Changing Minds...

[John Little]

In truth this is not a political post so I hope that admin will not move it out of General, though it may mention the P word.

Human beings live busy lives and most are so set on their daily rounds that they have scant time to search around and find information with which to form decisions on what we may think or do in our communities.

Most of us rely on the telly, newspapers, radio, and increasingly the internet, as well as other sources of what is new. Some of it comes as entertainment and therefore unconsciously while much is more overt. Politicians for example try to convince us that their way is best and they use a wide range of techniques, including lies – and all do it.

Looked at with a cynical eye it is probably true that they are all as bad as each other.

Advertising people are more honest – they try to sell us stuff but when they tell you it’s the best car in their ad, or show you some golden burd climbing up a silk skein to the top of a building so you’ll buy a particular perfume, their aim is obvious.

I once, a very long time ago, had to do a course of study on Propaganda, so I am aware that most propagandists are in agreement that it is Propaganda that holds society together.
We exist under rules, codes, ways of doing things, assumptions and so on that decide the way we interact with each other and this glue that holds us together is Propaganda.

Let me give an example from Robert Tressell in the Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, published 100 years ago.

He thought that what was wrong with the world was that everyone accepts the ‘Money idea’.
In his book the working class produce goods by their labour.
It is then sold by the Capitalist employer who pays the worker.
But what he pays the worker is a mere fraction of what he sells it for.
If he paid the worker the true worth of goods then the worker would have enough money to buy the goods himself.

Tressell thought this was a form of robbery and saw the evils of the world as stemming from the fact that most of us accept this.

Why do we accept it?

Propaganda. Our view of the world is shaped into our acceptance by forces we do not control.

Yet we do not all agree. The information coming into our heads leads us as individuals to draw different conclusions.

On my Facebook page I get hundreds of feeds and many of them I disagree with profoundly. If I deleted everyone I disagreed with there would be a lot less folk on there. But I do not.

Why?

Because if the last few years have taught me anything at all it is that you cannot change the mind of a single human being if they do not wish it to be changed. They are the product of the same things that you are the product of.

So I don’t post stuff that is going to cause arguments on their own pages. Why should I? If they want to put on their page what is on their mind then why should I pick a fight with them?

Took me a while but by and large the compliment is returned; I post some fairly radical stuff on my pages and folk do not take issue because it’s my page and my call- as theirs is to me.

You see in reality we all want the same thing.
We all want the best for us, ours, the country, our kids, education, laws, truth, justice and the American way…

Okay – scratch that last.

So if you feel the way you do, there is not a damned thing I can do to change your mind. In my blog or on my page I can say what I want and you can read it, but you are not going to change my mind either.

The road to Damascus moment is a very rare thing. If peoples’ minds change then it is a process that comes gradually, not because someone rants at you or gets angry on the Org.

And you are an adult. You are entitled to think what you think.. As am I.

So no point in grudge or quarrel or wishing to assassinate the neighbours.

Consider - I may not actually be talking about what you think I am talking about but something else entirely...

Time to move on.

To get on with life.

[Neil Howie]

If you really believed that minds cannot be changed why would you bother posting on Facebook?

Perhaps you mean that minds cannot be coerced ?

Surely you would hope that a well presented argument backed up with sources and considered counter arguments would persuade a rational mind of their point of view?

Tressell never lived to see the major social and political reforms of the 20th century or the failings of the communist system. He would still propose that we are stuck in the capitalist trap, and no doubt ask if much had really changed?

[John Little]

Coerced is a better word.

i post on Facebook because I take what it says in the status window literally, when it enquires: "what's on your mind"


its a sounding board for my thoughts and perhaps to let friends/ family know what I am thinking.

it is not a challenge or an invitation to a fight, simply me saying what I think.
And if I see ideas I disagree with on others pages then I do not see it as a glove thrown down for a stramash.

i have said my piece when I post and will very rarely argue If someone comes back contradicting.

You are right about rational minds. I wish they existed.


You are spot on about Tressell.

[squidge]

I don't agree John. I think even people who don't want to change their minds can change them. I think damascene moments happen more often than you suggest. I have worked and volunteered with people for near enough forty years. I have seen people change their minds about things they were absolutely fixed on so so so many times. Sometimes little things but often fundamental beliefs that were linked into their sense of who they are.

You are right to say that you don't change people's minds by ranting on here or calling oeople names. YOU don't change people's minds at all - they change their own minds. You can only help them by providing evidence, a well thought out argument or by enabling, encouraging people to look at things a different way or by simply encouraging them to imagine something different or to explore their own beliefs.

An example :)

A couple are bought tickets for the Phantom of the Opera. Expensive tickets by someone who doesn't have a lot of money. It's a special anniversary and a special present. The husband is furious. He HATES the theatre and "opera" in particular. He ABSOLUTELY does not want to go. He complains loudly and often that "the theatre is not for him" that it will be full of stuck up folk, that it's a complete waste of time to go, that he won't understand it, that he will be bored, that he will just leave. It is utterly exhausting for his wife and they argue but he is adamant. It is not an option not to go because it would hurt the person who gave them the tickets massively. In the car to the theatre he complains loudly, angrily, they struggle to park, the theatre is too busy, the seats are too small, the programmes too expensive. The lights go down and the last thing he says is "don't expect to be staying all night". His wife is relieved that it starts cos at least he shuts up.

It starts. At the end of the first act the chandelier drops and the lights go up. His wife closes her eyes and waits. He doesn't say anything. "Well?" She finally asks. "Yeah" he says "it's ok". They don't leave, he thinks it's WONDERFUL He goes on about how wonderful it was for WEEKS! He happily goes along to another show and has changed his mind completely because of experience and evidence.

Its its a strength to be able to change your mind. A closed mind is not a good thing

[John Little]

Have you not just said exactly what I put in bold?

You cannot change the mind of a single human being unless they wish it to be changed.

All the rational evidence and help in the world will not change a mind.

Indeed it will often dig in, put a tin hat on and defend its position to the death.

in your analogy the husbands mind changed. But he changed it.

No-one else.

[bekisman]

Interesting thread John..

I liked this: "Changing another person's mind is literally one of the hardest things to do in the world. Think of how many conversations you've ever had in which one of the participants decided the other was right and abandoned their previous views altogether. It almost never happens. Why? Because even though ideas flit in and out of our heads like mosquitoes, ideas that are believed cling with electromagnetic power. Once we believe an idea we develop an emotional connection to it, not to mention a commitment to it—as if to a person—and often become attached to it with a strength we often don't realize has little to do with the merit of the belief itself. And once we're attached to anything—whether a person, place, thing, or idea—giving it up is extremely hard. We will always grieve over a loss, no matter how small."

It then goes on to give an indication / pointers of 'how' it can be done..

On a smaller scale, Ive always hated Olives, no way would I eat Olives, I'd spit them out, I've hated them all my life, Mrs Beks persevered (most lately at De Vitas in Wick) and guess what? I still hate 'em. BUT any changes on maybe, points of view have not been because others have changed me by persuasion or rational intellect, but in my own mind because I maybe subconsciously wanted to change? Who knows. We may well think we see a change of mind in some individuals, but was it really someone else who caused it or some little flash of neurons in my brain? even the greatest physiologists are not sure, so how the hell would I know..





https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/happiness-in-world/201003/getting-people-change-their-minds

[John Little]

Yes Beks - that's a good article and I agree with it.

That's how propagandists work.

One of the leading experts in Propaganda in the last century was Jaques Driencourt and I think it was he who say that if to try to make people think what you wish them to, you will not succeed. They already have to have 'streams of consciousness' that incline them to be thinking along the lines you wish them to.

Unless the streams exist, then the Propagandist will '..dig for water in the desert and find nothing.'

If someone is already inclined your way then, you might be able to tip their thoughts - or more accurately, to focus them.
But to change a mind that does not wish to - non!

[squidge]

I'm not agreeing entirely though John. I agree that no one can change a persons mind for them, that only they can change their own mind. However, you said that no one will change their minds unless "they wish it to be changed".

The man in my example ABSOLUTELY did not wish to have his mind changed. He was not open to the idea that he would enjoy this show at all. That might seem an extreme reaction to a theatre show but it was more than that. Changing his mind about the theatre meant changing his mind about who he was. A working class man, he absolutely believed that the theatre was not "for the likes of him" It was a thing "posh people" did. And whatever he was, he was not posh. He believed that it would be too clever for him, full of people who took pleasure from something that would go right over his head. He did not want to be part of a "theatre going set" As he thought they were. The only reason he even went was because his wife gave him no option and he was really setting out to prove that he was right and she was wrong.

So, whilst no be can change someone's mind except themselves, people can change their minds even against their own wishes when faced with evidence or experience which is too much to ignore. At that crucial moment when the lights went up, our man was struggling with whether to change his mind or not... Or maybe with whether to tell his wife he had changed his mind lol but he really really did not want to.

[John Little]

I'm not quite sure what you are disagreeing with.

"...people can change their minds even against their own wishes."

Here I think we have a mind operating on several levels and maybe that is what you are getting at. His conscious mind did not wish to change. But despite all that he could do, his subconscious mind was already pre-disposed to change.

This was the root of the disagreement over propaganda between Hitler and Goebbels.
Hitler believe that propaganda could change minds - straight in yer face propaganda.

Goebbels did not - he believed in feature films with a message that was understated and even unseen.

'The Eternal Jew' was made on Hitler's personal orders and showed Jewish people and Rats in alternating sequences. Women in the audience screamed and men were disgusted. It did not work and was a propaganda disaster.

Goebbel's feature films worked on the basis that a German man (his notion) was able to take his family to the cinema on a Friday night, watch a good film with a 'moral message' (his words) and come out after being entertained - and would feel good. If he and his family felt good then they were content.

No in your face argument was going to accomplish that. It's the difference between integration and agitational where one soothes and breeds content, whilst the other brings inner conflict and discontent.

So coming back to the mind, persuasion takes place at the subconscious level and that will only change if it wishes to. The conscious mind may do what it wishes.

Is that closer to what you are saying?

[John Little]

I would add that a mind which changes too readily may not be truly changing.

There used to be a saying about people with the mind of a feather pillow - that is to say that they knew little about a given situation and so they had no convictions about it. Such people often took the view of the first person who spoke to them - until they got into discussion with someone else and changed their mind.

After talking to the original person they would change their mind back.

Such people then were like feather pillows and bore the impression of the last head that laid upon them.

Perhaps any psychologists on here may enlighten us about which is in charge of us most? Conscious or subconscious?

And does it vary from person to person so that some are more influenced by one than the other - and vice versa?

[squidge]

When we are dealing with changing opinions and changing opinions we can't apply the same words to our subconscious mind as we can to our conscious mind. So, rather than saying our subconscious mind "wishes" to change its perhaps better to say a subconscious mind is open to change. Our man was not an unintelligent man, he knew consciously that to persist in saying how crap the show was would be blatantly ridiculous because it was magnificent and, because his subconscious mind was open to change, his conscious mind made a choice.

Changing folks minds with with rants and rudeness rarely works but posting information on Facebook, encouraging discussion and exploration of different issues, offering different ways of looking at a subject may very well influence somebody who appears ABSOLUTELY to have no intention of changing their mind and who would argue that their subconscious mind is not for changing either. The thing is that you and I and anyone else on the outside looking in, don't know a person's subconscious mind and if we assume that there is nothing we can do to change their mind we might lose an opportunity to make a difference or even to save a life. In addition, if we see something said which we believe to be a lie then we have a responsibility to challenge that. Remember the hoo haa you and I had over that article in telegraph about the service vote John? That was a good example of that. It was not true and I could not allow it to be passed as true.

We we can only be true to ourselves, be kind to others and be gentle when challenging people. There is a place for directness and there is a place for rudeness at times, but Facebook and forums are not that place.

Edit - I just saw something on FB which I thought was pertinent to my last post. "Do no harm but take no s***t. Think that's good advice.

[John Little]

A propagandist would say that the man was pre-disposed to change his mind already because it was attuned to what gave him pleasure. That would agree with both J Bentham and JS Mill who thought that mankind was wholly motivated by what gave the most pleasure.

Perhaps what changes minds is what gives the unconscious part of us most pleasure?
And this extends to ideas too.

I don't see how anyone can argue that their subconscious mind is for changing though. If they could it would not be subconscious but very conscious.

And certainly on internet forums if people's cherished views are challenged and swamped, if people are rude, then it would quite quickly become depopulated.

People need to be nicer overall.

[bekisman]

Hi Squidge, not wishing to be pedantic (now would I!)?: "The man in my example ABSOLUTELY did not wish to have his mind changed. He was not open to the idea that he would enjoy this show at all. That might seem an extreme reaction to a theatre show but it was more than that. Changing his mind about the theatre meant changing his mind about who he was. A working class man, he absolutely believed that the theatre was not "for the likes of him" It was a thing "posh people" did. And whatever he was, he was not posh. He believed that it would be too clever for him, full of people who took pleasure from something that would go right over his head. He did not want to be part of a "theatre going set" As he thought they were. The only reason he even went was because his wife gave him no option and he was really setting out to prove that he was right and she was wrong"

But we do not know what actually was in this person's mind 'inverted snobbery'? Being -as you say - it is class-conscious that such 'stuff' is for snobs or nobs, he 'knew' his station in life? really? Others being 'too clever for him' really? I was born in a Council House and bought up on a rough Council estate, as a lot of us are on here, but it was not class-position that changed my mind over going to see Pavarotti in Glasgow. I really do not know anyone who puts themselves in a 'non-posh' box..

[rob murray]

The man stated a prefered choice based on his percpetion of going to the opera which, despite having no expereince of, and based on the information he had obtained / imagined, he decided wasnt for him. SO he made at that stage a rational choice ie not to go based on his collective perpetion, however once he expereinced opera he changed his mind or rather re considered his previous rational choice which he deemed now, in light of his actual expereince, to be irrational. So yes humans make rational choices which they can, should they choose, then see as irrational, ie change their minds, in economics this is a field of study called Rational Choice Theory which purports to explain consumption preferenes in an economy as made by individuals at a micro level.

[squidge]

Hi Squidge, not wishing to be pedantic (now would I!)?: "The man in my example ABSOLUTELY did not wish to have his mind changed. He was not open to the idea that he would enjoy this show at all. That might seem an extreme reaction to a theatre show but it was more than that. Changing his mind about the theatre meant changing his mind about who he was. A working class man, he absolutely believed that the theatre was not "for the likes of him" It was a thing "posh people" did. And whatever he was, he was not posh. He believed that it would be too clever for him, full of people who took pleasure from something that would go right over his head. He did not want to be part of a "theatre going set" As he thought they were. The only reason he even went was because his wife gave him no option and he was really setting out to prove that he was right and she was wrong"

But we do not know what actually was in this person's mind 'inverted snobbery'? Being -as you say - it is class-conscious that such 'stuff' is for snobs or nobs, he 'knew' his station in life? really? Others being 'too clever for him' really? I was born in a Council House and bought up on a rough Council estate, as a lot of us are on here, but it was not class-position that changed my mind over going to see Pavarotti in Glasgow. I really do not know anyone who puts themselves in a 'non-posh' box..

lol Beks, i don't think it was so much inverted snobbery as his own lack of self esteem, confidence and his unfamiliarity with and perhaps fear of something different. It was however - gosh - more than 20 years ago now and I would be incredibly surprised if his opinions were the same now as they were then. We grow and change and that event was part of his own personal growth.

Many people have a fear of things that are different, of change, Sometimes I wish I was a bit more cautious but on the whole I quite like the challenges and uncertainties that go along with change.

[bekisman]

lol Beks, i don't think it was so much inverted snobbery as his own lack of self esteem, confidence and his unfamiliarity with and perhaps fear of something different. It was however - gosh - more than 20 years ago now and I would be incredibly surprised if his opinions were the same now as they were then. We grow and change and that event was part of his own personal growth.

Many people have a fear of things that are different, of change, Sometimes I wish I was a bit more cautious but on the whole I quite like the challenges and uncertainties that go along with change.
You won't change my mind ref OLIVES Squidge! (yet I love dipping bread in Olive Oil - even if it is a no, no!) 'Fear of change'? that's edging towards Metathesiophobia! it's not fear it's building up knowledge 'is this better' or 'is this not' life's experiences.. I'm 70+ and thinking back over my life I'm advised by Mrs Beks that I've not 'changed my mind' - ever.. stubborn, arrogant, no idea.. but I'm still waiting...;)

[squidge]

Mmmmmmmmmm Olives :)

[golach]

[QUOTE=bekisman;1137778yet I love dipping bread in Olive Oil - even if it is a no, no ..;)[/QUOTE]
Dipping Italian bread in Olive oil and Balsamic vinegar is an old Italian delicacy I was introduced to a long time ago, it's braw

[bekisman]

Dipping Italian bread in Olive oil and Balsamic vinegar is an old Italian delicacy I was introduced to a long time ago, it's braw

See, there is another one!:lol:

[Rheghead]

Could anyone change their mind about wind farms?

[Neil Howie]

Could anyone change their mind about wind farms?

Let's start with olives and take it from there....


Mmmmmm... olives!

[bekisman]

Let's start with olives and take it from there....


Mmmmmm... olives!
Nope in equal dislike; olives AND loads-of-subsidy-intermittent-puny-tree-huggers-things!