March 26, 2014

I love recognizing when I’m wrong. If we’re wrong and recognize it we have automatically learned something new about the world.

Being wrong often generates cognitive dissonance. For me, I am compelled to enthusiastically explore the new idea or evidence and reconcile it with my original view. This is sometimes called “updating beliefs”. The process is often accompanied by joy and deep appreciation for the lesson learned.

Occasionally I’ll be embarrassed, but this happens less and less as I train myself to view the process as a normal part of being human.

I’d estimate I’m wrong about 20% of the time in my day-to-day decision making.

Approximately 66% of that is due to fatigue and stress and the other 33% due to cognitive biases. Ironically, I know I am wrong with this statement. But how wrong? One day I’ll do a n=1 study with proper controls to get clearer on this issue.

There are levels of “wrongness”. Being 15% off about how long a task will take to complete does not pass a threshold for wrongness I find very interesting. I don’t learn much. Being 100% off is, and often reveals insights about our natural planning fallacy. Even more interesting is being wrong about a market opportunity or a utility increase from a new job. I especially love those kinds of lessons.