When we set a hypothesis, the brain will automatically enter the search mode and scan the surrounding supporting data, which is neither a good learning method nor a good research method.

To make matters worse, we usually don't even realize that this kind of confirmation bias (or self-bias) is subtly interfering with our lives.

Somehow, it seems that we happen to be surrounded by like-minded people-this is certainly not intentional, we just spend time with people we like.

But why do we like them?

Yes, it's because they think like us.

It seems that we just happened to read an article that can confirm our existing knowledge-this is certainly not intentional. We just try to keep reading excellent articles full of wisdom, but why do we think these articles are excellent and full of wisdom?

Yes, this is because we think they are meaningful.

We look around and weed out things that are contrary to our cognition, without even paying attention to this process, just like the same city may be full of happy people one day, but full of painful people one day, all because of our mood.

Confirmation deviation is a subtle and important force. As the psychologist Raymond Nickerson said, "If someone tries to find out the most noteworthy problem in human reasoning, confirmation bias will be one of the candidate answers". (Nixon, 1998)

Even the best scientists and thinkers can't get rid of the confirmation bias.

The only difference is that they realized the problem and took measures.