Conversation

Chesterton-Miller Behavioral Fence: when you see people behaving in a seemingly suboptimal way, ask what you’re missing about what they’re actually optimizing for. Behavior is rarely suboptimal, but assumed cost functions are usually wrong.
16
398
I actually first started thinking this way as a critical response to behavioral economics models. I think almost all of that is badly flawed. If you poke at their various “biases” you can usually find a Chesterton-Miller fence.
1
4
Replying to and
Sure, one should start by assuming there is rationality of some sort at play; but one should also leave open the possibility that irrationality may, in fact, be at work. As Larry Summers famously remarked about the foolishness of the EMH: "There are idiots. Look around."
2
4
You’re slipping from ‘rational’ in one sense to ‘irrational’ in another. The latter is nearly always from the POV of an authoritarian. This is why it is so hard to persuade the subject they’re being irrational even with seemingly impeccable logic.
1
2
Show replies