Cognitive dissonance is a signal that alerts us to a contradiction, a conflict, with with the old info being wrong, or with the new info being wrong. We have to discern which is the case :)

I think therefore I am, and the theory of mind to recognize others as similar to ourselves, is a good way to invalidate deluded solipsistic thinking too ;) Descartes got the whole "animals are simply complex machines" thing way off though... denying a psychological dimension that is observable and demonstrable to those who interact with other fellow animals.

Thanks for the feedback.