Empirical Evidence that the Ancient Pyrrhonists Were Right About the Causes and Consequences of Dogmatism

A recent paper, Psychological Features of Extreme Political Ideologies by Jan-Willem van Prooijen and André Krouwel, provides empirical insights into the psychology of political extremists. It finds four psychological traits that distinguish extremists of any sort from moderates:

• Psychological distress

• Cognitive simplicity

• Overconfidence

• Intolerance

These findings nicely parallel what the ancient Pyrrhonist philosophers described as the psychological traits of dogmatists - a technical philosophical term by which we Pyrrhonists mean people who have firm beliefs in non-empirical things. Dogmatism can apply to many things, including the political beliefs that were the subject of the study mentioned above. Political extremists are all dogmatists.

The Pyrrhonists point out that people are psychologically troubled due to encountering anomalies and contradictions when they try to make sense of the world. In response to this, some people adopt dogmatism in an attempt to address the trouble: they hastily develop firm beliefs about things that are contested and not well understood. These beliefs, of course, have shortcomings, yet the dogmatists are overconfident in them. And finally, because of these beliefs, the dogmatists express intolerance of those who have contrary beliefs.

All of this played out in ancient Greek philosophy, just as it does in modern politics.

What’s really cool is that the ancient Pyrrhonists not only figured all of this out, they also had a solution - one that modern science has yet to investigate.

First, here is more detail about the study's results and how they corroborate the reports of the Pyrrhonists.

Psychological Distress

The researchers say,

The basis of our argument is that psychological distress—defined as a sense of meaninglessness that stems from anxious uncertainty—stimulates adherence to extreme ideologies. This argument is consistent with significance-quest theory, which proposes that an important reason why people become radicalized is a quest for significance—the need to feel important and respected by supporting a meaningful cause (Kruglanski et al., 2014). Distressing personal or societal events (e.g., injustices, economic crises, wars) undermine the extent to which perceivers experience the world as meaningful and therefore stimulate people to regain a sense of purpose through strong and clear-cut ideological convictions….

Empirical findings support a relationship between psychological distress and extreme political ideologies. Compared with moderates, political extremists—on both the left and right of the spectrum—report stronger anxiety about their economic future (van Prooijen, Krouwel, Boiten, & Eendebak, 2015). Furthermore, extremists are more suspicious than moderates about governmental institutions, suggesting distressed expectations of these institutions (Inglehart, 1987). Experimental findings are consistent with these insights. For instance, people psychologically compensate for feelings of uncertainty and fear through strong ideological convictions (McGregor, Prentice, & Nash, 2013), and inducing a loss of significance increases extreme beliefs on both the left and right (Webber et al., 2018).

The ancient Pyrrhonist philosopher, Sextus Empiricus, identified this kind of distress and the desire to be free of such distress as the causal origin of Pyrrhonist philosophy:

We say that the causal origin of the Pyrrhonist Way is the hope of attaining ataraxia. Certain talented people, upset by anomaly in "the facts" and at a loss as to which of these "facts" deserve assent, endeavoured to discover what is true in them and what is false, expecting that by settling this they would achieve ataraxia. (Outlines of Pyrrhonism I.12)

The “certain talented people” Sextus refers to here are those who have figured out that following the Pyrrhonist solution for dealing with the anomalies in the “facts” brings ataraxia. Those who do not figure this out take another path: the dogmatic way. In the dogmatic way, one chooses a plausible story that seems to account for the “facts.” The problem, which Sextus repeatedly points out in analyzing the various theories dogmatists have adopted, is that they have done so precipitously - often so precipitously that the theories adopted by the dogmatists flagrantly disregard the evidence. (Outlines of Pyrrhonism I.20)

Cognitive Simplicity

When one is faced with an anomaly in the “facts” that has no obvious solution, whatever belief one takes on is not going to be able to account for all of the anomalies. It has to be simpler than that.

Here’s what the researchers say,

… extreme ideologies are characterized by a relatively simplistic, black-and-white perception of the social world. Feelings of distress prompt a desire for clarity, and extremist belief systems provide meaning to a complex social environment through a set of straightforward assumptions that make the world more comprehensible (Kruglanski, Pierro, Mannetti, & De Grada, 2006). These theoretical insights would therefore predict a link between political extremism and cognitive simplicity.

Empirical findings support this view. One classic study analyzed the content of speeches about slavery by politicians shortly before the U.S. Civil War and found decreased integrative complexity among relatively extreme politicians compared with political moderates (Tetlock, Armor, & Peterson, 1994). In a recent series of studies, participants consistently rated how similar or dissimilar they considered a range of social stimuli, including politicians, social groups, and newspapers. Compared with moderates, political extremists formed more sharply distinguished, homogenous clusters of similar versus dissimilar stimuli, suggesting that they perceive the social world in simpler and more clearly defined mental categories (Lammers, Koch, Conway, & Brandt, 2017).

Finally, evidence suggests that political extremists view societal and political events more simply. Although the political left and right endorsed diametrically different solutions to the EU refugee crisis (with the left being more inclusive and the right more exclusive toward refugees), both extremes believed that the solution to this crisis was simple—distinguishing them from moderates, who believed that more complex solutions were needed (van Prooijen, Krouwel, & Emmer, 2018). Such cognitive simplicity is also reflected in political extremists’ tendency to believe conspiracy theories. Although the left and right are equally likely to endorse conspiracy theories (Uscinski & Parent, 2014), the political extremes believe conspiracy theories more strongly than moderates (van Prooijen, Krouwel, & Pollet, 2015; see also Imhoff, 2015; Krouwel, Kutiyski, van Prooijen, Martinsson, & Markstedt, 2017). Political extremism is associated with a relatively simplistic outlook on the social and political world.

Overconfidence

Here’s what the researchers say,

…political extremists are overconfident in their judgments. This proposition is closely tied with the insight that political extremism predicts cognitive simplicity. While simplistic causal models of reality enable extremism by addressing the epistemic need to make the world more predictable (Kruglanski et al., 2006), they also enhance beliefs that one accurately understands reality. Put differently, people are more confident about judgment domains that seem simple.

…Belief superiority is a poor predictor of actual knowledge … and predicts a tendency to select agreeable but ignore disagreeable information (Hall & Raimi, 2018). Furthermore, political extremists display increased confidence in numeric estimation tasks (Brandt, Evans, & Crawford, 2015), suggesting overconfidence also in nonpolitical judgment domains.

Finally, one study assessed Dutch participants’ domain-specific knowledge and judgmental certainty about the EU refugee crisis. Results revealed that left- and right-wing extremists did not differ from moderates in their domain-specific knowledge of this geopolitical event, yet they did experience increased judgmental certainty. Consistent with our theorizing, findings showed that the relationship between political extremism and judgmental certainty was statistically accounted for by the belief that the solution for the refugee crisis is simple (van Prooijen et al., 2018). The findings reviewed here suggest that political extremists—on both ends of the spectrum—are overconfident in their beliefs.

Similarly, Sextus points out that overconfidence in one’s own opinion is one of the traits of the dogmatists. At the conclusion of Outlines of Pyrrhonism, he says,

Because of his love of humanity the Pyrrhonist wishes to cure by argument, so far as he can, the conceit and precipitancy of the Dogmatists…. And in the case of those who are severely afflicted with precipitancy he employs arguments that are weighty and capable of vigorously disposing of the Dogmatists' symptom of conceit….

Intolerance

The researchers say,

…political extremists are less tolerant of different groups and opinions than moderates. Through the combined processes of cognitive simplicity and overconfidence, extremists may experience their moral judgments as moral absolutes that reflect a simple and universal truth. Such moral superiority implies that different values and beliefs—and the groups of people who endorse them—are considered morally inferior. This line of reasoning is consistent with findings that strong moral convictions predict intolerance (Skitka, 2010).

…political extremism reliably predicts intolerance. In a large Dutch sample, participants on both extremes derogated out-groups more strongly than did politically moderate participants (van Prooijen et al., 2015). Furthermore, compared with moderates, both left- and right-wing extremists display stronger dogmatic intolerance, defined as the tendency to reject opposing beliefs, and consider any ideological belief that differs from their own to be inferior (van Prooijen & Krouwel, 2017). Political extremists are thus less tolerant than moderates about different ideological belief systems or the groups of people that endorse them.

While antiquity largely lacked the kind of political extremism that we see today, this was because people seldom lived in democratic societies. Caesars, Pharaohs, kings, tyrants, and satraps ruled them. But the most famous philosophical story of all of Greek antiquity is the death of Socrates - a death orchestrated by the intolerance of his political enemies.

Intolerance is not limited to political issues. One can find it in philosophy just as easily. The Stoic philosopher Epictetus showered abuse on Epicurus. (Diogenes Laertius, 10.6) Similarly, Epicurus showered abuse on other philosophers:

Epicurus used to call this Nausiphanes jelly-fish, an illiterate, a fraud, and a trollop; Plato's school he called "the toadies of Dionysius," their master himself the "golden" Plato, and Aristotle a profligate, who after devouring his patrimony took to soldiering and selling drugs; Protagoras a pack-carrier and the scribe of Democritus and village schoolmaster; Heraclitus a muddler; Democritus the nonsense-monger; …and Pyrrho an ignorant boor. (Diogenes Laertius, 10.13-16)

Other examples are easy to find because, just as political ideologies claim moral superiority over other political ideologies, the ancient Greek philosophies of life claimed moral superiority over other philosophies.

Escaping Extremism and Dogmatism

The Pyrrhonists laid out a detailed approach for how people can not only escape dogmatism and political extremism, but, most importantly, to not only rid themselves of the psychological distress that can accompany being exposed to conflicting and irreconcilable opinions about important matters but also to attain eudaimonia.

To learn about this approach, if you like translations of ancient texts, I suggest Sextus Empiricus’ Outlines of Pyrrhonism. If you prefer a modern approach, I suggest my book, Pyrrho’s Way. Read the introduction here.

Hat tip to Steve Stuart-Williams, whose article, The Psychology of Political Extremism, brought this research to my attention.