That's not what I'm saying. In fact, I don't think there is any contradiction engendered by that position: there isn't anything about being a "conscious piece of the world" and being inessential to it which would produce cognitive dissonance. Not that I think it is a happy thought, that as individuals we are each almost entirely insignificant. But that is the human condition, and always has been, so while the forlorn emotions it causes can be troublesome, it isn't a matter of cognitive dissonence.

The angst arises from knowing our thoughts to be reasonable, and being told they should instead be logical. In trying to get our thoughts to be "logic", like the math which we can so succesfully use to model everything else except our thoughts (and reasoning), we experience cognitive dissonance caused by the conflict between a natural desire to be reasonable and human and the expectation imposed on us from false teachings to be logical and robotic. We know we are more than biological robots programmed by evolution to replicate our genes, but we are told we cannot know that or even be that. The cognitive dissonance this causes is far more profound than simple personal anxiety, which is why I call it existential angst. It is the root cause of the monumental tide of anxiety, depression, religious fundamentalism, drug use and addiction, and even bigotry and political turmoil that has been rising to engulf our society for decades.

I know that sounds like an alarmist and pretentious theory, but it is far easier to dismiss than it is to deny.