re: #69 Dangerman

This has become a problem in many areas. People incorrectly question expertise. Because they just “know”.

Happened to me the other day.
Discussing a sort of complicated financial decision someone told me I was wrong because he had a spreadsheet at home that “proved” it.

The particular question was one I am asked a lot. I know how to do the analysis and I know how he got his answer.

He ignored 8 variables and only focused on the 2 easy obvious ones. Well then of course it works.

If I tried to explain you have to account for these other 6 I’d have got “oh they don’t matter” or something else equally hand waving.

he had already decided he was right and so no matter what I would explain, he still had to be.

Accepting reality is too much of an adjustment for people who are certain they already “know”.

The world is too complex so we all model it in various ways. But to ignore reality, to stick with a model even when it has been shown to be wrong, is a pathway to destruction and obselecence. As has happened at least 6 times in the last 250 years, one group sticking to old models of the world is collapsing even while another group using better models is rising.There is conflict as the former tries to turn back the tide, but because their models simply are no longer selective representations of the world, they will fail.

Nature cannot be fooled - Richard Feynman