On today’s Animal Spirits, Re-Kindled, Ben and I dive into one of the best books ever on decision making, Superforecasting.
Listen here
Items discussed
An open letter to Ben Bernanke
Quotes
“Every day, the news media deliver forecasts without reporting, or even asking, how good the forecasters who made the forecasts really are.”
“Old forecasts are like old news- soon forgotten- and pundits are almost never asked to reconcile what they said with what actually happened.”
“Our desire to reach into the future will always exceed our grasp. But debunkers go too far when they dismiss all forecasting as a fool’s errand.”
“Sometimes forecasts are meant to entertain.”
“It is wise to take admissions of uncertainty seriously.” (Daniel Kahneman)
“That too is consistent with the EPJ data, which revealed an inverse correlation between fame and accuracy: the more famous an expert was, the less accurate he was.”
“Few things are harder than mental time travel.”
“Knowledge is something we can all increase, but only slowly.”
“Once we know the outcome of something, that knowledge skews our perception of what we thought before we knew the outcome.”
“Underlying superforecasting is a spirit of humility- a sense that the complexity of reality is staggering, our ability to comprehend limited, and mistakes inevitable.”
“Not even knowing it’s an illusion can switch off the illusion.”
