[b]Michael Lewis
To Redelmeier the very idea that there was a great deal of uncertainty in medicine went largely unacknowledged by its authorities. There was a reason for this: To acknowledge uncertainty was to admit the possibility of error. The entire profession had arranged itself as if to confirm the wisdom of its decisions.[/b]
Works that way for philosophers too. You know the ones.
The way the creative process works is that you first say something, and later, sometimes years later, you understand what you said.
Or, sure, sometimes you go to the grave not understanding it.
The deep problem with the system was a kind of moral inertia. So long as it served the narrow self-interests of everyone inside it, no one on the inside would ever seek to change it, no matter how corrupt or sinister it became—though even to use words like “corrupt” and “sinister” made serious people uncomfortable, and so Brad avoided them.
And that goes double [at least] for Don.
What happened was that everyone in Ireland had the idea that somewhere in Ireland there was a little wise old man who was in charge of the money, and this was the first time they’d ever seen this little man, says McCarthy. And then they saw him and said, Who the fuck was that??? Is that the fucking guy who is in charge of the money??? That’s when everyone panicked.
Human nature as it were.
Before I went to college the military had this “we do more before 9am than most people do all day” and I used to think and I do more than the military. As you know there are some select people that just find a drive in certain activities that supersedes everything else.
And not just the assholes anymore.
Confirmation bias, he’d heard this called. The human mind was just bad at seeing things it did not expect to see, and a bit too eager to see what it expected to see. Confirmation bias is the most insidious because you don’t even realize it is happening, he said.
He means you, Mr. Objectivist. Or, worst case scenario, me.