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336 comments on "I Don't Know"
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336 comments on "I Don't Know"
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nice post, it reminded me generally of heuristics, and this paper, "Cognitive Biases Potentially Affecting the Judgement of Global Risks"
(PDF) http://www.singinst.org/upload/cognitive-biases.pdf
personally i've got no idea either about this, i'm just dealing with it on a personal level
Nate, great post and I like the graphic above too.
Frankly that is my experience with how humans behave. True open-minded people are as common as enlightened Zen masters. Scientist and engineers are the worst at parsing data and getting all upset if it doesn't match their reality filters.
Heaven help Obama, the poor man is already looking like he is way past overload. Someone becoming a "decider" or claiming "papal authority" starts looking understandable in light of human overload and people being in power. I do think Obama is our most intelligent president in ages, but the problems are SO big and seeing them clearly lie outside of MSM explanations that I expect MUCH LESS of leaders and other people. They're human, and unfortunately almost all of them are overwhelmed with life in general. It takes a truly crazy or determined person to being new ideas and concepts into practice.
"Frankly that is my experience with how humans behave. True open-minded people are as common as enlightened Zen masters. Scientist and engineers are the worst at parsing data and getting all upset if it doesn't match their reality filters."
Yep. We all have our cognitive biases.
Great topic, Nate. Thanks for bringing up a subject that should be covered and emphasised in all science-related courses. At the university I went to, The Philosophy of Science was an optional course for all disciplines, as far as I looked, but it was the best paper I ever took.
Our scientific knowledge seems to be a tiny island of what seems to describe some aspects of our experience.
This tiny island is always changing, and floats in an infinite, inscrutable ocean of mystery.
Wisdom is a way of staying aware of the nature of our supposed knowledge as well as the infinite mystery in which we exist.
We tell ourselves stories that can blind us if we mistake them for reality, but can help us if we do not.
The "pupil's metaphor" is dangerous because the student is apt to be too enthralled with it. The "teacher's metaphor" may be the very same model or image or story, but the teacher uses it carefully as one helpful tool, with an awareness that the metaphor is not the reality.
We wield godlike technology with a great deal of foolishness. (E.O. Wilson)
We commit atrocities because we believe absurdities. (Voltaire)
"I don't know" and "I am sorry" and "I love you" are phrases we use too little and perhaps abuse too often.
We are headed for the world of Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" soon enough. In the end, our close relationships will be what matters.
I will try to give the children I've adopted and am raising a chance to survive -- just as the father in McCarthy's "The Road" tried to give his child a chance to survive. I'm not sure that any children alive today will be glad to survive the Bottleneck, but I hope that some do and at some point will be glad of it.
Meanwhile, the high and mighty commit more atrocities each day, all in the name of whatever absurdities are thought to best justify rapacious violence. "And so it goes...." (Vonnegut)