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About this quote

What does it mean?
This suggests we cling to our beliefs so tightly that we ignore facts contradicting them, even when those facts are obvious.
In plain terms
We often refuse to see reality because it conflicts with what we already think.
What can you take from it?
Question your own beliefs to avoid willful blindness.

Where it applies

  • political debates
  • scientific disagreements
  • personal conflicts

Putting it to work

  • practice active listening
  • seek disconfirming evidence
  • slow down decisions

Questions to consider

  • What belief do you struggle to question?
  • How do you react when proven wrong?

Another view

People can sometimes hold beliefs without ignoring reality entirely.

More from Orson Scott Card

  1. She was sure of that. Or at least she hoped it with such fervor that it felt like certainty.

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  2. My hands are clean, but not because I wasn't prepared to bloody them.

    Permalink to quote #306
  3. I'm not stupid!' in [his] experience, that was a sentence never uttered except to prove it's own inaccuracy.

    Permalink to quote #303

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