The BBC has a hilarious article called “How to make better decisions“:
Be warned: this article deals primarily with shark attacks, the lottery, beer, and how to get a date using mathematics. Is it a good decision to keep reading? Unfortunately, the answer is “you need to keep reading to find out.”
Sound irrational? Good – your massively irrational mind should have no problem with it, then.
Consider this: every year in the United States, when the Discovery Channel broadcasts “Shark Week” visits to Florida beaches decline. Presumably, the network’s programming makes the waters no less safe (assuming sharks are not, in fact, empowered by cable television).
It could also be that they show the program during a week that people are more likely to be home to watch, as there are no holidays. Need more data, really.
Imagine I handed you a cup of hot coffee and then asked your opinion about a person whom you had recently met; now suppose I instead handed you a cup of ice-cold soda. Experiments show that your opinion of this person would be different because you have been primed to feel warmth or coldness.
Add to the list…
* framing (how you present data is as important as the data itself)
* impact bias (overestimation of possible outcomes),
* confirmation bias (recognising only data that supports your hypothesis)
* loss aversion (we stand to gain more than we would lose, but our fear of loss prevents us)
* selective perception (seeing what you want to see),and
* rosy retrospection (integral to the repeated experience of family Christmas)…and you seem doomed to blunder through life led by your brain’s clumsy irrationality.
Maybe I’m thinking about this the wrong way, but cultural influence is not listed? No peer pressure? No bias from overconfidence in science, especially mathematical formulas? Excellent food for thought when it comes to understanding the wily hacker.