illusions doesn’t make me feel depressed. Even if the illusion promised something desirable, I think what I have usually felt was more like intellectual relief, “So that’s why (whatever was promised) never seemed to work.”
I can even experience a slight stroke of euphoric lunacy upon the shattering of my delusions. Somehow the world seems to burn brighter without the blurry lenses that biases provide.
I’d heard of the connection between depression and more accurate perceptions (notably, more accurate predictions due to less overconfidence), but I wasn’t aware of the causal direction. It had been portrayed to me as being that the improved perception of reality was the cause of the depression. Or maybe I just mistakenly inferred it and didn’t notice. I didn’t know it actually went the other way, though now that I think about it, that actually makes a lot of sense.
Personally, I find that imroved map-territory correspondence leads to more happiness, at least the improved rationality which results from learning Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy. It’s not just losing illusions that helps. It’s better understanding yourself, better understanding what is actually causing your emotions, and realizing that you have a more internal locus of control rather than external regarding your emotions. It’s liberating to be able to stop an emotional reaction in its tracks, analyze it, recognize it as following from an irrational belief, and consequently substitute the irrational emotion for a rational one. It helps especially with anger and anxiety, as those have a tendency to result from irrational, dogmatic beliefs.
What if self-deception helps us be happy? What if just running out and overcoming bias will make us—gasp! - unhappy?
You are aware, I’m sure, of studies that connect depression and freedom from bias, notably overconfidence in one’s ability to control outcome.
You’ve already given one answer: to deliberately choose to believe what our best judgement tells us isn’t so would be lunacy. Many people are psychologically able to fool themselves subtly, but fewer are able to deliberately, knowingly fool themselves.
Another answer is that even though depression leads to freedom from some biases and illusions, the converse doesn’t seem to apply. Overcoming bias doesn’t seem to lead to depression. I don’t get the impression that a disproportionate number of people on this list are depressed. In my own experience, losing illusions doesn’t make me feel depressed. Even if the illusion promised something desirable, I think what I have usually felt was more like intellectual relief, “So that’s why (whatever was promised) never seemed to work.”
Agreed. I always feel profoundly relieved and even moderately triumphant.
I can even experience a slight stroke of euphoric lunacy upon the shattering of my delusions. Somehow the world seems to burn brighter without the blurry lenses that biases provide.
I’d heard of the connection between depression and more accurate perceptions (notably, more accurate predictions due to less overconfidence), but I wasn’t aware of the causal direction. It had been portrayed to me as being that the improved perception of reality was the cause of the depression. Or maybe I just mistakenly inferred it and didn’t notice. I didn’t know it actually went the other way, though now that I think about it, that actually makes a lot of sense.
Personally, I find that imroved map-territory correspondence leads to more happiness, at least the improved rationality which results from learning Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy. It’s not just losing illusions that helps. It’s better understanding yourself, better understanding what is actually causing your emotions, and realizing that you have a more internal locus of control rather than external regarding your emotions. It’s liberating to be able to stop an emotional reaction in its tracks, analyze it, recognize it as following from an irrational belief, and consequently substitute the irrational emotion for a rational one. It helps especially with anger and anxiety, as those have a tendency to result from irrational, dogmatic beliefs.