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Cognitive Bias and Friends

As expected, Aristotle gave the best instrumentalist justification for having friends.  To paraphrase: We are disgusting, self-involved, snot-producing, hairy beasts who cannot see our own faults.  We can easily see the faults in others.  By socializing with others, we can see what they do wrong.  With some reflection, we can see if we do those same wrong things: "If it's disgusting that John has snot hanging from his nose, perhaps the same is true of my snotty face."  And thus we see that, to protect ourselves from our own biases, we should consult friends:?If all these [biases are affecting me] without my knowledge, then I don?t really know why I?m doing what I?m doing, and I don?t really know myself that well apparently. So how can I make the right decisions or make the right choices for myself when all these biases are throwing my decisions all over the place??There?s a really simple answer here, which I like and people also seem to like it...continue to full post

Full post as published by Crime & Federalism on June 20, 2009 (boomark / email).