
Heads, I Win. Tails, You Forget We Had a Bet - jackschultz
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/09/we_remember_predictions_that_come_true_but_forget_the_flops.html
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jaclaz
Maybe too re-known by the HN audience, to be "news", but in the classic
"Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences" by John Allen
Paulos there is a part, titled "A STOCK-MARKET SCAM" where the point is
extremely well-made (the simplified scam described is a way to make a
relatively small number of people believe that 6 consecutive weekly stock
market predictions were accurate):

"If this is done knowingly and with intent to defraud, this is an illegal con
game. Yet it's considered acceptable if it's done unknowingly by earnest but
ignorant publishers of stock newsletters, or by practitioners of quack
medicine, or by television evangelists. There's always enough random success
to justify almost anything to someone who wants to believe."

and, later:

"There is a strong general tendency to filter out the bad and the failed and
to focus on the good and the successful. Casinos encourage this tendency by
making sure that every quarter that's won in a slot machine causes lights to
blink and makes its own little tinkle in the metal tray. Seeing all the lights
and hearing all the tinkles, it's not hard to get the impression that
everyone's winning. Losses or failures are silent. The same applies to well-
publicized stock-market killings vs. relatively invisible stock-market
ruinations, and to the faith healer who takes credit for any accidental
improvement but will deny responsibility if, for example, he ministers to a
blind man who then becomes lame."

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hermanradtke
Taleb has a similar message The Black Swan. There is very low risk to making
wrong predictions and a ton of upside if one is right.

