https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1815228633239134483
Posted on 07/25/2024 4:55:47 PM PDT by ransomnote
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1815228633239134483
Application?
Basically “experts” are quick to question professionals in their area of expertise for being error prone - but assume all other professions are 100% accurate and unassailable.
Check.
This Gell-Mann amnesia effect describes experts who value expertise more than they value truth itself.
There are a lot of people like this.
They’re commonly called “Democrats.”
Bump
“Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.
In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.”
― Michael Crichton
I like your definition. Have a friend like that.
I never had that reaction. I hold everything I have read up to now as current data, ready to modify with the next data input. Nothing is truth. Just the known set of data. Wasn’t it in 5th grade we were taught how to be skeptical and analytical of articles in newspapers?
Never was interviewed for an article that gave a reliable translation of our interview. Never believed anyone else’s interview either. Even when I was the interviewer, all you’re hearing is someone else’s interpretation or memory. That’s interesting, in itself, but there’s nothing in what they’re saying that you should bet your life on.
Good explanation.
The mass media has a much deeper problem.
Even if they wanted to be objective—which of course they do not—they are relying on the public relations flaks of large organizations—government, corporate, non-government who are basically paid liars.
Everywhere I worked the average worker was banned from talking to the media. The senior executives or public relations flaks who did talk to the media either were ignorant of basic facts or lied about them.
Every single time.
bttt
Perhaps his screen name ought to be “random note”?
We taught our sons to question everything, give a lot of credence to their own experiences, and look “outside the box” for answers no matter the situation or question. Once, years ago when they were in their teens, we had a friend of theirs visiting, and a deep discussion arose about some subject or another.
The discussion wandered into the “what would you do if you were faced with that dilemma?” realm. The visiting friend refused to think for himself even as our sons were discussing all types of options. He kept responding, “I’d listen to the ‘experts’. My husband kept pushing the issue encouraging him to think for himself while asking him “what if no experts in that subject were around?” The teen simply could not come up with an answer. He insisted someone smarted than he and with a college education would be able to solve the problem.
The teen was a child of two university professors so I know how he arrived at such a point. His parents had taught him there was always an expert smarted than him in any subject so there was no need to think for himself. This was before the internet was in every home and we weren’t yet at the point where anything could be looked up on the internet (don’t depend on the internet). It was sad to see, especially since our sons were coming up with several interesting solutions to the problem. His solution remained, “Consult the experts”.
We need a law regarding too many authors. Maybe the “Author Inverse Cube Law”?
Article Credibility = (number authors)^(1/3)
I recently visited a family member in the hospital. I asked the attending doctor whether heart failure could possibly be attributed to a recent covid vax.
The doctor told me not to believe the stuff I read on the internet. He said, “My mother always told me not to believe anyone who didn’t have a PhD or MD after their name.”
I was stunned.
These people are everywhere!
“I read it on the internet, so it must be true”
When I was in engineering school, I had a prof. This is before laptops and phones. He started writing on the blackboard, and we were all taking notes. He wrote:
P
h
D
“Piled higher and deeper”
How true!
Doctors and medical researchers are particularly prone to the “believe the experts” mentality—many spent a lot of time and money becoming “experts” and believe it gives them status.
Their identity is tied up with that status.
If you question “experts” it feels like a personal attack on them.
Only the most “together” and emotionally secure medical professionals can rise above their prejudices.
My doctor is one of the good ones—she is very pragmatic—if it works for a particular patient she is in favor of it.
Rationalizes much of the acceptance by the scientific community of the “climate crisis” fear-mongering. Lots of climatologists buy into it because that’s where they get their funding; lots of non-climatologists buy into it because of the ‘Gell-Mann Amnesia Effect’.
I had a doctor, telling me what was wrong, and showed me the internet flow chart used to make his diagnosis. I needed to get a shunt in my kidney. That was crap. I changed doctors.
New doctor:
I have a low sodium level. The fix, salt tablets.
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