John's Blog

We Are Irrational

Seeing another person with beliefs that are devoid of logic and reason is a beautiful thing.

It’s the best way of seeing that vast irrationality lives inside of you as well.

And this irrationality likely exists as a deeply held belief that you could not imagine is wrong.

The Line Between Compassion and Self-Righteousness

“Hey, read this book/do this thing/be like this, it’ll change your life” is more self-righteous than compassionate. Real compassion is being the space for the other person to exist just as they are.

Limited Edition

“Limited edition” means it doesn’t sell enough on its own.

Not All Informed Choices Are The Same

Some marriages are good marriages.

All divorces are good divorces.

Opt-Out

Everything great in life should be opt-out, not opt-in.

Confirmation bias is especially deadly because we cannot prove anything with confirming examples; induction will fail us. The proposition that all swans are white is not confirmed by seeing another white swan. Examples can never prove us correct, only wrong. While we ignore the one black swan out of the 1,000 we see, that one swan proves that our proposition was incorrect. We never confirm, only disprove.