I’ll go one step further and defend belief in belief, infinitely regressed. ;-) As you point out, the placebo effect here is simply the expectation of a positive result—and it applies equally at any level of recursion here.
Humans only need a convincing argument for predicting a positive result, not a rational proof of that prediction! Once the positive result is expected, we get positive emotions activated every time we think of anything linked to that result, leading to self-fulfilling prophecies on every level.
This being the case, one might question whether it’s rational to disbelieve in belief, if you have nothing equally beneficial to replace it with.
When it comes to external results, sure, it makes sense to have greater prediction accuracy. But for interior events—like confidence, creativity, self-esteem, etc. -- biasing one’s predictions positively is a significant advantage, as it stabilizes what would otherwise be an unstable system of runaway feedback loops.
People whose systems are negatively biased, on the other hand, can get seriously stuck. They basically hit one little setback and become paralyzed because of runaway negative self-fulfilling prophecy.
(I’ve been such a person myself, and I’ve worked with/on many of them. Indeed, it was noticing that other, far less “rational” and “intelligent” individuals were much more confident, calm, and successful than I was, that led me to start seriously investigating the nature of mind and beliefs in the first place, and to begin noting the distinctions between people I dubbed “naturally successful” and those I considered “naturally struggling”.)
I’ll go one step further and defend belief in belief, infinitely regressed. ;-) As you point out, the placebo effect here is simply the expectation of a positive result—and it applies equally at any level of recursion here.
Humans only need a convincing argument for predicting a positive result, not a rational proof of that prediction! Once the positive result is expected, we get positive emotions activated every time we think of anything linked to that result, leading to self-fulfilling prophecies on every level.
This being the case, one might question whether it’s rational to disbelieve in belief, if you have nothing equally beneficial to replace it with.
When it comes to external results, sure, it makes sense to have greater prediction accuracy. But for interior events—like confidence, creativity, self-esteem, etc. -- biasing one’s predictions positively is a significant advantage, as it stabilizes what would otherwise be an unstable system of runaway feedback loops.
People whose systems are negatively biased, on the other hand, can get seriously stuck. They basically hit one little setback and become paralyzed because of runaway negative self-fulfilling prophecy.
(I’ve been such a person myself, and I’ve worked with/on many of them. Indeed, it was noticing that other, far less “rational” and “intelligent” individuals were much more confident, calm, and successful than I was, that led me to start seriously investigating the nature of mind and beliefs in the first place, and to begin noting the distinctions between people I dubbed “naturally successful” and those I considered “naturally struggling”.)