Better: Imitate what successful people do/did in your situation.
Or perhaps: Adopt the most successfully tested strategy; if you think you’ve figured out something better, ask first why you don’t see others doing it already.
The problem is that you are more likely to know how things turned out for successful people than for unsuccessful ones. A policy which has a large chance of disaster but a small chance of great success might appear to be very good under this heuristic, since it worked great for everyone you’ve heard of.
Excellent point. I was thinking more in terms of social strategies, which don’t seem to have devastating black swan outcomes in the way that “guaranteed” gambling or investment strategies do. Is there a pithy way to make that distinction?
Better: Imitate what successful people do/did in your situation.
Or perhaps: Adopt the most successfully tested strategy; if you think you’ve figured out something better, ask first why you don’t see others doing it already.
The problem is that you are more likely to know how things turned out for successful people than for unsuccessful ones. A policy which has a large chance of disaster but a small chance of great success might appear to be very good under this heuristic, since it worked great for everyone you’ve heard of.
Excellent point. I was thinking more in terms of social strategies, which don’t seem to have devastating black swan outcomes in the way that “guaranteed” gambling or investment strategies do. Is there a pithy way to make that distinction?