Confirmation Bias

Assumptions

I just discovered a new podcast. The first episode dealt with a controversial issue regarding the existence of mountain lions or panthers in the natural state. If anyone is interested, it is called The Bear Grease Podcast with Clay Newcomb. I have had an interest in this subject ever since my late teenage years, so I listened intently. However, what caught my attention more than the stories of sightings, the compiling of evidence, or the objections from biologists or Arkansas Game and Fish commission personnel, was the insight into the psychology surrounding people's disposition toward the existence of these creatures.

One of the officials being interviewed mentioned that many of the stories or accounts about the animals come from people who already had an opinion, and their experience is then interpreted in such a way as to confirm what they already thought was true. We see this all the time in politics and sports. If a person's preferred candidate is caught in some compromising scandal it's easy to assume that the evidence has been altered or the story has been wrongly reported. On the other hand, if the other side is found with even the least hint of impropriety then of course all the allegations and charges are certainly true.

In sports, it is very difficult to be objective about calls being made by the referees or umpires because we are convinced even before the play has happened that it should go our way. Go to any high school ball game of any sport and sit on the home side and my point is self validating. 

But do we also do this with our spiritual beliefs? Have we concluded that certain assumptions must be true and then gone into the Scriptures or into our experience to seek to prove our point? Are the things that seem so obvious to us obvious because those are the lenses that we are using to evaluate the evidence?

Traditions

Have you ever wondered why the Pharisees, scribes, and priests did not recognize or receive Jesus as the promised Messiah? In hindsight it seems pretty clear the many ways that Jesus fulfilled prophecies and the law through His life and ministry. There may be many reasons, including the desire to preserve their own power over the regular Jewish people, which was threatened by the perceived radical teachings of this itinerant rabbi from Nazareth. 

Of course, Jesus also compares them to the blind reading the blind (Matthew 15:1-14). His point is that they have become blinded by their own doctrinal precision and long held traditions so that when God sent the promised hope to them they were incapable of rendering an accurate judgement about Jesus. You see, they had already formed a preconceived view of what the Messiah would be like and act like and Jesus did not fit their paradigm. So instead of reevaluating their own preconceptions, they simply concluded that He was not the Christ they were looking for.

I actually think that they knew on some level that Jesus was the Christ, which is what makes their rejection of Him such a horrible and heinous sin (John 15:21-25). The point is that their bias was so strong that even with the confirmation of the miracles and ministry of Jesus they would not believe even what they knew was actually true. The cost to their worldview and traditions was simply too high for them to submit to the truth.

Self Evaluation

But what about me? It's easy to recognize the faulty assumptions of other people, but what about the assumptions I am making? This may be even more probable for someone who is already predisposed against traditions, because it can become easy to assume that all the traditions are wrong. However, Jesus did not chastise the Pharisees for keeping the good tradition but rather for rejecting the clear commands of God (Matthew 23:23).

In the famous extended teaching of Jesus, which has been labeled the “Sermon on the Mount,” Jesus gives a clear warning meant to cause the prudent to examine one’s self first before judging other people. Since Jesus gave us this insightful warning I want to be careful about my own tendency toward confirmation bias and seek to be even more diligent to lay aside any anachronistic assumptions or personal persuasions in pursuit of the pure truth of God’s word. I hope you will join me!

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