Since we regret what we don’t do much more than what we do, we’re bound to make many poor choices.

The key is learning to see them as lessons, yes, but also to discern the cost of bad decisions and the price of their eventual reversal.

The maths of poor choices

Simple people demand simple messages. While malicious actors have no qualms about providing them, those with better intentions and integrity will struggle to acquiesce.

Good people will argue that there are no simple people. Everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt. Everyone deserves to be presented with nuance and complexity. Everyone deserves the right to make up their minds.

Decent pragmatists are needed here. Simple people are growing in number, and we need simple messages that convince most to do the right thing.

Simple messages

One may argue that populist movements focus on the issues that excite the majority. Where others refuse to visit, they build their temples. They proclaim to be a voice for the voiceless, to shed light on the darkness the system relies on, to tell it as it is.

Even if such claims were true—spoiler: they aren’t—we can find logical arguments against them. The majority of the population in a specific part of the world may be afraid of the neighbouring tribe. Still, enticing them to be violent against any local representatives of the villainous tribe would be morally and pragmatically wrong.

However, today’s thought isn’t about the need to counter flawed populist arguments based on their appeal to the masses. Today, I feel the urge to contradict their very appeal. Admittedly, populists must dig the foundations of their pernicious speeches on premises that concern a significant portion of the populace. However, when science gets involved, surveys tell us populists avoid many of the concerns of most people. For instance, polls continuously demonstrate that most people are worried about climate change, and populists call it a hoax—if they dare to mention the elephant in the room at all.

When a populist speaks our language, we may want to start learning a new one.

Other voices, other fools

Accidents happen. They will continue to happen.

Let’s take an innocuous example: out of the seven hours of daily work, there is one minute in which we cannot afford to lose our internet connection—say because it is a minute in which we present our progress at a daily meeting. However unlikely, a sudden loss of connectivity or a power cut is possible. If either happens during our work hours (~29% probability), there’ll be a 1-in-420 chance that it will be during that unfortunate minute, a 0.24% probability. (Or a 1-in-84,600 chance if we consider all the minutes of one day, a ~0.0012% probability in that case!) Expending significant time or resources to minimise this risk would be overkill.

Just as we don’t look up every time we walk under a balcony for fear a plant pot may turn into a lethal projectile aimed at our heads, we accept the minimal risk and move on.

Risk is everywhere. And reasons to worry unnecessarily are equally ubiquitous.

Ubiquitously insignificant

Most can follow instructions. Few can write them. Fewer still can get others to follow the ones they wrote.

Questioning every step of the way moves us from one camp to the next, but only if we understand where we’re going and, more importantly, why.

Instructions on how to get where we’re headed

Freedom is so fragile a concept that we may lose it not only when it is taken from us but also when we fear we may be so deprived. The mere thought that saying or doing something ideologically opposed to those in power may be reason enough to have us silenced, imprisoned or disappeared constitutes a loss of freedom even before the fact.

Authoritarians know this far too well. The rest of us, maybe not so much.

Martian Thoughts

The maths of poor choices

Simple messages

Other voices, other fools

Ubiquitously insignificant

Instructions on how to get where we’re headed

Fragile freedom