Risk management through diversification is a totally different use of the word diversification
Totally different than what?
1 is not something people actively “think” about
Sure they do, but to make it more stark let me change it a bit: “Am I pretty?”
More generally, this example represents the whole class of subjective opinions.
If you feel 2 doesn’t have a correct answer, then it seems you’re endorsing some form of moral nihilism
Not quite, just rejecting moral realism is quite sufficient here. But in any case, people do think about it, in different ways, and I don’t know how would one determine what is a “correct” answer.
This example represents the distinction between descriptive and normative.
For 3, people are not actually looking for the “best” answer; they want a satisfactory answer.
Also, not quite. People do want the best answer, it’s just that they are often satisfied with a good-enough answer. However the question of what is “best” is a hard one and in many cases there is no single correct answer—the optimality is conditional on certain parameters.
This example represents the individuality of many “correct” answers—what is correct depends on the person.
Diversity of opinions is helpful for risk management, specifically the risk that you commit all your resources to the single idea that turns out to be wrong. This is commonly known as “don’t put all your eggs into one basket”. Risk management is not only about money.
if you don’t know how to determine a correct answer, there’s not much to think about until you do.
I strongly disagree. In fact, figuring out how would you recognize a correct answer if it happens to bite you on the ass is the major thing to think about for many problems.
The benefit I mentioned above of diversity (higher chance of getting the right answer) is the same thing as what you’re talking about then, not like you said :”That, too, but there are other issues as well”. If you can recognize the correct answer when you see it, then the use of diversity is to increase your chances of getting the right answer.
So are we down to the only correct use of the original quote is when people aren’t sure how to recognize a correct answer?
Nope. The thing is, it’s not a “correct”—“not correct” binary dilemma. For any reasonably complex problem there might be a single “correct” answer (provided what you consider optimal is fully specified) and a lot of different “technically not correct” answers. Those “technically not correct” answers are all different and will rise to different consequences. They are not the same—and if getting the “technically correct” answer is unlikely, you do care about which “incorrect” answers you’ll end up using.
Basically, diversification helps with dealing with the risks of having to accept “technically not correct” answers because the technically correct one is out of reach.
Totally different than what?
Sure they do, but to make it more stark let me change it a bit: “Am I pretty?”
More generally, this example represents the whole class of subjective opinions.
Not quite, just rejecting moral realism is quite sufficient here. But in any case, people do think about it, in different ways, and I don’t know how would one determine what is a “correct” answer.
This example represents the distinction between descriptive and normative.
Also, not quite. People do want the best answer, it’s just that they are often satisfied with a good-enough answer. However the question of what is “best” is a hard one and in many cases there is no single correct answer—the optimality is conditional on certain parameters.
This example represents the individuality of many “correct” answers—what is correct depends on the person.
We were talking about diversity of opinions, and you switched to talking about diversity for risk management.
Also, if you don’t know how to determine a correct answer, there’s not much to think about until you do.
Diversity of opinions is helpful for risk management, specifically the risk that you commit all your resources to the single idea that turns out to be wrong. This is commonly known as “don’t put all your eggs into one basket”. Risk management is not only about money.
I strongly disagree. In fact, figuring out how would you recognize a correct answer if it happens to bite you on the ass is the major thing to think about for many problems.
The benefit I mentioned above of diversity (higher chance of getting the right answer) is the same thing as what you’re talking about then, not like you said :”That, too, but there are other issues as well”. If you can recognize the correct answer when you see it, then the use of diversity is to increase your chances of getting the right answer.
So are we down to the only correct use of the original quote is when people aren’t sure how to recognize a correct answer?
Nope. The thing is, it’s not a “correct”—“not correct” binary dilemma. For any reasonably complex problem there might be a single “correct” answer (provided what you consider optimal is fully specified) and a lot of different “technically not correct” answers. Those “technically not correct” answers are all different and will rise to different consequences. They are not the same—and if getting the “technically correct” answer is unlikely, you do care about which “incorrect” answers you’ll end up using.
Basically, diversification helps with dealing with the risks of having to accept “technically not correct” answers because the technically correct one is out of reach.