Confirmation Bias In The Minneapolis Shooting

The clearest, or at least funniest, example of confirmation bias in recent politics was when New Mexico Senator Martin Heinrich tweeted “Given the committees that I have served on, I have seen a lot of real terrorists. Their glove compartments don’t look like this…” (the ellipsis was his).

He included a picture of Renee Macklin Good’s glove compartment in which were stuffed animals. Good was the woman who got herself killed in Minneapolis by an ICE agent last week.

Now I found Heinrich’s observations hilarious because of his large and curious implication that he has done a study of terrorists’ glove compartments. (One imagines actual gloves would be found in these: a way to avoid fingerprints, you see.) Apparently, Heinrich’s investigations revealed a lack of comforting furry fellows in the many (how many?) terrorists’ vehicles he examined. Thus, he asks us to infer, Good was not a terrorist. If so, that wouldn’t mean she wasn’t acting criminally.

Heinrich tweeted before the ICE agent’s bodycam video was “leaked”, or before Good’s “dancing” video came out, and so he was working solely from the perspective of his Sherlock Holmesian glove compartment studies (perhaps he has a monograph?) and early videos which, I ask all of us to admit, could support several theories of Good’s motivations.

Even now, after the other videos and the bodycam, in which we hear Good’s roommate scream “Drive, baby! Drive! Drive!” as Good drives off, I think it is fair to say that none of us can say with absolute certainty whether Good merely meant to flee and while doing so frighten the officer, or maybe she meant to bump him, perhaps wound him a little, or even to viciously mow him down. Her final perspective will be forever unknown.

The officer’s perspective is different. It didn’t help Good that this same officer was recently also attacked, and hit, and dragged some 50 yards, by a vehicle driven by a man who entered the country illegally, and who was convicted of sex crimes and attempting to flee. Good hit him again, as even Mayor Frey admitted, while downplaying the officer’s hip injury, seemingly excusing Good’s actions because those injuries were minor.

Especially before the bodycam video, and even after, it is clear that many went to this event with their biases held high, and, as we all do, they looked first and foremost for evidence that confirmed their hopes, their cherished theories, their desires. Which is to say, their biases.

I don’t mean bad actors, conscienceless propagandists like NPR (who were particularly culpable here), the evil schemers and manipulators or “influencers” who look to any event and purposely “spin” it, leaning especially into lies by omission, to further their goals. These actors are contemptible; they make even professional Indian scammers blush. I am speaking of ordinary people, like those who get their “news” from sources like NPR or Fox.

Everybody knows confirmation bias exists, I always say, but everybody also thinks it always happens to the other guy. All of us are sure we don’t suffer this dread mental maladaptation. But of course all of us do. It is a solid inescapable fact about us. About all of us, I say again.

That being so, it ought to be our regular practice, especially in “live”, important, or consequential matters, to remember this weakness. But to also understand that “bias” is a neutral word. When you confirm a bias it does not necessarily mean you have believed a falsity. Your bias in any given instance may be correct.

The two crucial things to take into evidentiary battle are this: (1) always seek to disprove yourself, and (2) uncertainty is not decision.

(1) I am constantly pointing out (see the Class) that we excel at finding evidence which supports our beliefs. That’s not wrong. This skill only degrades into conformationitis (yes) when we refuse to accept, see, or credit evidence which goes against us. You have to force yourself. It can even be painful in highly charged emotional events. It will be the last thing in the world you want to do. But do it you must lest you end up like Candace Owens or the people who jump on the hood of ICE vehicles.

A good indicator someone is suffering from conformationitis is if they latch onto one, and only one, piece of evidence which confirms their biases, to the exclusion of all other evidence. Of course, this one piece is often discarded for newer shinier singular pieces. But it’s the singularity that is important: the lack of an appreciation of all other evidence.

For instance, on Day One of the Good shooting, it was either “she had stuffed animals” or “she was dropping her kids off.” On Day Two, it was when Good said “I’m not mad at you” or odd arguments that the officer called his attacker a naughty word after she hit him and he shot her. Don’t scoff at this last one. An investigator saying a naughty word was what got OJ off.

(2) Separate uncertainty from decision. In Good’s case, there is uncertainty in her (final) motive. We do not have to decide which was correct. We often do not have to decide. We can leave it at uncertainty. If we decide, then we have the awful temptation to defend our decision come what may. That’s the other avenue by which conformationitis sneaks in.

Here is some homework. What is this woman’s motivation? Or this man’s? Or these “hood riders“?

(I have in the queue a story on confirmation bias of academic Experts that confirms my bias that academic Experts are far less intelligent than we’d like them to be.)

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