inconveniences of his chosen course, ordinarily has a life that averages out

better than he would have if he provided less reliability.

 

Thirteen: Overoptimism Tendency

 

About three centuries before the birth of Christ, Demosthenes, the most famous

Greek orator, said, “What a man wishes, that also will he believe.”

 

Demosthenes, parsed out, was thus saying that man displays not only Simple,

Pain-Avoiding Psychological Denial but also an excess of optimism even when he

is already doing well.

 

The Greek orator was clearly right about an excess of optimism being the normal

human condition, even when pain or the threat of pain is absent. Witness happy

people buying lottery tickets or believing that credit-furnishing,

delivery-making grocery stores were going to displace a great many

superefficient cash-and-carry supermarkets.

 

One standard antidote to foolish optimism is trained, habitual use of the simple

probability math of Fermat and Pascal, taught in my youth to high school

sophomores. The mental rules of thumb that evolution gives you to deal with risk

are not adequate. They resemble the dysfunctional golf grip you would have if

you relied on a grip driven by evolution instead of golf lessons.

 

Fourteen: Deprival-Superreaction Tendency