We're on the Threat of the Moment

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We're in a period, whether that whole system, where democracy is really being threatened. Because the essence of democracy is that the assumption that what unites us is more important than what separates us. This is not qualitatively different from a religious belief. You don't have faith in the academy of sciencethe enterprise of science. If you want to get a spacecraft to mars, you use science, a technology. You don't use astrology. And now you and i share the belief that our system, the scientific system, is a correct one. We are not, very clearly in the majority, not in this country, not a bet onit. Its the conspirater to

Imagine that two doctors in the same city give different diagnoses to identical patients. Now imagine that the same doctor making a different decision depending on whether it is morning or afternoon, or Monday rather than Wednesday. This is an example of noise: variability in judgments that should be identical.

Shermer speaks with Nobel Prize winning psychologist and economist Daniel Kahneman about the detrimental effects of noise and what we can do to reduce both noise and bias, and make better decisions in: medicine, law, economic forecasting, forensic science, bail, child protection, strategy, performance reviews, and personnel selection.