Just accepting and doing whatever works, until it doesn't, is typical of most life forms.
Animals forced to adapt by living in urban environments- rats, for instance, were found to have greatly increased IQs over those of their forest relatives.
If you've ever tried to outwit a city pigeon, you'll realize that also.

Beliefs have never been about facts. There's no need to believe what is true... it's just rue... Beliefs are an attempt to "make something true" that no amount of evidence can.

"If you use a crazy theory to make a correct prediction a couple of times, you can get stuck in that belief and may not be as interested in gathering more information,"
Yep, that fits my experience. This shows again how important it is to try to disprove your views again and again. Maybe there is more to it that we haven't discovered yet but it is definitely an interesting point.