If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

diddly-squat said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

>By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

Surely that’s just another example of confirmation bias.

Bubblecar said:

>By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

Surely that’s just another example of confirmation bias.

Yes, that’s why it is just as important.

But “confirmation bias” is invariably discussed in terms of being to ready to accept what you want to accept, and almost never in terms of being too ready to reject what you want to reject.

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

yeah in the sense that the force of a desire, beliefs or whatever held so, or structure of neuron orientations displaces other desires and beliefs etc, the purpose of a self-confirming attitude might be argued to in fact be displacement

so if disconfirmation were displacement the answer to your proposition would be agreement from me

it’s like the flipside of confirmation bias, might be seen so

transition said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

yeah in the sense that the force of a desire, beliefs or whatever held so, or structure of neuron orientations displaces other desires and beliefs etc, the purpose of a self-confirming attitude might be argued to in fact be displacement

so if disconfirmation were displacement the answer to your proposition would be agreement from me

it’s like the flipside of confirmation bias, might be seen so

or if the disconfirmed were the displaced, maybe better writ

transition said:

transition said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

yeah in the sense that the force of a desire, beliefs or whatever held so, or structure of neuron orientations displaces other desires and beliefs etc, the purpose of a self-confirming attitude might be argued to in fact be displacement

so if disconfirmation were displacement the answer to your proposition would be agreement from me

it’s like the flipside of confirmation bias, might be seen so

or if the disconfirmed were the displaced, maybe better writ

and probably basic elimination is disconfirmation, people do it all the time

is is, it’s called recalcitrance

SCIENCE said:

is is, it’s called recalcitrance

I thought I’d better look that up, to avoid misunderstanding:

recalcitrance
ri-ˈkal-sə-trən(t)s
NOUN
the state of being recalcitrant

HTH

The Rev Dodgson said:

SCIENCE said:

is is, it’s called recalcitrance

I thought I’d better look that up, to avoid misunderstanding:

recalcitrance
ri-ˈkal-sə-trən(t)s
NOUN
the state of being recalcitrant

HTH

Possibly even more helpful:
recalcitrant
ri-ˈkal-sə-trənt
ADJECTIVE
obstinately defiant of authority or restraint
difficult to manage or operate
not responsive to treatment

So surely disconfirmation bias is the opposite of recalcitrance then.

The Rev Dodgson said:

diddly-squat said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

you had me until the end lad…

;)

The Rev Dodgson said:

obstinately
defiant
not responsive

So surely disconfirmation bias is the opposite of recalcitrance then.

is the meaning of opposite opposite opposite

The Rev Dodgson said:

diddly-squat said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

in fairness though, I think any bias creates a problem in that it means you are not open to accepting an outcome because you are inherently opposed to it. What you call it is kind of irrelevant…

diddly-squat said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

diddly-squat said:

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

in fairness though, I think any bias creates a problem in that it means you are not open to accepting an outcome because you are inherently opposed to it. What you call it is kind of irrelevant…

so you confirm that what is being called disconfirmation bias here is simply confirmation bias

SCIENCE said:

diddly-squat said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

in fairness though, I think any bias creates a problem in that it means you are not open to accepting an outcome because you are inherently opposed to it. What you call it is kind of irrelevant…

so you confirm that what is being called disconfirmation bias here is simply confirmation bias

Yes.

More specifically the 50% (approx.) of the set of all confirmation bias that is rarely discussed.

The Rev Dodgson said:

diddly-squat said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

If confirmation bias is recognised as being a real problem in the evaluation of alternative hypotheses, why is disconfirmation bias not seen as an equal problem?

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

Ooh, that’s interesting.

You could say it was disconfirmation bias that accounts for the fact that General Relativity never won a Nobel Prize.

Firstly because the earliest observations of the bending of light seemed to disagree with the theory of GR. The disconfirmation bias caused the rejection of the fact that the observation had an excessive error margin.

Secondly because later it was found that other theories explained all the then observations as well as GR. The disconfirmation bias caused the rejection of the fact that the other theories all had free parameters that could be tuned to match observations whereas GR had no free parameters.

The Rev Dodgson said:

SCIENCE said:

diddly-squat said:

in fairness though, I think any bias creates a problem in that it means you are not open to accepting an outcome because you are inherently opposed to it. What you call it is kind of irrelevant…

so you confirm that what is being called disconfirmation bias here is simply confirmation bias

Yes.

More specifically the 50% (approx.) of the set of all confirmation bias that is rarely discussed.

fair enough we mean we’ve long taken issue with the dogmatic adherence to falsifiable hypotheses as a basis for SCIENCE, not least because it tends to fall to semantics or otherwise be biased (as you say) to inertia

well what’s your solution then is it data versus dogma or is it some mind trick

SCIENCE said:

well what’s your solution then is it data versus dogma or is it some mind trick

I don’t think there is a solution, but a couple of things that might help are:

1. Before you dismiss something ask yourself if you really have sufficient reason.
2. Consider the consequences if it turns out that you were wrong to dismiss it.

In other words, think like an engineer. :)

mollwollfumble said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

diddly-squat said:

I would have thought that always thinking what you believe to be true is in fact not true is the foundational step in the scientific method. Or do you mean disconfirmation bias to be not out-and-out rejecting things that you think to be true, because you think them to be true?

By disconfirmation bias I mean accepting too readily evidence that appears to prove that hypotheses that you reject should indeed be rejected.

It is especially evident amongst climate change pseudo-sceptics and conspiracy theorists of all types, but I think it also occurs widely amongst reputable scientists.

And even engineers.

Ooh, that’s interesting.

You could say it was disconfirmation bias that accounts for the fact that General Relativity never won a Nobel Prize.

Firstly because the earliest observations of the bending of light seemed to disagree with the theory of GR. The disconfirmation bias caused the rejection of the fact that the observation had an excessive error margin.

Secondly because later it was found that other theories explained all the then observations as well as GR. The disconfirmation bias caused the rejection of the fact that the other theories all had free parameters that could be tuned to match observations whereas GR had no free parameters.

Yes, I guess there would have been plenty of scientists dismissing GR in the early days.

Of course, now it has transitioned to the status of being one of the main drivers of disconfirmation bias, for any hypothesis that is inconsistent with it.