Category: choice
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on my mind
As the year comes to a close, I’ve been thinking a lot about thinking. Having explored books on topics covering neuroscience, consciousness, free will and logic this past year, I’ve come to appreciate more than ever how much a bunch of smart people have been thinking far more deeply about thought than I’d ever dared.…
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caution to the wind
“You can’t be too careful.” Or can you? Does this mean there’s no amount of caution that would be excessive – that the stakes are too high for any risk-taking? Or, alternatively, is this an admonition to avoid being too careful? In creative arts, risk aversion gets in the way of innovation. Might it be…
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proportionality
What’s with this love for proportionality? I’m referring to the notion that one side in a conflict should limit its response to an attack to be equal in force to that of the other side’s provocation. But nothing more. Can someone please explain why this is a good idea? The putative rationale I’ve heard is…
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u.s. elections
There’s this widely-held notion that the two-per-state composition of the U.S. Senate unduly advantages “red” states (rural areas) with sparse populations as compared to those more densely-populated (urban) “blue” states. A corollary to this idea is that the U.S. House of Representatives does the opposite, i.e., because it is a per capita form of representation (each…
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taking vs making
In the United States, the idiom used to describe the act of reaching closure on a set of choices under consideration is to “make the decision.” In the UK and much of Europe, the idiom for that act is to “take the decision.” Semantics aside, taking a decision suggests that the decider (a term popularized…
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dead or alive
Ben Franklin famously gave the advice of writing down pros and cons in two opposing columns, making an algebraic-like assessment, and then simply rendering the correct decision. The best choice of the two would then be obvious. Although that’s not bad counsel in certain narrow circumstances, it fails miserably as an effective approach to decision…
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democracy is popular
Democracy is awesome, right? Yet an inherent fundamental flaw remains: giving the power to the people, left to their own devices, the majority can easily exploit the minority. This shortcoming has reared its head repeatedly throughout history. When it gets particularly ugly, we call it “populism.” Put differently, populism is a rather common product of…
