
Studies Show the Value of Not Overthinking a Decision - cmcginnis
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121450609076407973.html?mod=hps_us_inside_today
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gruseom
It's a fascinating study, but a strange title. The substantive point is that
the brain manifests decisions long before consciousness detects them. Not only
does the title miss this, it replaces it with something less interesting (and
a non sequitur to boot)!

By now there is a whole body of research demonstrating that consciousness
doesn't work the way we experience it, and that the identity we believe in and
call ourselves is largely illusory. Does anyone know of a book that provides a
good survey of these findings? The ones I've run across so far have been
disappointing, and the material is so compelling it seems like there ought to
be an amazing book on it.

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Anon84
The better known book is of course, Blink [http://www.amazon.com/Blink-Power-
Thinking-Without/dp/031601...](http://www.amazon.com/Blink-Power-Thinking-
Without/dp/0316010669/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1214697360&sr=8-1) .
It is very well written, but (IMHO) not as heavy as it should be on
references.

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gruseom
Heh, that's amusing given that I just commented on how unsatisfying Gladwell's
meta-narratives are in the end (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=230782>).
I have the impression that he could just as easily have written an equally
seemingly brilliant book about how people who make spot decisions usually get
it wrong.

So no, what I'm looking for is more of a survey of the experimental research
on consciousness and identity, the kind of thing that this latest study would
fit into. There are a host of such findings and the area seems ripe for an
overview. The closest thing I know is "The User Illusion" by Tor
Nørretranders. It's a good source on some of this material (e.g. fascinating
results on priming which demonstrate that our thinking is conditioned by
subliminal perceptions). But it's out of date and also rather shallow (the
inevitable tying in of Gödel and all that).

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aaronblohowiak
Write one.

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gruseom
No thank you. Writing such a book would be 1000 if not 10000 times harder than
reading it. I'm interested enough to do the latter, but not the former.

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pmjordan
Overthinking is not to be confused with gathering relevant information.

I'm pretty sure research is still good: know as much about the subject matter
as you reasonably need to or are able to, then decide quickly based on that
information.

I wonder - Is this why decisions by committees are so terrible?

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fauigerzigerk
I'm not sure what they actually say about overthinking. All their experiments
deliberately exclude reasoning of any kind. They ask people to make completely
arbitrary decisions and then they tell us something about the timing of their
incredibly crude measurements. Not very illuminating.

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DavidSJ
I'll think of this study the next time I find myself overthinking a decision.

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wallflower
Analysis Paralysis ==> Not Having Fun + Having too many expectations

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ovi256
This is SCIENCE!

Jokes aside, their experiment is quite innovative. I would have said their
endeavour is impossible.

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rokhayakebe
This is not a matter of consciousness.

It is a matter of speed between the read and the write abilities of the brain.
The brain writes faster than it can read, thus creating a latency.

