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I think when one looks around, narrative fallacy is ever-present. The evidence is all around us, in virtually every newspaper and book. We seek to make the worl

I think when one looks around, narrative fallacy is ever-present. The evidence is all around us, in virtually every newspaper and book. We seek to make the world cause and effect, to make people "good" or "bad", etc. One of my personal pet peeves around this fallacy is how often it arises in sports. Before Jordan won 6 championships, he was a "great player who didn't elevate his teammates". After all the winning, he became "the greatest player to ever play". People just want a simple story, because they're busy - it's hard to have a nuanced view of everything you see or hear about.

bryanrasmussen 6y ago
>I think when one looks around, narrative fallacy is ever-present Yes I think the same, it's certainly a comforting story to tell oneself about why people reduce the complex world to simple narratives, thus narrative fallacy if it exists falls prey to narrative fallacy. However I have to assume that I could be wrong and what I perceive as examples of this narrative fallacy and demonstrating its existence do nothing of the sort. Finally, the evidence all around us that I perceive does not lead to a proof of a biological inclination. It just leads to my consideration that there might be one. So if Jeff Bezos or Nassim Taleb tells me it's a biological inclination, I would be inclined to find some polite way to tell him to prove it.
__s 6y ago
Yep. "biological inclination" doesn't have to mean there's some "fallacy gene". It just means that our brains have evolved to extrapolate as much as possible for the least effort (you try running a computer on this wattage..), we want fast decisions & most people don't want to have to maintain dozens of constraints in their head (only recently have we started learning to write down these constraints, which is much easier to keep track of) Meanwhile ideas have evolutionary pressure too. It's called memes. Memes work best when they require low effort from their carriers. If a meme requires some existing knowledge, & truth often relies on knowledge, that means it can only be transmitted to those with the knowledge, unless it brings that knowledge as baggage

bryanrasmussen 6y ago

>I think when one looks around, narrative fallacy is ever-present Yes I think the same, it's certainly a comforting story to tell oneself about why people reduce the complex world to simple narratives, thus narrative fallacy if it exists falls prey to narrative fallacy. However I have to assume that I could be wrong and what I perceive as examples of this narrative fallacy and demonstrating its existence do nothing of the sort. Finally, the evidence all around us that I perceive does not lead to a proof of a biological inclination. It just leads to my consideration that there might be one. So if Jeff Bezos or Nassim Taleb tells me it's a biological inclination, I would be inclined to find some polite way to tell him to prove it.

__s 6y ago

Yep. "biological inclination" doesn't have to mean there's some "fallacy gene". It just means that our brains have evolved to extrapolate as much as possible for the least effort (you try running a computer on this wattage..), we want fast decisions & most people don't want to have to maintain dozens of constraints in their head (only recently have we started learning to write down these constraints, which is much easier to keep track of) Meanwhile ideas have evolutionary pressure too. It's called memes. Memes work best when they require low effort from their carriers. If a meme requires some existing knowledge, & truth often relies on knowledge, that means it can only be transmitted to those with the knowledge, unless it brings that knowledge as baggage