Nice psychology website

I happened upon this website today:

http://youarenotsosmart.com/

I found that it covered some interesting psychological phenomena, among others:

Thought I’d share.

Quick rejoinder to the sunk-cost “fallacy”:

The article implies that people behave irrationally when they base future decisions to some extent on past losses. Following Mises’ view of rationality, I think people are behaving perfectly rational there. Their preferences simply aren’t in line with mathematical or numerical rationality - i.e. strict monetary cost-versus-benefit ratios.

Mr. McRaney is wrong. There is no objectively “best” choice. If people subjectively consider the choice which negates the feeling of past loss to be the “best” one, so be it.

Perhaps Mr. McRaney is not so smart, either. :stuck_out_tongue:

More musings on the sunk-cost “fallacy”:

I submit that it’s powerful behavioral evidence for an evolutionary heritage in persistence hunting. Persistence hunting involves chasing down a single animal until it collapses from exhaustion. Many of our anatomical features (e.g. hairlessness and sweat glands all over our bodies) give us better endurance over most other mammals, especially during the hottest part of the day. But persistence hunting also requires mental endurance - the willingness to carry on in the face of grave obstacles. That mentality alone could make the difference between taking home a meal and coming home empty. So I think that’s where our fear of loss comes from. It’s a fear of future loss, i.e. not making a successful hunt.

Here’s one that tackles some of those and more:

6 Logical Fallacies That Cost You Money Every Day | Cracked.com

Not a fan of this mode of thinking.

We should take thoughts like “Less Wrong”, “Overcomming Bias”, and “You’re not as Smart as you think you are” to

“No such thing as wrong (or maybe right is what sells)”, “Asserting Bias”, and “You are as smart as you need to be”

And all science can do is categorize how people do such things and the consequences of the actions that exist within it’s logical structure. Otherwise this seems to fall into empty psychologisms or the current fad of hobby horse scientism.