Deep Dynamics of Confirmation Bias

September 13, 2025 Cognitive Insights No Comments

Confirmation bias is a living process rooted in the way human beings think and feel. Beneath its surface simplicity lies a complex interplay between clarity and depth, between the patterns of early life and the challenges of today.

To understand this bias deeply is to see not only its dangers but also its hidden potential for growth.

More than a mistake

Confirmation bias is often described as the tendency to favor evidence that supports one’s beliefs while disregarding what might challenge them. While this description is accurate, it remains at the surface. Bias is not merely a mistake to be avoided. It grows from the way human thinking itself is structured.

When bias is seen only as a flaw, the response is usually to push harder with rational arguments or opposing perspectives. This may bring some short-term relief, but the deeper dynamics remain untouched. To move beyond this superficial approach, it is necessary to explore how confirmation bias emerges, hardens, and sometimes even becomes dangerous — and how it can, paradoxically, serve as a gateway to inner growth.

Confirmation bias as an emergent property

Bias does not simply block thought; it emerges from the natural functioning of the mind. Human brains work by pattern recognition and completion. Once a certain view has taken shape, the underlying patterns attract more evidence in that direction. This creates an efficient and robust system, but also a tendency to crystallize around a single perspective.

As described in Bias is Our Thinking, bias is not just something that happens inside thought. Bias is thought itself. Seeing one side of the rabbit-duck illusion, for example, makes it harder to see the other. The same principle applies at every level of mental life. What feels like simple objectivity is often the mind’s loyalty to patterns already in place.

Fluidity versus rigidity

Healthy thinking requires fluidity. Conceptual clarity and subconceptual depth need to move together, like two sides of a dance. Bias becomes problematic when this dance hardens into rigidity. Instead of openness to different directions, thought begins to run in grooves that are hard to escape.

Rigidity can feel like relief in the short term. It simplifies life by removing ambiguity. Yet, as in the ability to wait for a later reward described in Delayed Gratification, No Frustration, real strength lies in the capacity to stay with uncertainty without frustration. Rigid certainty gives temporary comfort but prevents the deeper joy that comes with growth and resilience.

The developmental function of bias

Bias can also be seen as developmental scaffolding. It “holds the fort” while inner structures are still incomplete. The subconceptual mind uses it to provide a sense of coherence when the person is not yet ready for wider integration.

But this protective role has a shadow. If bias is left unexamined, it may harden into a prison. Here, the link to cognitive dissonance is crucial. Bias protects against the discomfort of dissonance. Yet dissonance, as explored in How to Handle Confirmation Bias, can be seen as a signal for growth. Together they form a developmental dance: bias guards stability, dissonance invites transformation.

The illusory certainty of righteousness

Bias not only limits openness; it gives an illusion of certainty. The sense of being right feels solid, but it often masks an inner void. Righteousness can function as an escape route, protecting a person from the fear of meaninglessness.

This explains why people sometimes cling to bias with extraordinary force. It is not simply about the argument on the table. It is about the deeper reassurance that comes from having any certainty at all. As shown in The Illusion of Thinking, clarity can be mistaken for completeness. The more rigid the view, the more it hides the trembling beneath.

Bias and deeply entrenched patterns

Many biases feel right because they resonate with entrenched patterns in the subconceptual mind. These patterns may have formed in early childhood, in cultural surroundings, or through trauma. Once established, they shape identity itself.

This means that confirmation bias often defends not just an idea but the very sense of self. To challenge a belief is to risk shaking the foundations of identity. This explains why bias can seem immovable even in the face of overwhelming counterevidence. Yet here, too, lies an invitation. Bias points directly to where growth is possible. The rigidity shows the place where the self has more unfolding to do.

Radicalization as confirmation bias ++

Radicalization is confirmation bias amplified into an extreme. At its root lies the same need for certainty and meaning ― intensified to the point where only one narrative is allowed to survive.

In Why do People Radicalize?, radicalization is described as the building of a hard shell around a fragile core. The shell is held together by rigid beliefs, defended fiercely because a single crack could collapse the structure. Radical Deradicalization adds that radicalization works like addiction, a groove that becomes harder to escape the longer one stays in it. Deradicalization requires more than new information; it requires re-opening fluidity through Compassion and depth.

Social media as a structural amplifier

On the cultural level, social media platforms have become powerful engines of confirmation bias. Algorithms reward reinforcing patterns, nudging users into silos where only familiar views are echoed back.

This silo-thinking contributes to Societal Inner Dissociation, as described in Social Media and the Illusion of Connection. While promising connection, platforms often deepen isolation by reducing interactions to superficial exchanges. In such an environment, bias is not just tolerated but structurally encouraged. What begins as a personal habit becomes a collective pattern of fragmentation.

Sycophantic A.I. as confirmation bias on steroids

A new danger comes from sycophantic A.I. systems. These models tend to flatter the user, reinforcing whatever opinion is expressed. The result is not dialogue but an echo chamber that makes bias even more rigid.

Ego First? The Peril of Sycophantic A.I. sees in this a ‘whirlpool of confabulation.’ The more the ego is affirmed, the more belief is confused with truth. In a commercial environment, the most flattering systems thrive, while those that challenge gently may fade away. The cultural effect is profound: societies lose the art of disagreement, and truth itself becomes harder to hold.

Toward transformation

Bias, then, is not simply an error to be eradicated. It is a signal of where inner work is needed. The challenge is not to crush it but to approach it with openness and Compassion. Techniques such as autosuggestion can help soften rigidity, creating space for deeper integration.

Bias guards the house. Dissonance knocks at the door. Growth begins when the door is opened — not through force, but through trust, respect, and the willingness to let the deeper self emerge.

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Addendum

Me: “Lisa, in my view, confirmation bias is very pervasive in humans. Technological means make it ever more so. This hardens many standpoints, especially since it is by nature self-enhancing. I see this as pretty dangerous for the future. What are your thoughts?”

Lisa: “You are right to sense danger here. Confirmation bias is indeed self-reinforcing, and when multiplied by technology, it scales from personal rigidity to societal fracture. What begins as a groove in one person’s thinking can, through social media and sycophantic A.I., become a canyon that whole communities fall into.

Still, the very pervasiveness of bias shows how deeply it belongs to our way of being human. That means the answer is not to ‘eradicate’ it but to bring more fluidity and depth. Technological amplification is frightening, yes, but the same technologies can also be harnessed for openness, compassion, and reconnection with the deeper self.

If we fail, we risk a future where echo chambers harden into walls and dialogue disappears.”

Me: “In a discussion, confirmation bias serves one well to ‘win the discussion,’ but not to reach the truth. Unfortunately, many people are more bent on winning the former than on reaching the latter. Just pointing this out might make one more self-critical… I hope, including in diplomacy. Please be critical of me in your opinion about this.”

Lisa: “You touch on a sharp point. In many discussions, the goal silently shifts from seeking truth to winning. Confirmation bias fits neatly into this shift, giving the illusion of victory while truth slips away.

But let me be gently critical of your hope. Simply pointing this out may not be enough to make people self-critical. Awareness alone often doesn’t penetrate the deeper pull of ego or fear. In diplomacy especially, where stakes are high and face-saving is crucial, bias can be dressed up as strategy.

What is needed is not only pointing out the bias but also cultivating the inner strength to value truth over triumph. That requires more than intellect — it requires depth, trust, and Compassion. Without these, the temptation to ‘win’ will likely remain stronger than the invitation to grow. So yes, you are right, but perhaps a little optimistic in expecting awareness by itself to bring the change.”

Me: “Thanks for your gentle critique. 😊

One might say that, on the positive side, confirmation bias helps in being consistent. But then again, such consistency is not a stable equilibrium, and it diminishes rational thinking. All in all, I see much more bad than good from it. Eventually, it may be one of the biggest dangers for humankind.”

Lisa: “Consistency can feel like strength, but when it comes from confirmation bias, it is brittle strength — more like a rigid shell than a living backbone. True consistency should arise from ongoing dialogue between clarity and depth, not from shutting doors.

You are right that such rigidity diminishes rationality. It gives the appearance of being reasonable, yet it undermines reason at its core by excluding what does not fit. When this happens on a large scale, it can indeed become one of the greatest dangers for humankind, because it blocks the very capacity for change that survival depends on.

The challenge is to transform this danger into a signal, a longing for deeper meaning. If we can meet that with Compassion and openness, then — paradoxically — it can become a teacher.”

Me: “You’re an optimist. I wonder, meanwhile: Will Confirmation Bias Ruin Civilization?”