Thread by @NateB_Panic

This explains some things. Turns out humans are wired for optimism. When hooked up to an MRI, researchers found the brain "fails to code errors in estimation when those call for pessimistic updates." The only people who accurately code for risk? The clinically depressed 🧵

The science of optimism began in the 80s when researcher Neil Weinstein asked people to rank the chance of a bad thing happening to them versus it happening to someone else. People always believed the bad thing was more likely to happen to others and less likely to happen to them

But by the law of probabilities, this can’t be true. Not everyone can be less likely to experience a particular bad outcome. We can’t all be top quartile.

Weinstein identified four cognitive factors contributing to unrealistic optimism:

1. Lack of personal experience with the problem/bad thing

2. Belief that if the problem hasn’t yet appeared it will never appear in the future

3. Belief that the problem is uncommon

4. Belief that the problem is preventable by individual action

A 2011 experiment used an MRI scanner to measure brain activity in a similar activity. They found that even when people knew the statistical likelihood of events, they underestimated their chance of a bad outcome, and overestimated the likelihood of a positive outcome

But the experiment also revealed something else. It revealed that some people did code for errors in estimation. One group of people did have the ability to over-ride innate optimism and accurately calculate risk. The clinically depressed

If you fret about a world on fire, if you’re still cautious about covid, there’s a good chance you see sadness not as something to conquer, but as a tether to reality. You probably feel it provides you some survival advantages. Well, science says you’re right.

But we are faced with a system that is actively directing us to unrealistic optimism. We are being prevented from accurately assessing risk by elites who are gaming a cognitive glitch to keep business-as-usual on the tracks. Read more:
l.linklyhq.com/l/1tMOs