How Opinions Are Formed • Record reality Piece memory

Introduction

In everyday conversations and discussions, we are constantly expressing opinions. Whether we are judging a situation, evaluating a person, or interpreting a phenomenon, we tend to arrive at conclusions almost effortlessly. This process often feels intuitive, even automatic.

However, when I began to consciously step back and examine these “opinions,” I realized that they do not emerge out of nowhere.

More precisely, every opinion is the result of a process, and that process can be broken down and analyzed. My goal here is not to construct a universal theory of human cognition, but to answer a more focused and fundamental question:

When we express an opinion, where does it actually come from?

After multiple iterations of reflection and refinement, I have converged on three primary factors that shape opinion formation. These factors are not exhaustive, nor are they meant to explain every possible case. But in most everyday scenarios, they provide a sufficiently clear analytical framework.

In my current understanding, an opinion is mainly influenced by:

The scope of information one has access to
The ability to reason and process that information
Subjective preference

These three do not replace one another, nor are they mutually exclusive. In many situations, what we perceive as a “rational conclusion” is actually the combined effect of informational boundaries, reasoning capacity, and personal inclination. The difference lies only in how much weight each factor carries in a given case.

1. The Scope of “Facts”

The first clarification is that “facts” here do not refer to a complete, objective reality accessible to everyone. Instead, they are better understood as:

the subset of information an individual is exposed to.

In other words, what we call “facts” is always partial, filtered, and bounded.

These boundaries are shaped by many variables, including information channels, environment, education, language, and even chance encounters. As a result, when two people discuss the same topic, the factual foundation they rely on may already be different, though this difference is often overlooked.

Consider a simple example: if we ask which fruit has the highest nutritional value, the question appears straightforward. Yet it assumes that we already know which fruits exist and what nutrients they contain. If you have never heard of a particular fruit, it will never enter your comparison space.

In that sense, what shapes your judgment is not the full structure of reality, but:

the portion of reality that is visible to you.

Differences in opinion, therefore, are often a natural outcome of differences in informational coverage, rather than errors.

This perspective aligns with the concept of bounded rationality, proposed by Herbert Simon (20th-century economist and cognitive scientist, Nobel laureate). One of his central insights is that human decision-making always occurs under constraints of limited information and limited computational capacity.

2. Reasoning and Processing Ability

If the first factor determines what you can see, the second determines:

how you process what you see.

This refers to the ability to analyze, compare, and infer based on available information.

In my view, this is a form of structured reasoning, similar to the logic used in mathematical or geometric proofs. It is not entirely subjective, nor does it fluctuate arbitrarily. It has a degree of consistency and repeatability. When the input information is the same, differences between individuals often emerge at this level.

Returning to the example of fruit nutrition, once we have data on nutritional content, the next question becomes unavoidable: how do we define “nutritional value”? Should it be based on a single metric, such as vitamin concentration, or a composite index that weights multiple nutrients?

Once this definition is established, the remaining task becomes a process of logical evaluation and trade-off.

Without a clear reasoning structure, one may oscillate between criteria or fail to reach a conclusion at all. With stronger reasoning ability, however, one can organize, categorize, and evaluate the information in a consistent way.

At its core, this factor is about:

whether one can transform raw information into a structured judgment process.

3. Subjective Preference

The first two factors still belong, broadly speaking, to the domain of rational analysis. The third does not.

Subjective preference is neither something that needs to be proven nor something that can be standardized. It does not depend on logic, nor is it fully constrained by information.

A simple example is enough: some people prefer apples, others prefer bananas. This difference requires no justification and carries no inherent error.

However, preference does not remain confined to choices; it extends into opinions.

Even when individuals share the same information and possess similar reasoning ability, they may still arrive at different conclusions. A person might fully understand that apples are more nutritious under a certain definition, yet still favor bananas and express a more positive evaluation of them.

In open-ended questions, preference can even dominate. Areas such as aesthetics, interests, and values do not have a single correct answer. Differences here are not failures of logic, but expressions of irreducible individual variation.

In this respect, my view resonates with the distinction drawn by David Hume (18th-century Scottish philosopher) between reason and sentiment. Reason can help us organize and analyze, but it does not determine what we ultimately value or prefer.

4. When Opinions Diverge

Once opinion formation is understood through these three factors, disagreement takes on a different meaning.

Instead of immediately framing disagreement as a matter of right versus wrong, it becomes possible to analyze it along three dimensions:

Is the information base the same?
Is the reasoning process the same?
Are the preferences aligned?

The value of this framework is not to instantly resolve disagreement, but to clarify where the divergence originates.

Many conflicts escalate not because the issue itself is inherently complex, but because the underlying sources of difference are never separated.

5. Same Conclusion, Different Paths

Another often overlooked point is that:

the same conclusion does not imply the same cognitive process.

Two people may arrive at identical opinions without sharing the same information, reasoning, or preferences.

They may not:

have been exposed to the same data
have followed the same reasoning steps
have held the same underlying preferences

The convergence of conclusions may simply be accidental, the result of different paths leading to the same endpoint.

Therefore, agreement in outcome should not be mistaken for equivalence in understanding.

6. Returning to the Question

So, how is an opinion formed?

In my current understanding, it is not a single act of judgment, but the combined outcome of three forces:

what information you encounter, how you process it, and what you are inclined to favor.

These factors do not need to align, nor do they replace one another. Together, they produce what we eventually express as a “view.”

This model is not perfect, nor does it explain every complex situation. But in most everyday contexts, it offers a sufficiently clear lens.

When I now encounter disagreement, judgment, or decision-making, I tend to step back and ask:

Is the difference coming from information, reasoning, or preference?

More often than not, the moment that question is asked, the answer begins to emerge.

References

Hume, D. (2000). A treatise of human nature (D. F. Norton & M. J. Norton, Eds.). Oxford University Press. (Original work published 1739–1740)

Simon, H. A. (1955). A behavioral model of rational choice. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 69(1), 99–118. https://doi.org/10.2307/1884852