Hodgepodge 4/365 - Learning Something New

I have a love-hate relationship with Facebook. I know I am not alone in this. Especially at this moment in time. (The election. Shudder.)

But the love part—I love it because it makes me feel somewhat surrounded by friends from all over, and from so many of my various avenues of life. It's not like I have a lot of friends; I'm just an ordinary person, no "followers." But I've got diverse friends with many interests, and I enjoy that diversity.

I also, especially, love FB for all the things that people share—including warm-fuzzy kitten videos, but even more, websites and videos where I actually learn something.

When I finished my last daily blog, one possible "theme" I considered for a new one (if I was ever so crazy as to do another, which, forget it) was "Learning something new," as in: if you're paying attention, you really can learn something new every day. Because there's a heck of a lot to learn, and the avenues for doing so are myriad, thanks to the Internet. And I figured, why not start collecting some of those tidbits, right here? Except, of course, I was not crazy enough to do another daily blog.

Until four days ago.

So here I am, with free rein to write about whatever. Including: new stuff! New to me, anyway.

This ties in with FB because just yesterday I ran across this extremely cool graphic on cognitive biases, by one John Mannoogian III, that a friend had posted:

I shared it on FB. Then this morning a different friend shared the original blog post on the Better Humans website with me, where the author of the information on which this extremely cool graphic was based, one Buster Benson, described his process and all the various implications of his research.

I would have seen neither of these fascinating things without FB.

So, yeah: mostly love. Though next Tuesday can't come too soon.

As for this blog, my blog, I often stumble on wonderful stuff like this, share it on FB, and then lose track/sight of it. I try to bookmark things, but then I never go back and look at my bookmarks, which just pile up anyway. So many links, so little time. So I figure this blog can (in part) be a repository for fascination. I will also just blab about my day, or about my random thoughts and opinions, as appropriate. (That's why I called this iteration "Hodgepodge.")

But back to the extremely cool graphic, from which I believe I will learn quite a lot as I continue to study it. Buster Benson's entire explication is well worth reading, but here's his summary of four major problems that biases help us—yes, ALL of us—address, whether we like it or not (I quote his points directly):

1. Too much information
We notice things that are already primed in memory or repeated often.
Bizarre/funny/visually-striking/anthropomorphic things stick out more than non-bizarre/unfunny things.
We notice when things have changed.
We are drawn to details that confirm our existing beliefs.
We notice flaws in others more easily than flaws in ourselves.
2. Not enough meaning
We find stories and patterns even in sparse data.
We fill in characteristics from stereotypes, generalities, and prior histories whenever there are new specific instances or gaps in information.
We imagine things and people we’re familiar with or fond of as better than things and people we aren’t familiar with or fond of.
We simplify probabilities and numbers to make them easier to think about. 
We think we know what others are thinking.
We project our current mindset and assumptions onto the past and future.
3. Need to act fast
In order to act, we need to be confident in our ability to make an impact and to feel like what we do is important.
In order to stay focused, we favor the immediate, relatable thing in front of us over the delayed and distant.
In order to get anything done, we’re motivated to complete things that we’ve already invested time and energy in.
In order to avoid mistakes, we’re motivated to preserve our autonomy and status in a group, and to avoid irreversible decisions.
We favor options that appear simple or that have more complete information over more complex, ambiguous options.
4. What should we remember?
We edit and reinforce some memories after the fact.
We discard specifics to form generalities.
We reduce events and lists to their key elements.
We store memories differently based on how they were experienced.

He boils those points down to these:

1. Information overload sucks, so we aggressively filter. Noise becomes signal. (Downside: We don’t see everything. Some of the information we filter out is actually useful and important.)
2. Lack of meaning is confusing, so we fill in the gaps. Signal becomes a story. (Downside: Our search for meaning can conjure illusions. We sometimes imagine details that were filled in by our assumptions, and construct meaning and stories that aren’t really there.)
3. We need to act fast lest we lose our chance, so we jump to conclusions. Stories become decisions. (Downside: Quick decisions can be seriously flawed. Some of the quick reactions and decisions we jump to are unfair, self-serving, and counterproductive.)
4. This isn't getting easier, so we try to remember the important bits. Decisions inform our mental models of the world. (Downside: Our memory reinforces errors. Some of the stuff we remember for later just makes all of the above systems more biased, and more damaging to our thought processes.)

Buster Benson ends, fittingly, with this poem by Emily Dickinson:

The Brain — is wider — than the Sky
For — put them side by side — 
The one the other will contain
With ease — and You — beside —