“If someone’s confidence is high, we believe they are probably right; if they are less certain, we feel they are less reliable“, research suggests, as reported by Dan Gardner in ‘Future Babble: Why Expert Predictions Fail – and Why We Believe Them Anyway‘.
“Obviously, this means we deem those who are dead certain the best forecasters, while those who make ‘probabilistic calls’ – like “it is probable this will happen but not certain” – must be less accurate, and anyone who dares to say the odds of something are 50-50 will be met with scorn“. The author goes on to add that it is not a conscious decision path.
So let’s summarize: we tend to believe those confident experts – who are probably wrong. And we tend to discredit those experts that don’t look too confident and who qualify their statements or speak about probabilities – who are probably closer to the truth or what can be said about it at the present moment. That’s quite an annoying situation, isn’t it?
I have personally drawn a personal conclusion: when too many experts agree with high confidence, I conclude that is groupthink and that it is worthwhile to take a contrarian position. At least you establish a noticeable difference with the bulk of the experts!
Be careful of experts that look too confident – they are probably wrong when it comes to predictions.
