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I would argue that the test was irrational: "(A) Linda is a bank teller or (B) Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement. Eighty-five perce

I would argue that the test was irrational: "(A) Linda is a bank teller or (B) Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement. Eighty-five percent of the subjects chose B". Many people could have assumed that being in set (B) automatically means set (A) = NOT set (B). Set (B) being more precisely defined, it can easily be assumed that anyone in set (B) is not in set (A). The participants can easily assume that a person can be in only 1 set (no rules were defined).

csallen 10y ago
So what you're saying is the participants went with their intuitive feeling about how the question might be structured as opposed to applying deliberate and effortful analysis/reasoning to understand what was being asked.
- Dylan16807 10y ago
  Such reasoning would not allow reading the question-asker's mind, so no. You can rationally arrive at either interpretation of the question.
  - csallen 10y ago
    As you yourself pointed out, it the idea that A = !B is an assumption. It's not supported by anything on the page whatsoever. In fact, it's explicitly rejected by what's on the page. Simply reading and reasoning about the answers, which are completely unambiguous, would lead one to conclude that B is a subset of A. Therefore it must be false that A = !B. There's no mind reading necessary, only rational thought. Listening to internally-generated assumptions without bothering to fact-check them via explicit reasoning is intuition.
    - Dylan16807 10y ago
      Language is naturally ambiguous and dependent on context. It's not lack of rationality that causes people to interpret questions in different ways. You can only show lack of rationality in a situation like this if they provide the wrong answer and understand the question.
      - csallen 10y ago
        The point isn't that people aren't capable of being rational. If they read the question carefully and think hard about it, of course they'll be able to figure it out. But that takes a lot of conscious effort. The point is that people aren't often willing to put in that effort, so they default to intuition. What's more, they might not even realize they're doing this.
        Dylan16807 10y ago
        But there is a huge difference between 'intuition about conversation' and 'intuition about the state of reality'. The former is not tied to rationality as much as practice at fighting through obtuse language. The latter is much closer to telling you whether people are thinking rationally by default. Compare https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12524799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12524799 this comment, where the kids already know which pile has more candy, but they don't understand what the weirdly-formatted question is asking.
        csallen 10y ago
        Interesting experiment. Based on thaumasiotes' description, I don't see any problem with the experimental design, only with the conclusion drawn from it. Something changed between the younger and older kids' ability to understand the question that was asked, and that in and of itself is interesting. I object to the characterization of these experiments as "communicating badly" or relying on "obtuse language". The questions asked in both experiments are exceedingly straightforward and unambiguous. If "which is longer" and "which is more likely to be true" fall below the bar for designating a question as confusing, then so does every other question imaginable. Conversation is an integral part of the "real world", and it's almost always far more ambiguous than examples we're examining. Yet we're still expected to parse and decipher conversation in order to survive in society: to thrive at your job, to vote for the best candidate, to get through school, etc. It's in no way useful to design an experiment that attempts to avoid conversation in a world that runs on conversation. There exist people who can consistently pick the correct answer in all of these experiments, no matter how the question is worded. And there exist people who will get it wrong unless the question is worded perfectly. Who is more rational? Who is better at grasping "the state of reality", as you put it? Who would you rather have on your team at work?

csallen 10y ago

So what you're saying is the participants went with their intuitive feeling about how the question might be structured as opposed to applying deliberate and effortful analysis/reasoning to understand what was being asked.

Dylan16807 10y ago
Such reasoning would not allow reading the question-asker's mind, so no. You can rationally arrive at either interpretation of the question.
- csallen 10y ago
  As you yourself pointed out, it the idea that A = !B is an assumption. It's not supported by anything on the page whatsoever. In fact, it's explicitly rejected by what's on the page. Simply reading and reasoning about the answers, which are completely unambiguous, would lead one to conclude that B is a subset of A. Therefore it must be false that A = !B. There's no mind reading necessary, only rational thought. Listening to internally-generated assumptions without bothering to fact-check them via explicit reasoning is intuition.
  - Dylan16807 10y ago
    Language is naturally ambiguous and dependent on context. It's not lack of rationality that causes people to interpret questions in different ways. You can only show lack of rationality in a situation like this if they provide the wrong answer and understand the question.
    - csallen 10y ago
      The point isn't that people aren't capable of being rational. If they read the question carefully and think hard about it, of course they'll be able to figure it out. But that takes a lot of conscious effort. The point is that people aren't often willing to put in that effort, so they default to intuition. What's more, they might not even realize they're doing this.
      - Dylan16807 10y ago
        But there is a huge difference between 'intuition about conversation' and 'intuition about the state of reality'. The former is not tied to rationality as much as practice at fighting through obtuse language. The latter is much closer to telling you whether people are thinking rationally by default. Compare https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12524799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12524799 this comment, where the kids already know which pile has more candy, but they don't understand what the weirdly-formatted question is asking.
        csallen 10y ago
        Interesting experiment. Based on thaumasiotes' description, I don't see any problem with the experimental design, only with the conclusion drawn from it. Something changed between the younger and older kids' ability to understand the question that was asked, and that in and of itself is interesting. I object to the characterization of these experiments as "communicating badly" or relying on "obtuse language". The questions asked in both experiments are exceedingly straightforward and unambiguous. If "which is longer" and "which is more likely to be true" fall below the bar for designating a question as confusing, then so does every other question imaginable. Conversation is an integral part of the "real world", and it's almost always far more ambiguous than examples we're examining. Yet we're still expected to parse and decipher conversation in order to survive in society: to thrive at your job, to vote for the best candidate, to get through school, etc. It's in no way useful to design an experiment that attempts to avoid conversation in a world that runs on conversation. There exist people who can consistently pick the correct answer in all of these experiments, no matter how the question is worded. And there exist people who will get it wrong unless the question is worded perfectly. Who is more rational? Who is better at grasping "the state of reality", as you put it? Who would you rather have on your team at work?