Cognitive dissonance is the discomfort of accepting conflicting facts with our beliefs, hindering learning. The book “Black Box Thinking” by Matthew Syed explores how data from aviation black boxes improved patient safety. Examples include UFO cult believers and wrongful convictions. Cognitive dissonance affects decision-makers and diving beliefs like Nitrox safety or cave diving risks. Addressing it in the diving community involves human-centric learning, accepting errors, improving incident reporting, and empathetic analysis of incidents.