Vidqun: But how to avoid confirmation bias?
Great question, and a really hard thing to do. One of the best ways to approach this problem is to learn to recognize it in others and then to work to see it in ourselves. That takes a lot of hard work, honesty and self-awareness. Most people are simply too lazy and afraid to do it.
The peer review process can also be of help, maybe. Ironically, it can often have the opposite affect. Other people usually are more than glad to point out our own biases. Sadly, many will do so in brutal, unkind ways. It takes a tough person that really wants to know what is true to survive that process. Unfortunately, that process can cause many people to "double-down" on their biased beliefs and hold onto them even more firmly.
There's a great book on the subject I'd like to recommend. Here's a link to a thread I started on this book a while back:
Mistakes Were Made, But Not by Me (by Tavris and Aronson)
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