Are You Open To Being Wrong?

Hey My J's,

Here I am, back with your daily dose of banter on the blockchain and today. My thought of today is about being wrong and being open to being wrong. If I look at interactions between people today online and offline its all such a power play.

So many unnecessary arguments fueled by knowing a few facts or half measured discussions and a whole lot of ego to fill in the gaps left by their reasoning. It's as if the ability to say you're wrong, acknowledge that you don't know everything or have all the facts is such a horrid thing people avoid it like the plague and argue to the bitter end.

Which is often to the determinant of the argument and those involved in it, it just seems to be like an insane amount of wasted energy and very little progress in the process.

Why is it so bad to not know

I'm not quite sure why people feel like their point of view must be correct even whenever day we see things change and what was once considered common knowledge changes. We're always learning new things and we by no means have all the answers. I've met plenty of people who think they've learned all they need to and are not open to a single new piece of information and while it's your choice I still feel it's bit naive.

I really couldn't understand why since it had very little to do with the level of intelligence people had, as these people ranged on the spectrum of intellect so it made it hard for me to understand why people feel this way.

A simple explanation would be to dismiss these people as stupid but perhaps it's not the level of intellect but the way we think.

I've been looking on and off at the Dunning-Kruger effect which psychologists call metacognition – thinking about thinking. This is a cognitive bias in which people mistakenly assess their cognitive ability as greater than it is. Plenty of people suffer from this bias even myself but I am aware to an extent of it and I try to reason with myself when I do catch myself falling victim to that train of thought.

The fool thinks himself to be wise, while a wise man knows himself to be a fool. - William Shakespeare

What I find funny is how this effect can be reinforced by society and even encouraging it. Organizations hire the most confident person during an interview, but it turns out that that person is also the least capable one.

Celebrities who think they’re smart to gain notoriety and the spotlight while scientists who made world-changing discoveries get no media attention.

Your friend who claims to be a good driver or a great chess player is usually the least skilled one.
The pressing question is: Why are the least competent people usually the most confident ones?

The least skilled person often overestimates their ability because they have no idea how much they don’t know. In other words, poor performers believe they know everything in a particular subject and therefore they tend to be overconfident about it.

Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance. — Confucius

It’s also something that should give us all pause for thought. The effect might just explain this baffling self-belief of some of your friends and colleagues. As unlikely as you might think it is, you too could be walking around blissfully ignorant of your ignorance. This is the problem of the case with many not able to or cannot even fathom to think about the way they think and if they can see the flaws in how they think.

Have your say

What do you good people of steem think? Are you open to being wrong? Do you often re-evaluate
your stances on things? Do you accept other opinions if not right away, eventually?

Holla at me in the comments! All my commenters I will now refer to as Jessie. Jessie is a good friend of mine, but Jessies got a girl, and I want to make her mine.

So have at it my Jessies! If you don't have something to comment, simply comment "I am a Jessie."

Let's connect

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