Post No.: 0816 Furrywisepuppy says: In a joint evaluation when comparing two scenarios – one where an innocent person gets shot after stumbling into a robbery at a store where that person frequents, and one where that innocent … Read More
Post No.: 0795 Furrywisepuppy says: The ‘introspection illusion’ is when we believe our own introspections are more reliable than other people’s. (This includes trusting one’s own intuitions over scientific data, like believing that heavier objects fall faster than … Read More
Post No.: 0782 Furrywisepuppy says: Whenever we criticise other people’s political positions, it reveals our own political positions. Whenever we comment on how others can eat ‘weird’ food combinations, it reveals our own preferences, if not fussiness. Whenever … Read More
Post No.: 0773 Furrywisepuppy says: I find illusions incredibly fascinating. They reveal so much about the inner workings of the brain. Illusions and hallucinations can affect every one of our five main senses – namely sight or vision, … Read More
Post No.: 0754 Furrywisepuppy says: Our intuitions can sense when someone is lying reasonably well (although how well ‘well’ means is subjective!) But no single specific non-verbal behavioural cue or any linguistic (e.g. colloquialisms) or paralinguistic (vocal tone … Read More
Post No.: 0741 Furrywisepuppy says: If we’re unwavering zealots then can we ever believe that our worldviews are wrong? Even past facts can be reinterpreted in favour of our positions… If a political party wins an election … Read More
Post No.: 0733 Furrywisepuppy says: ‘Motivated reasoning’ is about justifying decisions, judgements and attitude changes (or lack thereof) based on our emotions and cognitive biases, in order to reduce cognitive dissonance and/or to serve self-serving outcomes. Cognitive … Read More
Post No.: 0728 Furrywisepuppy says: An opinion or unverified presumption is logically more guaranteed to speak about the person who holds or shares it than the subject of the opinion or presumption. For example, if we judge someone … Read More
Post No.: 0724 Furrywisepuppy says: With the benefit of hindsight – after you’ve seen the correct answer/outcome – many things appear like they should’ve been ‘obvious’ before, when they weren’t. Also, if you lack the knowledge of, or … Read More
Post No.: 0714 Furrywisepuppy says: Following Post No.: 0702 and our quest to reduce noise – interviews, reviews or assessments should be structured rather than informal or ad hoc so that each subject receives the exact same set … Read More
Post No.: 0702 Furrywisepuppy says: We had learned from Fluffystealthkitten in Post No.: 0689 that inconsistent verdicts don’t cancel each other out. So what can we do to tackle the noise or unwanted variability in professional assessments or … Read More
Post No.: 0689 Fluffystealthkitten says: Due to the ‘false consensus effect’, we assume others see the world as we do, hence we assume everyone would come to the same conclusions as we would based on the same presented … Read More
Post No.: 0681 Furrywisepuppy says: We’ve talked heck aplenty about biases in this blog. But there’s another collection of problems that affects human judgements that’s equally as important to recognise… Whereas bias is analogous to having all … Read More
Post No.: 0670 Furrywisepuppy says: We intuitively desire and gravitate towards simple internal models of the world over handling its true complex nature, hence we have a tendency to simplify our understanding of the actual world to the … Read More
Post No.: 0664 Fluffystealthkitten says: As everybody knows, carefully manicuring one’s own public image isn’t always about honestly conveying the truth, the whole truth, and only the truth with one-to-one fidelity but about emphasising and exaggerating what one … Read More
Post No.: 0655 Furrywisepuppy says: The tragedies that have been most recently reported in the press become more conspicuous, salient or ‘available’ in our minds. We consequently tend to overestimate their risk. This can happen with recent aeroplane … Read More
Post No.: 0642 Furrywisepuppy says: Most people care about their ‘self-presentation’ almost above all else – image and perceived reputation matters. Most people, without knowing it, will constantly adapt their words and actions to suit different audiences in … Read More
Post No.: 0630 Furrywisepuppy says: The ‘planning fallacy’ occurs when one estimates unrealistically close to the best-case scenario thus ends up being overoptimistic about a task. It’s an extremely frequent and widespread fallacy committed by individuals, businesses, governments … Read More
Post No.: 0622 Furrywisepuppy says: We’ve been learning throughout this blog that our brains don’t interpret the physical world or reality objectively – there are individualised interpretations of the world and our brains interpret the world according to … Read More
Post No.: 0611 Furrywisepuppy says: Advertising isn’t just about products and brands – adverts convey a whole host of other social and cultural information such as norms, stereotypes, values, gender roles, how to ‘supposedly’ live, what our houses … Read More
