Superstitious people don't understand probability

David DiSalvo, writing in Neuronarrative, has an interesting discussion on the role of the fallacy of conjunction in paranormal beliefs. Hat tip to Vaughan from Mind Hacks for the link and connecting it to Jung's idea of synchronicity.

DiSalvo's blog post is based on an article entitled Paranormal belief and susceptibility to the conjunction fallacy in the journal of Applied Cognitive Psychology. The abstract for the article reads as follows:

"Numerous studies have shown paranormal believers misperceive randomness and are poor at judging probability. Despite the obvious relevance to many types of alleged paranormal phenomena, no one has examined whether believers are more susceptible to the conjunction fallacy; that is to misperceiving co-occurring (conjunct) events as being more likely than singular (constituent) events alone. The present study examines believer vs. non-believer differences in conjunction errors for both paranormal and non-paranormal events presented as either a probability or a frequency estimation task. As expected, believers made more conjunction errors than non-believers. This was true for both event types, with both groups making fewer errors for paranormal than for non-paranormal events. Surprisingly, the response format (probability vs. frequency) had little impact. Results are discussed in relation to paranormal believers' susceptibility to the conjunction fallacy and more generally, to their propensity for probabilistic reasoning biases."

DiSalvo explains the fallacy of conjunction as a tendency to believe that when events co-occur (or conjunct) they were ‘meant’ to co-occur, or at least were more likely to co-occur than a single event occurring alone. According to the article in the the journal of Applied Cognitive Psychology rerferred to above, the conjunction fallacy could be at the core of belief in the paranormal.

As pointed out by Vaughan from Mind Hacks, the fallacy of conjunction also features in Jung's concept of synchronicity (or meaningful coincidence). Wikipedia defines sychronicity as:

"Synchronicity is the experience of two or more events which are causally unrelated occurring together in a supposedly meaningful manner. In order to count as synchronicity, the events should be unlikely to occur together by chance."

I found it surprising to read in Wikipedia that the physicist Wolfgang Pauli co-authored an article on synchronicity with Jung, considering Pauli's views on pseudoscience and his famous quote on that topic:

"It's not right, it's not even wrong."

Those were the early days of quantum physics and I suspect that you would not find too many serious phycisists today who would consider linking physics with nonsense like synchronicity.

In closing, I believe that when looking at the fallacy of conjunction, one should also consider confirmation bias.

A trillion

How much is a trillion? Or should it be how many?

A trillion is a million million, or 1,000,000,000,000.

According to 100777.com,a trillion dollars laid end to end would stretch almost to the sun. The American Handgunner magazine in its July/August 2009 edition, has a particularly interesting way of concretizing it:

"CCI makes about 1,000,000 rounds of .22LR ammo daily. If you figure about 250 workdays a year, it would take four years to make a billion - and 4,000 years to make a trillion."

According to Wikipedia the United States national debt now is $11 trillion, but is set to rise to $20 trillion by 2015.

It is said that when America sneezes the whole world suffers. We seem to be in for a rough ride. Those damn greedy bankers, ... and politicians, ... and ..., probably all of us.

Is Oprah a whole-brain half-wit too?

When will the left brain right brain myth suffer a welcome and timely death? Well, certainly not while celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey keep on mindlessly promoting it on their shows.

The neuroscience concensus is clear - it is nonsensical to refer to people as left brained or right brained. Oprah, however, states unequivocably that right-brainers will rule this century. She gained this penetrating insight into the workings of the human mind in an interview with Daniel Pink, the author of A Whole New Mind.

From the blurb for the show:

Pink, a former chief speechwriter for former Vice President Al Gore, presents a convincing argument that our country is entering a new era -- the so-called conceptual age -- during which right-brained skills such as design and storytelling will become far more crucial than traditionally left-brained skills such as accounting and computer programming.

Pink's views on which skills will be required in this century may well have merit, but what does it have to do with the right brain? Is he just trying to sell his book on the back of the seduction of neuroscience?

Oprah recounts on the show how she addressed graduating students at Stanford University and gave each student a copy of Pink's book. A fine gesture to be sure. I trust that, unlike Oprah, the students will have the sense to see through the nonsense. I'm not so sure about her millions of followers though.

Genius is just hard work?

David Brooks, writes as follows in the New York Times on Genius: The Modern View:

"Some people live in romantic ages. They tend to believe that genius is the product of a divine spark. They believe that there have been, throughout the ages, certain paragons of greatness — Dante, Mozart, Einstein — whose talents far exceeded normal comprehension, who had an other-worldly access to transcendent truth, and who are best approached with reverential awe."

but,

The latest research suggests a more prosaic, democratic, even puritanical view of the world. The key factor separating geniuses from the merely accomplished is not a divine spark. It’s not I.Q., a generally bad predictor of success, even in realms like chess. Instead, it’s deliberate practice. Top performers spend more hours (many more hours) rigorously practicing their craft.

Interesting, but hardly new. I haven't had time to check out the science, but his commenters mostly disagree.

It is certainly encouraging to the aspiring expert in any field to have this positive message: "Work hard and diligently enough and you will get there". Some commenters to Brooks article distinguish between being successful and being a genius in a particular field. That, I think, sums it up. I have in many fields of achievement seen the difference between "naturals" and "ordinary's" who are just prepared to work hard. There is just no way someone with ordinary talent will reach the same heights as a natural who will work as diligently. That should not discourage those of ordinary talent. They can still end up pretty good, and that is good enough for most of us.

Now to look at the science when I get the time!