mind traps
“In driver’s training we were taught to identify our visual blind spots and eliminate them with the help of mirrors and sensors. In life (...) we need to learn to recognize our cognitive blind spots and revise our thinking accordingly”
from Think Again by Adam Grant
Hindsight bias is the tendency, after an outcome is known, to see the outcome as having been inevitable. When we say, “I should have known that would happen,” or, “I should have seen it coming,” we are succumbing to hindsight bias.
hindsight bias
a machine that tries to circumvent thinking
Poker players call this tendency to confuse the quality of a decision with the quality of its outcome resulting, and it’s a dangerous tendency. A bad decision can lead to a good outcome, after all, and good decisions can lead to bad outcomes. No one who’s driven home drunk has woken up the next day and seen it as a good decision just because they
... See moreSelf-Serving Bias: This is the tendency to blame external forces when bad things happen and to credit ourselves when good things happen. It is based on our lack of development of the three core capacities—locus of control, scope of considering, and source of agency. According to this bias, when I win a poker hand, it is due to my skill at reading
... See moreself-serving bias
Baader-Meinhof phenomenon,” Olive said when I mentioned it at lunch. “My brother just told me about this. You don’t notice something and then you learn the name for it and suddenly it’s everywhere.”
Baader-Meinhoff Phenomenon
In hindsight bias, people who know the outcome of a situation believe the outcome should have been easy to predict in advance.
hindsight bias