Daniel Kahneman – A Bat and a Ball Cost $1.10

Daniel Kahneman[Update 9/8/2010 A paper Danny co-authored, "Income's Influence on Happiness" has just been released.]

… the bat costs $1 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost? Daniel Kahneman KNOWS that the first thought that entered your head was $.10–even if you're a Computer Science major at MIT. But that's the wrong answer.

Daniel Gilbert's "Stumbling On Happiness" led me to Nicholas Taleb's "Fooled By Randomness". Both books cite the work of Danny Kahneman. I blogged a bit about him here. I have been rummaging around the internet looking for whatever I can find on Danny and his work and have come up with some excellent content. But let me give you a taste of the sort of fascinating facts you'll hear in Danny's lectures first.

In a study Danny (I don't know him personally but after listening to all these lectures, I feel as though I do. He could no doubt name the cognitive bias this suggests) mentions in one of his talks, people are asked how much pleasure they derive from their car. They are then asked enough questions about the car to determine its blue book (resale) value. It turns out that there IS a correlation between the amount of pleasure the subject reported and the dollar value of the car. i.e. Yes, that late model BMW in the garage DOES give you more pleasure than my 20 year old Honda would. BUT! They then go on to ask the subject if they find their commute to work pleasurable, and guess what?– nobody does!. It turns out that the ONLY time people derive pleasure from their car is when they are THINKING about it.

From Wikipedia:
With Amos Tversky (Kahneman's longtime research partner, with whom he would have shared the Nobel prize had Tversky not died in 1996) and others, Kahneman established a cognitive basis for common human errors using heuristics and biases (Kahneman & Tversky, 1973, Kahneman, Slovic & Tversky, 1982), and developed Prospect theory (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979). He was awarded the 2002 the Nobel Prize in Economics for his work in Prospect theory.

Major Contributions:

  • anchoring and adjustment -describes the common human tendency to rely too heavily, or "anchor," on one trait or piece of information when making decisions.
  • availability heuristic -where people base their prediction of the frequency of an event or the proportion within a population based on how easily an example can be brought to mind.
  • conjunction fallacy -when it is assumed that specific conditions are more probable than a general condition that contains the specific condition. (i.e. You think you're MORE likely to die in an air disaster brought on by a terrorist event, than you are to die in ANY kind of air disaster).
  • framing (economics) -reversals of preference when the same problem is presented in different ways. (10% fat vs. 90% fat-free!)
  • loss aversion -the tendency for people strongly to prefer avoiding losses than acquiring gains. (Why New Yorkers stay in New York for the culture, and Angelenos stay in LA for the weather!!).
  • peak-end rule – we judge our past experiences almost entirely on how they were at their peak (pleasant or unpleasant) and how they ended.
  • prospect theory -how people make choices in situations where they have to decide between alternatives that involve risk.
  • reference class forecasting -predicts the outcome of a planned action based on actual outcomes in a reference class of similar actions.
  • simulation heuristic – people determine the likelihood of an event based on how easy it is to picture mentally. (Why we buy lottery tickets.)
  • status quo bias -in other words, people like things to stay relatively the same.

Media – Most of these lectures have a fairly long-winded intro. Skip ahead if you don't need the background info.

Explorations of the Mind – Well-Being: Living and Thinking About It Real Player Version.
(Actually worked better on Ye Olde Mac with a slower DSL connection).

The Wonders and the Flaws of Intuitive Thinking. (Real Player) Princeton Assembly for the Class of 2008.

Conversation With History – Intuition and Rationality (Real Player)

Download Conversation With History – Intuition and Rationality mp3.

Download "Explorations of the Mind – Intuition: The Marvels and the Flaws" mp3.

"Explorations of the Mind – Intuition: The Marvels and the Flaws" (Real Player)

Psychology and Behavioral Economics (Real Player)

Nobel Prize Lecture (Windows Media or Real Player)

Update March 2009- Kahneman and Taleb on the same stage discus the crash.

Update April 2009- Excellent Kahneman article at Haaretz.com.

Daniel Kahneman: The riddle of experience vs. memory

Update March 2010. From the February 2010 Ted talks.

Found a few more DK links.
A Perspective on Judgment and Choice 24pg. PDF doc. on the subject of his Nobel Prize.
The Allais Paradox Wired magazine 10/10

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Albert Hofmann Transmitter/Receiver UCSB 1983

Saint Albert

Portrait by Alex Grey
High Quality (64MB) mp3 46 minutes.
Download "Transmitter/Receiver" Albert Hofmann at the UCSB Psychedelics Conference ll, 1983.

Nassim Nicholas Taleb – The Future Ain't What It Used To Be

Nassim Nicholas TalebIf you want to be a dentist, it's rational to assume that if you go to school, get your degree, and set up a dental practice, you will be able to attain a comfortable standard of living. You may be able to project your probable income range with some degree of accuracy.
But if you want to be a rock star, it's irrational to assume that if you go to rock school, get good at guitar, and start a band, you will become rich and famous.
According to Nassim Nicholas Taleb's way of thinking, the dentist and the wannabe rock star fall into two distinct categories with drastically different risk characteristics. The dentist falls into the domain he calls 'Mediocristan', and the rock star, 'Extremistan'. Extremistan is dominated by 'fat tails', or rare but profoundly significant events. Problems arise when we think we're operating in Mediocristan but in fact are operating in Extremistan."Karl Marx wanted to turn knowledge into action, what I want to do is turn our lack of knowledge into action". Taleb suggests that by becoming aware of our own ignorance, we can stop taking action where our action is irrational.
I'm on my second reading of Fooled By Randomness and am very much looking forward to The Black Swan. In the meantime I've been hunting down all the audio I can find on Taleb because his talks are extremely interesting and he is a very engaging speaker. He has a bit of attitude when addressing an audience, in part no doubt because much of what he has to say offends of lot of people, especially anyone whose expertise is related to forecasting. He has obvious disdain for financial forecasters in particular, probably because he sees the impact these 'guys in suits riding around in limousines' have on the lives of 'people taking the subway to work everyday' (i.e.pensions).
What Taleb has to say has resonated with me at a very deep level. Much of the facts and studies he brings to light confirm my long lingering suspicion that something about the way the world sees itself is profoundly inaccurate and weirdly irrational.
I've listened to each of these talks at least a half dozen times and every time I do I take away another profound insight. Be sure to check out Taleb's Home Page as well.
Taleb on EconTalk.org April 30, 2007
LongNow Lecture-The Future Has Always Been Crazier Than We Thought Feb. 4, 2007
And from PopTech 2005:
Nassim Nicholas Taleb is not afraid to say "I don't know." In fact, he's proud of his ignorance. A mathematician, philosopher and hedge-fund manager all in one iconoclastic package, Taleb demonstrates the wisdom in admitting the limitations of our knowledge.

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Biblical Entheogens: a Speculative Hypothesis

Time and Mind JournalA lot of noise on the internet today around a recently published article in a new journal called Time and Mind by cognitive psychology professor Benny Shanon on the subject of Moses and Entheogens.

Abstract:
A speculative hypothesis is presented according to which the ancient Israelite religion was associated with the use of entheogens (mind-altering plants used in sacramental contexts). The hypothesis is based on a new look at texts of the Old Testament pertaining to the life of Moses. The ideas entertained here were primarily based on the fact that in the arid areas of the Sinai peninsula and Southern Israel there grow two plants containing the same psychoactive molecules found in the plants from which the powerful Amazonian hallucinogenic brew Ayahuasca is prepared. The two plants are species of Acacia tree and the bush Peganum harmala. The hypothesis is corroborated by comparative experiential-phenomenological observations, linguistic considerations, exegesis of old Jewish texts and other ancient Mideastern traditions, anthropological lore, and ethnobotanical data.

The entire 25 page article can be downloaded for free from here (scroll down to bottom of page, if the pdf link stops working let me know in the comments, I have a copy.)

ayahuasca peyote magic mushrooms

google trends 030508 peyote ayahuasca magic mushrooms

Utah High Court OKs Non-Indian Peyote Use
New York Newsday – Jun 23 2004
American Indian church leader sues Utah officials over 2000 peyote raid
KATC – Apr 28 2005
'Medicine man' arrested on peyote charges
Centre Daily Times – Jun 24 2005
Study: Religious peyote use not harmful to American Indians
KESQ – Nov 4 2005
Charges dropped vs. couple in peyote case
Macon Telegraph – Feb 23 2006
Netherlands bans magic mushrooms
TREND Information – Oct 12 2007

See Also:
This is an article in two parts. The first part discusses current research in psychoactive preparations of ergot in various religious systems with a particular emphasis on Persian, Greek, Jewish and Islamic sources.
Incense is psychoactive: Scientists identify the biology behind the ceremony.

Anxiety Culture

Crap JobFun, Bob-meets-Discordia web magazine Anxiety Culture. Great graphics too.

The cliché, "never put off until tomorrow..", can be reversed for people who worry about problems. It's always better to postpone worrying. An effective postponement device is the "˜worry sheet', which is a piece of paper for writing down your problem/worry as it occurs – so you can forget it now, and deal with it at some later date. Minor worries can be postponed indefinitely.

Rather than putting off life's pleasures until after you've solved all your problems (ie after you're dead), you postpone all the worrying until after you've finished having a good time.

Horizon: Psychedelic science by Bill Eagles

mind-hacks.png

Mind Hacks is a collection of probes into the moment-by-moment workings of our brain with a view to understanding ourselves a little better and learning a little more, in a very real sense, about what makes us tick. It's by Tom Stafford and Matt Webb, and published by O'Reilly.

psychedelic-splash

And from the Mind Hacks Blog: In 1997, BBC science programme Horizon broadcast a legendary edition on the use of psychedelic drugs in medicine. Luckily, it's been uploaded to Google Video and you can now watch the whole thing online. Read more…

TVO's 'Big Ideas' – Another treasure trove.

Big Ideas video podcast TV Ontario produces a lecture format show featuring heavy thinkers. You can subscribe   here. I'm posting links to a particular show I found especially illuminating on the subject of micro-financing and a new book, 'A Billion Bootstraps' by Eric Thurman. Here's the mp3 lecture but check out TVO's Big Ideas Past Episodes page – hundreds of hours of pro audio lectures from the likes of Deepak Chopra,and Naomi Klein, as well as many you've not heard of before.

Seminars About Long Term Thinking

I've mentioned this before, but these lectures are just SO GOOD I think it worth repeating.
http://www.longnow.org/projects/seminars/

And check out what's coming up.

  • 02007
    • Dec. 14 (Friday) – Jon Ippolito & Joline Blais, "The Edge of Art"
  • 02008
    • Jan. 11 (Friday) – Paul Saffo, "Embracing Uncertainty: the secret to effective forecasting"
    • Feb. 4 (MONDAY) – Nassim Nicholas Taleb, "The Future Has Always Been Crazier Than We Thought"
    • Feb. 25 (MONDAY) – Craig Venter, "Joining 3.5 Billion Years of Microbial Invention"
    • Apr. 25 (Friday) – Niall Ferguson & Peter Schwartz, "Historian vs. Futurist on Human Progress"
    • May 21 (WEDNESDAY) – Iqbal Quadir, "Technology Empowers the Poorest"
    • Jul. 23 (WEDNESDAY) – Edward Burtynsky, "The 10,000-year Gallery"

2007 Women's Visionary Congress Audio Recordings

2007 Women's Visionary Congress Audio Recordings

womensvisionarycongress

The Women's Visionary Congress is a gathering of healers, activists, researchers and artists who are redefining the use of entheogens in contemporary society. This Congress will address the traditional uses of these substances and investigations into their therapeutic applications. Read more…

Favorites:
Annie Sprinkle
Adele Getty
Kat Harrison
Carolyn "Mountain Girl" Garcia

See Also:
SheShamans

A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy

Keynote Clay Shirky gave on Social Software at the O'Reilly Emerging Technology conference in Santa Clara on April 24, 2003

Good morning, everybody. I want to talk this morning about social software…there's a surprise. I want to talk about a pattern I've seen over and over again in social software that supports large and long-lived groups. And that pattern is the pattern described in the title of this talk: "A Group Is Its Own Worst Enemy." more…

And a fun way to read it!   Copy and paste the text into Spreeder and speed read it! You can also change the prefs to suit your speed reading tastes.

Michael Silverblatt, 'Bookworm', Interviews William Gibson

Unfortunately I can't link directly to the audio. You can subscribe to Bookworm in iTunes (and I highly recommend it). You can listen from this KCRW link to the Gibson interview page.

Spook Country (Putnam)
What's happened to William Gibson? Along with the most sophisticated future-predictions, speculations about the sociology of cities, and adventures in virtual post-realities, he has finally learned how to get his characters from one room to another. We explore this accomplishment (in which he takes a good deal of pride)

Asylum Street Spankers – Ribbons On Your SUV

Viral political satire in a musical theater setting!

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/KmsOIjzQ1V8" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

Or here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/v/KmsOIjzQ1V8