← all facts
cognition
Your brain ignores facts that contradict your current context.
The Moses illusion occurs when people fail to notice factual errors in sentences because the question contains a semantically related entity.
In studies, people frequently answer 'two' when asked how many animals of each kind Moses took on the ark. The brain processes the sentence as a coherent narrative, prioritizing ease of understanding over verification of details.
You hear what you expect, not what is said.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Erickson and Mattson (1981), The Moses Illusion
- What the check found
- The claim accurately describes the established psychological phenomenon documented by Erickson and Mattson (1981).
- Confidence
- Well replicated
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.