Aleppo and how to hold on in an uncertain world.

With the terrible events happening in Aleppo many people are voicing opinions about why it happened and what should happen now.

Socio-political events like this are seen by many in a "good guy" vs "bad guy" scenario.
"We must defeat the bad guys no matter what" and of course "we are the good guys so whatever we do is for the greater good."

It is not always easy to understand what is really happening in the world as the information we get is often skewed one way or another to fit somebodies agenda.

Even the mainstream media agencies are having difficulties and are more and more just reporting what is happening without trying to explain the "why" or "how".

When a group of experts was asked to make predictions about the future they were not more right than a bunch of monkeys with buttons.

It seems like we vastly underestimate our capabilities to predict the future.
It also seems that the larger a group the easier it gets to predict the behavior of that group but the behavior of individuals in a certain group are highly unpredictable.

So how do we get a grip on what is happening in the world?

I thank Nassim Nicolas Taleb, to help me with this. The trick is to become more and more anti-fragile. Fragile is what loses from volatility, robust is what neither gains or loses from volatility and  Anti-fragility is what gains from volatility.
(For more research in anti-fragility: https://youtu.be/iEnmjMgP_Jo)

A second way is what Nassim calls a Position of Fuck You, from The Gambler Movie.

The third thing is to know who pays for the news, who sponsors the news and to diversify your news sources. Remember that experts can be especially prone to blind spots and hindsight. 

As mentioned in the previous blog post, using E-prime language seems to help with putting things in perspective.

Another way of protecting ourselves from misinformation is to admit that we sometimes don't have all the information. We are often pushed to have an opinion on something and people who are slow in coming to a conclusion are seen by some as dumb but they are wrong.

Holding back coming to conclusions and judgment is a very smart move.
Scientists use sentences like: "evidence seems to suggest", "The evidence seems to point to the direction of.....", "further research will have to make out..." ext...

It's ok to say that you don't know.

I personally make it a sport for myself to try to catch myself on a bias so that I can put that to consideration when I want to make up my mind about something.

Although criticism is used by many people as a hype, in order to criticize others, the skill of self-examination and inviting constructive criticism seems to be lost. It seems to be more like a sport to some people to break others down instead of using it to help somebody get better.

One other way is to dispense your belief in your intuition for a moment and just look up the data.
Intuition is great f it comes to social situation but is far less great when it comes to juggling big numbers.

These tips will at least guide and help you towards a sustainable future in an unpredictable world.

Feel free to ask questions or raise concerns you have in the comments.
I help people to find, follow and fulfill their purpose in life.
Have a great day and see you next time.