Musings on Friday the 13th

It's late evening and I just realized it's Friday the 13th! If I recall, there is no definitive beginning to this superstition, only some suggestions of how it came about. Suffice it to say, people are superstitious and it doesn't take them long to associate an action or outcome with mundane things and think they are magically connected.

I think about this a lot, probably because I'm often trying to figure things out and make them better (I have a preternatural affection for efficiency, not to mention my desire to understand how things work).

For example, I was trying to set up my new phone (It didn't go well. Don't ask, I might start twitching again. Suffice it to say, a new phone - better, faster and stronger! - is on its way as I type!) Unfortunately every site I went to for information was written by the nerdiest, Asperger's Syndrome afflicted boys who obviously all failed every basic English class they ever had. Nothing was written clearly and the grammar was atrocious, making whole paragraphs meaningless. Everything was in gobbledygook.

I'm not stupid, but I'm only a surface level geek. Basically I know enough to fix common problems and (obviously) get myself into trouble for the bigger issues.

Anyway, suffice it to say, I read a hundred articles and tried a bunch of different walk-throughs. (And it worked, too! I waded into the Android pool and conquered ... briefly. Then I decided to dive in head first, only to find that the water was suddenly infested with piranhas with deadly lasers mounted to their heads! Oh, FAIL, Neece, you damned fool!)

Where was I? Oh, right. So as I was stumbling around trying different things with my phone, every time something went right, I would just keep going (after doing a little victory dance, of course). But if it went wrong, the very first thing that went through my head was, "what was I just doing to cause the problem?"

Logical Fallacy 12: The Availability Heuristic

A recent memory, an unusual event, or a striking anecdote leads us to overestimate the probability of events of that type occurring. (this is also called the Anecdotal Fallacy)

This is Part 12 in a series about Logical Fallacies. We are going through one fallacy at a time. There are many types of fallacious arguments. I’m going to try to explain them with examples then find ways to help you refute those arguments when they occur. Please comment or email if there’s a particular fallacy you want me to tackle, or if you have success with refuting an argument using a good technique you can share.

First, let's define the terms:

Heuristic: experience-based techniques that help in problem solving, learning and discovery. A heuristic method is used to come to a solution rapidly that is hoped to be close to the best possible answer, or 'optimal solution'. A heuristic is a "rule of thumb", an educated guess, an intuitive judgment or simply common sense. A heuristic is a general way of solving a problem.

Heuristics are basically evolutionarily good. They simplify and speed up decision making, using less energy to find a decent solution, especially when you don't really have enough information to make an educated decision, for when things are uncertain. For example, you have seen 2 people mauled by lions. It's a safe bet that if you run into a lion it will maul you. You don't need to actually be mauled by a lion yourself. When you go out to hunt, you will therefore do something to protect yourself from being mauled. Unfortunately heuristics are often irrational and instinctive.

Availability Heuristic: determining probability by the ease with which relevant examples come to mind, or by the first thing that comes to mind.

Examples: