From Daniel Kahneman “Thinking, fast and slow”
Biases are the enemy of good decision making.
Is it Possible to Avoid Biases?
Kahneman is not optimistic that you can prevent Biases easily. A big problem is you will be blind to notice your own Biases.
“The message of these examples is not encouraging. Because System 1 operates automatically and cannot be turned off at will, errors of intuitive thought are often difficult to prevent. Biases cannot always be avoided, because System 2 may have no clue to the error. Even when cues to likely errors are available, errors can be prevented only by the enhanced monitoring and effortful activity of System 2.” (p. 27)
Here Are Kahneman’s Tips to Help Avoid Biases:
- Try to recognize situations where certain Biases are well known to show up. For example, if you see a number, you should quickly remind yourself that the Anchoring Effect will affect your decision making.
- To avoid Biases, you must slow down, concentrate, and think carefully. You must not make a quick intuitive decision. You must use the rational, slow thinking part of your brain (System 2).
- It is much easier to see Biases in other people, than to see it in yourself.
- Since it is difficult to see Biases in yourself, you need other people to help you see your Biases.
- Organizations are better than individuals in overcoming Biases. Organizations can make procedures, formulas, algorithms, and checklists to help avoid Biases.
“Organizations are better than individuals when it comes to avoiding errors, because they naturally think more slowly and have the power to impose orderly procedures. Organizations can institute and enforce the application of useful checklists, as well as more elaborate exercises, such as reference-class forecasting and the premortem.” (p. 417)
“As a way to live your life, however, continuous vigilance is not necessarily good, and it is certainly impractical. Constantly questioning our own thinking would be impossibly tedious, and System 2 is much too slow and inefficient to serve as a substitute for System 1 in making routine decisions. The best we can do is a compromise: learn to recognize situations in which mistakes are likely and try harder to avoid significant mistakes when the stakes are high. The premise of this book is that it is easier to recognize other people’s mistakes than our own.” (p. 28)
Other Good Quotes How to Avoid Biases.
“This is how you will proceed when you next encounter the Müller-Lyer illusion. When you see lines with fins pointing in different directions, you will recognize the situation as one in which you should not trust your impressions of length. Unfortunately, this sensible procedure is least likely to be applied when it is needed most.” (p. 417)
“We would all like to have a warning bell that rings loudly whenever we are about to make a serious error, but no such bell is available, and cognitive illusions are generally more difficult to recognize than perceptual illusions.” (p. 417)
“it is much easier to identify a minefield (Bias) when you observe others wandering into it than when you are about to do so. Observers are less cognitively busy and more open to information than actors.” (p. 417)
“They (decision makers) will make better choices when they trust their critics to be sophisticated and fair, and when they expect their decision to be judged by how it was made, not only by how it turned out.” (p. 418)