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One test I've been toying with for 'smart person attempts to use their considerable intelligence to wave away inconvenient data' is "how many of these different reasons do they use when pushed towards a conclusion they don't want to accept?"

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Cedric Chin

@ejames_c

Aug 13, 2021

3/ It turns out there are basically only 7 ways you can respond to inconvenient data. 6 of them allow you to preserve your existing mental models. See if any of these are familiar to you, before we go through them in order:

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Cedric Chin

@ejames_c

Oct 5

The test applies to yourself, of course. If you catch yourself changing reasons more than 3 times, perhaps you might want to accept the conclusion? Instead of using your considerable intelligence to dig in?

Cedric Chin

@ejames_c

Oct 5

What isn't captured by the test: the scenario where you accept the data, change your conclusion, and then fail to take action on your updated conclusion, because ... reasons. (Which also regularly happens to reasonably smart people!)

Cedric Chin

@ejames_c

Perhaps one way to make this test more actionable/acceptable is to devil's advocate the acceptance. That is, don't accept the undesirable conclusion outright, but go "suppose this is true, what might this mean I have to do ...?"

5:09 PM · Oct 5, 2022Twitter Web App

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At which point, if every fibre of your being screams to look away, you know you've probably identified something you should take a closer look at.

Cedric Chin

@ejames_c

Oct 5

(I am workshopping this test, but in reality I've mostly trained myself to go look at the things that cause that internal 'DON'T LOOK HERE' feeling).