The mistaken attitude comes from both status considerations and a map-territory confusion. I think the author could do better by being explicit about what the cause or causes of the problem are, and also by putting more emphasis on the second issue.
It seems that in his post, Birnbaum implicates status as most if not all of the cause of our misperception,
And I should add that I’m not saying that I, personally, know how to suppress my own ego, or even that I succeed in doing it when I try. I’m just saying that I know I should.
However, the map-territory error is a significant cause of confusion. The mechanism is that people might feel that by believing something about the world, they can make it true in the world.
While I don’t follow baseball or baseball sabermetrics at all, and have never taken a course on statistics, I learned about statistics through GVT, VUKOTA, Corsi, qualcomp, and the other hockey sabermetrics. Here is something from just a few days ago:
We’ve already concluded that it doesn’t seem to stem from any lingering injury effects. Nor does it make sense to be a case of suddenly diminished skills…after all, we’re talking about a talented player in his mid-20s. So what option does that leave?
The most obvious remaining choice is a change in usage under current head coach Claude Julien. So let’s examine some of Bergeron’s statistics to find out if the talented pivot isn’t being non-optimally utilized on the man advantage. If the answer is yes, it’s actually good news for Boston, believe it or not. There could be a significant untapped resource for providing more goal-scoring production (Bergeron is signed through 2013-14) sitting on the Bruins roster, waiting to be taken advantage of.
Emphasis added. I agree with what the author of the above quote implies, that even when ego is not at stake, when evaluating third parties’ situations, it is counter-intuitive to think that someone’s having been wrong or foolish until now indicates they are in a good situation. This indicates that however important ego and status are, the map-territory confusion is sufficient to cause the mistake the blog post warns of.
In the example, someone assumes that readers will not realize that a third party (The Bruins) having been wrong is good for them, even though there is no ego involved for most readers.
That’s a slightly different case, though, isn’t it? The author is not saying “it’s good news for Boston [fans]” because they now are right when they were wrong before, and now their map is more accurate. Rather, he’s saying that it’s good news for Boston [fans] because the state of the world in the “right” case means more future Boston success than the state of the world in the “wrong” case.
Suppose Bergeron was doing well instead of poorly, and the author argued that it’s because the coach is playing him too much and he’s going to get tired or injured. In that case, the author might argue “Is Bergeron being played on every power play when he used to be played only rarely? If the answer is yes, it’s actually bad news for Boston, believe it or not.”
In other words, the “good news” and “bad news” don’t seem to refer to the desirability of the map matching the territory. In this particular context, they refer to the desirability of the territory itself.
Great point Phil! I didn’t see that, that is an important difference in the cases.
I had mentally automatically interpreted your point “it’s bad to be wrong. Therefore, if you’re wrong, the best thing is to *stop being wrong*. And the way to stop being wrong is to change your mind.” as a special case of his, “the state of the world in the ‘was wrong/am right’ case means more future success than the state of the world in the ‘was wrong/still wrong’ case.”
The mistaken attitude comes from both status considerations and a map-territory confusion. I think the author could do better by being explicit about what the cause or causes of the problem are, and also by putting more emphasis on the second issue.
It seems that in his post, Birnbaum implicates status as most if not all of the cause of our misperception,
However, the map-territory error is a significant cause of confusion. The mechanism is that people might feel that by believing something about the world, they can make it true in the world.
While I don’t follow baseball or baseball sabermetrics at all, and have never taken a course on statistics, I learned about statistics through GVT, VUKOTA, Corsi, qualcomp, and the other hockey sabermetrics. Here is something from just a few days ago:
Emphasis added. I agree with what the author of the above quote implies, that even when ego is not at stake, when evaluating third parties’ situations, it is counter-intuitive to think that someone’s having been wrong or foolish until now indicates they are in a good situation. This indicates that however important ego and status are, the map-territory confusion is sufficient to cause the mistake the blog post warns of.
The point is well-taken that there are causes other than ego, and I could have mentioned that in the post.
I’m not sure what you’re getting at with the hockey example, though.
In the example, someone assumes that readers will not realize that a third party (The Bruins) having been wrong is good for them, even though there is no ego involved for most readers.
Ah, OK.
That’s a slightly different case, though, isn’t it? The author is not saying “it’s good news for Boston [fans]” because they now are right when they were wrong before, and now their map is more accurate. Rather, he’s saying that it’s good news for Boston [fans] because the state of the world in the “right” case means more future Boston success than the state of the world in the “wrong” case.
Suppose Bergeron was doing well instead of poorly, and the author argued that it’s because the coach is playing him too much and he’s going to get tired or injured. In that case, the author might argue “Is Bergeron being played on every power play when he used to be played only rarely? If the answer is yes, it’s actually bad news for Boston, believe it or not.”
In other words, the “good news” and “bad news” don’t seem to refer to the desirability of the map matching the territory. In this particular context, they refer to the desirability of the territory itself.
Great point Phil! I didn’t see that, that is an important difference in the cases.
I had mentally automatically interpreted your point “it’s bad to be wrong. Therefore, if you’re wrong, the best thing is to *stop being wrong*. And the way to stop being wrong is to change your mind.” as a special case of his, “the state of the world in the ‘was wrong/am right’ case means more future success than the state of the world in the ‘was wrong/still wrong’ case.”