Metaphors We Live and Die By: Part 2

13 Thursday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, health, management, psychology, Uncategorized

Tags

cancer, disease, HCI, human factors, innovation, politics, testing, UX, war

Metaphors We Live and Die By: Part 2

men holding rifle while walking through smoke grenade

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Today, I want to delve further into the topic of metaphors that we often unconsciously adopt. In particular, I want to look at a common metaphor in four areas: disease, business, politics, and and the role of UX in the entire cycle of product development.

Although I am fascinated by other cultures, my experience is overwhelmingly USA-centric. I am aware that all of the four areas I touch on may be quite different in other countries and cultures. If readers have examples of how different metaphors are used in their culture, I would love to hear about it.

Disease is an Enemy to be Destroyed.

In most cases, American doctors view disease as an enemy to be destroyed. In fact, this metaphor is so pervasive that American readers are likely puzzled that I used the verb “view” rather than “is” in the previous sentence. In American culture, there is also a strong thread of another metaphor about disease: “Disease is a punishment.” This latter metaphor is behind such statements as, “Oh, they had a heart attack! Oh, my! Were they overweight? Did they smoke?” Perhaps I will consider this more fully another time, but for now, I want to examine the view that disease is an enemy to be destroyed.

It seems as though it is an apt metaphor. After all, aren’t many diseases caused by other organisms invading our bodies and doing harm? There are many examples: bacteria (Lyme Disease, pneumonia, ulcers, TB, syphilis), viruses (herpes, Chicken Pox, flu, common cold), protozoa (malaria, toxoplasmosis) or even larger organisms (trichinosis, tapeworms, hookworm).

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When it comes to considering causality, our thoughts usually travel along linear chains of causes. So, we may admit that while Lyme disease is “caused by” Borrelia bacteria, the “deer tick” that spreads the disease is also partly at fault. Similarly, although malaria is caused by a protozoa, the most effective prevention is to reduce the mosquito population or to use netting to keep the mosquitos from biting people. Similarly, you might try to prevent Lyme disease by wearing light clothing, using spray to keep the ticks off, checking for ticks after being in tick infested areas, etc. So, even in common practice, we realize that saying that the little organism causes the disease is an over-simplification.

Once one “gets” a disease, however, the most commonly invoked metaphor is war. We know what the enemy is and we must destroy it! I grant you that is one approach that can be very effective, but consider this. The “human” body contains approximately as many bacterial cells as human cells. What you think of as your “human” body is only half human! It is half bacteria! Furthermore, since we all have trillions of bacteria in us when we are well, the picture of treating bacteria as an enemy to be destroyed is at best an over-simplification. In fact, more recently, medical science seems to indicate that under-exposure to bacteria in childhood can make you more not less susceptible to disease. If you use anti-antibiotics to “destroy” the “enemy” bacteria in your body, many of the “good” bacteria necessary for digestion are also destroyed. This sometimes, though rarely, requires exotic treatment to return to health.

In cancer, both doctors and the general public mainly think of the cancer cells as “enemies” who must be destroyed! And yet, it seems that people may often have mutations that could lead to cancer but don’t. There are even very rare cases of spontaneous cures of cancer. What are some alternatives to thinking of cancer as an “enemy” that must be destroyed?

Clearly, I don’t know of a definite answer or you would have already heard about it on the news! But let’s consider a couple alternatives. First, instead of thinking you have to “destroy” this enemy, imagine you thought of cancer cells as confused. People get confused all the time. Sometimes, we put them in jail. Sometimes we put them in mental hospitals. Sometimes, we simply teach them what they need to know. Sometimes, we do end up killing them. But it is not our approach to kill someone just because they make a mistake. So, we might seek a way to “re-educate” cancer cells so that they “realize” that they are part of something even larger and more wonderful – the human body! How would one go about this? Using the metaphor of a confused person, we would have to understand just why they were acting confused. Then we would have to provide situations so that they could learn (or re-learn) what they needed to know in order to become a productive member of “society.” We could “remind” a liver cell that, after all, they were born to be a liver cell and they’re potentially quite good at that. We could think of cancer as cells that are misinformed or have amnesia about their true nature.

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We might also think along a different line. We could try to discover the best possible environment for these cancer cells to thrive – and then offer it to them somewhere else. For example, perhaps they really prefer an extremely acidic environment. Say you have a skin cancer on the back of your hand that thrives in a really acidic environment. You provide a gradient of acidity next to the tumor and encourage all those acid-seeking cancer cells to migrate into a really acid tube that is next to the tumor. The farther away it gets from you, the more acidic the environment.

You might also think of cancer cells as being rebellious. For whatever reason, they “feel” as though they are not experiencing enough of the “good life” being part of your body so they “take matters into their own hands” and begin leading a rebellion of cells out to steal the food supply and multiply in an unrestrained fashion. A solution might be to “convince” them that they are better off retaining their initial function rather than becoming a lawless gang of cells. I am not sure what the best metaphor for thinking about infection or cancer is, but surely it is worth imagining others rather than sticking to just one based on war as a metaphor.

Business is a Sport.

I treat this at greater length in The Winning Weekend Warrior, but the basic idea is simple. Yes, there are many strategies and tactics from sports that apply to business. But there is at least one crucial difference. Sports are designed to be difficult. They typically require skill and training if you are to do well. The parameters of the sport are fixed at any given time though they will vary somewhat over time. In golf, for instance, the hole is small and the distances are great. Though the rules of golf are complex, there is one over-arching principle. If it would help you to do something, doing that thing is penalized!

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If golf were a business, many CEO’s would nonetheless approach it as a sport. They would try to hire the “best people” – that is, people with a proven track record of good golfing. They would then proceed to offer incentives for people to do even better. If people shot a high score repeatedly, they would be fired. Eventually, such a CEO might get good results by having skilled people who are well motivated and well trained. But why? If putting a golf ball in the hole is what gained you profit, simply shorten the fairways, widen the hole, and eliminate the hazards! Of course, as a sport this would make golf no challenge and no fun. Everyone could win. But having everyone win is exactly what you should do to maximize profit. Yet many in management are so taken with the “business is a sport” metaphor that they do not change the situation. Some do “change he game” and with spectacular results. Google and Amazon come to mind.

Politics is War.

If you belong to a political party and believe the “other” party or parties are enemies to be destroyed, you are failing to understand the dialectic value that parties with different views can bring to complex situations. Life is a balanced dance between strict replication and structure on the one hand, and variation, exploration, and diversity on the other hand. A species who had no replication of structure from one generation to the next would die off. But so too would a species that had no variation because the slightest change in environment would also cause the species to die off. So it is with human cultures. If every generation had to start from scratch in determining what was edible, how to get along, how to avoid predators and so on, humans would have died out long ago. On the other hand, if a culture were completely unable to evolve and change, they would also die out. Typically, “conservative” parties want to keep things the same for longer and “liberal” parties want to change things more quickly. There is no obvious answer here. But what is vital is that members of each party see that there is value in the debate; in the dialogue; in the dialectic.

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The other party is not an enemy; it is the balance so that you can do what you do best. If you are predisposed toward exploration, science, new experiences, and so on, great! On the other hand, if you are more predisposed toward tradition and loyalty and repetition, great! If you did not have the people of the opposite predisposition, you would have to incorporate all that within yourself. Conservatives are what allows liberals to be liberal. And liberals are what allows conservatives to be conservatives. A huge problem arises, as it has recently in American politics, when one party decides they are just “right” all on their own and “victory” is worth lying, cheating, and stealing to get it. This is not unique to contemporary America of course. History is littered with administrations who were so convinced that they were “right” that they wanted to destroy all opposition. It has always ended badly. Politics is not war. (Though the failure of politics often leads to war.)

UX is All that Matters vs. UX Does Not Matter. Development is war!

As you might guess, neither of these extreme positions is useful. Price matters. Time to market matters. Marketing matters. Having good sales people matters. Having excellent service matters. Having a good user experience matters. It all matters. Depending on the situation, various factors matter relatively more or less.

(Original artwork by Pierce Morgan)

As in the case of political ideologies, it is just fine for UX folks to push for the resources to understand users more deeply; to test interaction paradigms more thoroughly; to collect and observe from more and more users under a wider variety of circumstances. Similarly, while you are pushing for all that and doing your best to argue your case, remember that the other people who are pushing for tighter deadlines, and more superficial testing are not evil; they simply have different perspectives, payoffs, and responsibilities. Naturally, I hope the developers and financial people do not view UX folks as simply “roadblocks” to getting the product out quickly and cheaply either.

The first half of 2018, I tried to catalog many of the “best practices” in collaboration and teamwork. You might find some of these useful if you are embroiled in “UX wars.” You and your colleagues from other disciplines might also find it useful to consider that it is worth taking the time to affirm your common purpose and common ground. You are meant to work together. Development is not war!

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Representation

11 Tuesday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, management, psychology

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Business, Design, Dictatorship, Feedback, measurement, politics, programming, Representation, science, symbol, testing, truth

Representation

“Choose your words carefully.” We have all heard that advice. It’s good advice and choosing a good representation is key to solving problems, but the general point extends beyond choosing words. Take a few moments now to divide DCXXXV by IX without translating to Arabic numerals. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

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Choosing the “best” representation for a problem depends on the nature of the problem but it also depends on your own skills and experience with a representation. If you have memorized the multiplication tables up to 99 x 99 (rather than only up to 9 x 9), you can use different techniques for multiplication than if you haven’t. If you already know how to program in FORTRAN and LISP, some algorithms will be easier to program in FORTRAN and some will be easier in LISP. But if the only language you know is R, then under most circumstances, it will be far faster and less error prone to use R than to learn another language and then use that one.

Every representation of a real-world situation will necessarily make some features of the situation obvious and other features will be hidden or less obvious. An elevator, for instance, might say, “Capacity: 12 people.” If all of the people are wildly obese, then 12 may not fit into the elevator. The capacity sign is assuming that the people will be somewhat average. If there are 12 adults in the elevator, and one of them is holding a newborn, it won’t make much difference. If there are only 10 people in the elevator and each one has a large suitcase full of gold bullion, there may be room for all 10 to stand, but the total weight of the cargo may exceed the capacity of the elevators, snap the cable, and plummet you to your death. Remember that the next time you get on an elevator filled with folks who have suitcases of gold bullion.

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Every representation has its limitations. If you’re familiar with a field, you will hopefully learn to recognize what those limitations are. In a famous book, The Mythical Man-Month, (still worth reading, though it should be called “Person-Month”), Fred Brooks shows that such a metric as “man-month” or “person-month” has serious limitations in planning and executing software projects. Some have paraphrased his message this way: “You can’t use nine women to make one baby in one month.” According to Brooks, who had plenty of experience as a high level manager of large software projects, when management finds that a software project is behind schedule (which is quite often), there are two major reactions of management: 1) require more measurements, reports, and presentations to management and 2) hire more people.

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The issue with reaction 1 is partly that it takes time away from the managers and workers in order to make those measurements, prepare those reports and presentations, and to attend the meetings. Beyond that, it puts the focus of attention on those measurements (representations) which will only be at best, modestly correlated with what the real problems are. If, for instance, requirements keep changing, or there are incompatibilities in the requirements, measuring lines of code produced is not only useless in itself; it keeps people from tackling the hard problem. A solution to a hard problem might be telling the client that there can be no more changes in requirements. A solution to a hard problem might be resolving the incompatibility in requirements. One can count lines of code pretty easily. One can count other things like “function points” with a little more work but it doesn’t require getting into the “hard” and people-oriented problems that really need to be solved.

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Reaction 2 – adding more people – will put more “resources” on the project. You can easily count the people. You can easily count the hours they work. The problem is that a person-hour is, like the elevator capacity, an over-simplified metric. In fact, it is a much worse representation of the resources on the project than the elevator metric. First of all, studies show that even among programmers with equal training, there are often ten-fold differences in productivity. The second, and even bigger issue is that even really productive programmers who are added late to a project will have to learn about the project: the people, the requirements, and the code base. If these new people are stolen from an existing project, that will also put that project in jeopardy as well. If they are instead new hires, then in addition to all the technical knowledge that they need to come up to speed on, they will also have to learn all sorts of administrivia that will take time and brain space away from the project: how to commute to work, where the cafeteria is, how to fill out time cards. Most likely, they’ll have to attend ethics training, and diversity training, and safety training. Even worse, a lot of the knowledge that they will need to become a productive member of the team mainly exists in the heads of the very people who are doing the programming now! This means that the busiest, most productive people on the project will have to take time away from programming to spend it instead on answering questions that the new people will have.

Even this understated the real impact however. Let’s look at that phrase I just used, “…will have to take time away from programming to spend it instead…” What hidden assumption about representation is buried in this phrase? It gets the reader to think along the lines that time is additive. If I am deeply involved in programming and I get an IM or phone call from a newbie asking me a question about the project, it might take an hour to answer. Does that mean I have subtracted an hour from my own productive programming? No. It’s probably much worse than that. Why? Because I am not a machine, but a human being. It will cost me much more than the hour to get back to the same state of flow that I was in when I was interrupted.

I was involved for a time in looking at programmer productivity for high performance computing using various tools and the X programming language. One of the people I interviewed put it this way: “My manager calls for an hour meeting for 10 am when I am in the middle of a complex [parallel programming] problem. He thinks he’s taken an hour of my time. For him it’s an hour long meeting. But for me, he’s really destroyed the whole morning.”

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These representational issues apply far beyond software development. For example, in the USA and in many other countries, we look at GDP as a measure of the economic productivity of the country. But how does this metric shape — or distort — our view of productivity? If a parent stays home with small children and they both love the time together, and the parent uses that time to help grow a loving, educated, productive citizen, it adds to the well-being of the country as well as that child and that parent and that family. But GDP? Nada. If instead, the parent paid money to put the child in mediocre day care, that would add to the GDP.

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Similarly, if I go to the grocery and buy a hard, tasteless tomato for myself, I will pay for the growing of that tomato, advertising it, shipping it, warehousing it, displaying it, and for the genetic alterations so that the tomato, while tasteless, is easy to transport without spoiling. Yay me! I have added to the GDP. But if I go to a friend’s house and taste a wonderful tomato, ask for some seeds or a cutting and grow my own heirloom tomato, watering it lovingly with rainwater, weeding around it, and fertilizing it with compost, I have added zero to the GDP. Yet, the tomato will give me more pleasure, not less, than the croquet balls they have in the store.

Representation is a good thing! Humans use symbolic thinking to do many things that would be difficult or impossible without these kinds of representations. But we must remember the limitations and not confuse reality with our representations of reality.

This is not a new phenomenon. In the American Revolutionary War, high ranking British military officers could not understand why the British navy “refused” to navigate their warships up the Bronx River to attack revolutionary positions upriver. If you’ve ever seen the Bronx River, you’ll realize why immediately. But the maps that the British brass looked at showed a navigable river!

river inside forest near brown leaf trees

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Yes, we need to use representation in our thinking. But we also need to think about our representations. You cannot assume that the one that is customarily used is “right” in all circumstances. People of different backgrounds and cultures will often use somewhat different representations of a problem or situation. (This is one of the advantages of diversity). However you do it, it’s worth questioning whether the way you are representing a situation or problem is optimal, or even adequate, for the problem at hand.

Suppose you are measuring “number of user errors” that users make while using a prototype text editor. You move from prototype A which averaged 10 user errors per half hour test to prototype B which only averages 5 user errors per half hour. Yay! You’ve cut user errors in half! But what if the errors you eliminated were all fairly trivial; e.g., people with version A couldn’t figure out how to number their footnotes with Roman numerals instead of Arabic. In version B, that error, along with other trivial errors, was eliminated. But one of the new errors causes the system to crash and all the user’s work to be lost. Have you really made progress?

All errors are not alike. All dollars are not alike. All people are not alike. Not even all tomatoes are equivalent. We constantly over-simplify and yet in some cases it’s necessary in order to deal with complexity. I don’t see how all such errors can be avoided. But it’s crucial for everyone, but especially for managers and executives, to be open to the cases where the representation that is being used has become counter-productive rather than “doubling down” on such errors. Finding and fixing errors of representation are generally harder to diagnose and fix than errors made with a representation. That is all the more reason why everyone, but especially leaders, must be open to changing the way issues are represented.

It is no accident that dictatorships generally result in nations wherein people have both less material wealth and less enjoyment and freedom. A dictator typically refuses to admit mistakes and fix them even if it means murdering someone to make the problem appear to go away. Ultimately, this process ruins any organization. Such a person need not be a national leader. They can be a company manager, a coach, a corporate executive, or a parent. Everyone makes errors, including errors of representation. But a reasonable person is open to fixing it when new information becomes available. You can be like that too.

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Regression to the Mean

10 Monday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, management, psychology, sports

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Business, experiment, family, Feedback, HCI, learning, life, politics, science, sports, testing, usability, UX

Regression to the Mean

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While working full-time at IBM Research, I was also a Fellow at the Institute for Rational-Emotive Therapy in Manhattan. I wrote an article in 1978 for their Journal, Rational Living. The title was: “Why Do I Self-Down? Because I’m an Idiot?” Indeed, many people put themselves down and it is not helpful. I hypothesized several different causes for this kind of self-slamming behavior. Most of these causes you could probably figure out on your own. But one in particular is subtle and non-intuitive. It is based on a statistical phenomenon which few people know about despite the fact that it is extremely pervasive. This phenomenon is called “Regression to the Mean.”

I want to define this term by explaining some examples. Imagine that you have a new soft drink which contains a combination of herbs that will purportedly make you smarter; e.g., gingko and bacopa. (There is some evidence these may actually work but let’s assume that they don’t or that your tea has too little to be effective). Here’s what you do to “prove” that it works anyway. You give an IQ test to 10,000 people and choose the 50 who score the lowest on the test and have them drink your tea for the next six months. At the end of that time, you give those 50 people an IQ test again and — Voila! The average (or mean) of the IQ scores has almost certainly gone up. Yay! It works!

Or does it? One of your competitors is not too happy about your study. In fact, they aren’t even happy you put your tea on the market. They decide to prove that your tea is not only ineffective but that it makes people less smart. So what do they do? They give an IQ test to 10,000 people and they pick the 50 who score the highest. They have them drink your tea for six months and at the end of that time, they have them take another IQ test. In this case, the mean (average) score is lower than the first time! Ouch! They say your tea causes brain damage!

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How can the same tea make people smarter and make them dumber? In this case, it does neither. What is going on? Here’s what is going on. When you measure something, there is always some error. Whether you are measuring your weight, your height, your blood pressure, or your IQ, the measurement is never exactly perfect. Your weight may vary slightly because of atmospheric pressure and more so because of water retention. If you take an IQ test, your score will partly reflect how well you do on such tests in general, but it will partly depend on luck. You may have felt particularly good that day, or a few of the questions might have been on topics you just heard about on TV the day before, or you may have made some lucky guesses. Or, you may have been unlucky on a particular day. You might have had a cold or misread one of the questions or forgotten your morning coffee. On any given day, some people will be a little lucky and some people will be a little unlucky. These things tend to balance out in a large group and if you tested all 10,000 people after six months, then assuming the tea has no real effect, no effect will be shown in the data.

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However, if you select the very best scores, you are partly picking smart people, of course, but you are also picking the people who were lucky that day. When you test just those people six months later, they will generally be just as smart but there is no reason to suppose they will be lucky again. Some will be lucky both times, most will not be particularly lucky or unlucky and a few will be unlucky. The average score will be lower. Conversely, if you choose the lowest scoring people, you will partly be choosing people who don’t do well on such tests in general. But you will also be choosing people who were tired, sick, guessed wrong or were otherwise unlucky that day. When you retest, those people will still tend to be people who do poorly on such tests, but they won’t necessarily all be unlucky again. Some will. Some won’t. On average, the scores will be higher than they were the first time.

The phenomenon of “Regression to the Mean” was first noted by Francis Galton in the 1880’s. Tversky and Kahneman, so far as I know, were the first to note that this phenomenon could easily cause managers, coaches, and parents to end up being unnecessarily negative. Here’s how it works. Let’s say you are learning to hit tennis serve. Although you will likely improve in general, over time, there will also be a lot of variation in your performance. Sometimes, everything will work well together and you’ll hit an excellent serve, one that is above your average level. At first, the coach’s natural inclination will be to praise this by saying, “Wow! Great serve!” or something like that. Unfortunately, your next serve, due to regression to the mean is very likely not to be quite as good as that one was. Your coach’s praising behavior was thereby punished. On the other hand, if you hit a particularly poor serve for your level, your coach might say, “Oh, come on. You can do better than that!” If they choose to say such things only on your very worst performances, then, due to regression to the mean, your next serve is likely to be somewhat better. In other words, their slamming you will be rewarded by your doing better the next time. The same general tendencies will apply to managers and parents as well.

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The same applies to you! Whatever you are doing, your performance will vary somewhat over time. If you begin by praising yourself internally whenever you hit a particularly great shot, your next shot will most likely be not so great. On the other hand, if you put yourself down when you find your performance particularly bad, “You idiot! How could you miss that!?” Your next shot will tend to be somewhat better. Over time, your positive self-talk will tend to be punished and your negative self-talk will tend to be rewarded.

It’s no wonder then that many managers, coaches, and parents end up saying very negative things about their charges. It’s also no wonder that many people say (or more likely think) many more negative things about themselves than they say positive things.

Is there anything to be done? First, simply be aware of this phenomenon. That is step one. If you are running a study, you need to be careful in selecting. The study about your tea could be fixed by re-testing the entire population; by selecting a random group of 50 rather than the best or worst; or by using a control group who did not drink tea but was retested anyway. When praising or punishing someone’s performance, do not bother with trying to reward or punish outcomes based on one trial. That’s actually a pretty poor way to coach yourself or others in any case. See The Winning Weekend Warrior for more on this. Also watch out for this when you read about various conclusions of other studies. Did the investigators select either the “best” or the “worst” for their study? If they did such a selection, did they talk about the bias this introduces? Did they have a control group?

Meanwhile, treat your mistakes as opportunities to learn, not as opportunities to put yourself down. There’s really no point in self-downing. But if you do find yourself self-downing, remember that it’s common; relax; smile at this human foible; then quit doing it. At least give yourself a break for the holidays.

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Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases. Science, 1974, 185, 1124-1131.

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And, then what?

06 Thursday Dec 2018

Posted by petersironwood in creativity, psychology, Uncategorized

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Business, consequences, Feedback, innovation, learning, science, testing, thinking

And then what?

When it comes to increasing the drama in TV crime shows, westerns, and spy thrillers, both the brilliant, evil villain and the smart, brave, good-looking protagonist display one common and remarkable weakness: they rush into action without much thought as to the possible consequences of their actions.

Here’s a scene that you and I have probably seen a thousand times. The hero has a gun drawn and a bead on “The Evil One” but the Evil One has a knife to the throat of the friend or lover of The Hero. The Evil One, as both we in the audience and The Hero know, cannot be trusted. Most likely, The Evil One has caused the death of many people already, is treacherous, and lies as easily as most people breathe. Nonetheless, The Evil One promises to release the hero’s friend or lover provided only that The Hero put down their gun and slide it over to The Evil One. And The Hero complies! Often, The Hero will elicit a “promise” from The Evil One: “OK, I’ll give you my gun, but you have to let them go!” The Evil One, for whom promises mean nothing, “promises” and then The Hero slides the gun over. At this point, The Evil One is obviously free to kill both The Hero and their friend or lover immediately. Instead, The Evil One will begin chatting them up. This allows time for magic, skill, accident, God, unknown allies, or brilliance to turn the tables on The Evil One.

Here’s another scene that we’ve both witnessed. The Hero suddenly finds out some crucial piece of information that lets them know the whereabouts of The Evil One. Often this is an abandoned warehouse filled to the brim with minions of The Evil One. But, it might be the cave deep beneath the island stronghold of The Evil One; a stronghold filled to the brim with his minions. The Hero rushes in with a woefully inadequate force and without informing anyone concerning his whereabouts. He or she confronts The Evil One who not only confesses to past misdeeds but outlines their future plans to The Hero as well.

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In the TV series or the movies, the sequence of events is determined by the writer(s) so even though The Hero faces impossible odds, he or she will almost certainly overcome those impossible odds. That makes for an exciting story!

But in life?

In real life, you’ll typically do a lot better if you think about the likely consequences of your actions.

Sometimes, people fail to do this because they have simply never developed the habit of thinking ahead.

Sometimes, people let their wishes completely color their decisions. For instance, an addicted gambler, despite their actual experience, believes that gambling more will result in a favorable outcome for them rather than the truth which would be that there is an extremely small chance that they will win overall.

Sometimes, people are too ignorant to realize that there are potential negative consequences. For instance, when I was a youngster, I had a “glow in the dark” watch and cross; each glowed partly because of radium. I enjoyed putting these right up to my eyes in order to observe the flashes of individual photons. I also put together model airplanes with glue. When I applied too much glue, I dissolved it with Carbon Tetra-choloride. I loved the exotic smell of Carbon Tet. Now, it is deemed too dangerous to be used in this way.

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In many cases, it seems to me that people do think about consequences but use an overly simple model of reality on which to base their predictions. In particular, people often treat individuals and social systems as mechanical systems and base their decisions on those mechanical models rather than actuality. For example, your kid does not, in your opinion, eat enough broccoli so you simply force them to eat broccoli. Your “prediction” of the consequences of this may include that the kid will eat more broccoli, be healthier, eventually like broccoli, etc. Depending on the individual child, it may be that none of these will actually occur. In some cases, it may even happen that the exact opposite of your goals will be achieved. The kid may eat less broccoli, be unhealthier, and hate broccoli more than ever. There are many other possible consequences as well. The kid may end up hating meals with the family or hating you or hating the color green.

When it comes to individuals and social systems, it is hard to know what the net effect might be. Often though, the most significant cognitive problem that people have is that they are so sure of their prediction that they base their actions on what they think should happen rather than what actually does happen.

As recounted in some detail in the Pattern, “Reality Check,” instituting a new social reward or punishment system often does indeed change behavior, but not necessarily in the desired manner. If, for instance, programmers are now rewarded on the basis of lines of code written, they might indeed write more lines of code but many of those lines of code may be unnecessary. You might write 1000 lines of code or you could spend time thinking about the problem and then write two lines of code that accomplish the same result. Will you do so if you are only rewarded 1/500 th of the bonus?

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Similarly, you may measure the performance of service technicians by how many calls they “handle” during their shift. But if that is the main or sole measure, you may also end up having those service people tend to offer trivial or even useless advice based on insufficient information. In all these cases, if management keeps seeing what really happens, any damage done by having an inaccurate predictive model of what will happen as a result of a change will be mitigated. But in a system, whether private or governmental, where people are mainly motivated to keep management happy by telling them what they want to hear, instead of correcting a poor intervention, the problems caused by inadequate models will tend to multiply, fester, or explode.

So:

Think of possible consequences and try to determine which ones are most likely. Then, observe what really does happen. This helps avoid turning an issue into a disaster and, over time, it also helps you develop more realistic models of reality. It will also tend to put you in the habit of taking a flexible and reality-based approach to your decisions rather than one that is based on a rigid and inaccurate model of how things should be. The latter approach to decisions will not only make you individually ineffective; it will also make it almost impossible to work well with others (unless everyone involved shares the same inaccurate model).

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Myths of the Veritas: The Sixth Ring of Empathy

20 Thursday Sep 2018

Posted by petersironwood in America, management, psychology, Uncategorized, Veritas

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emotional intelligence, empathy, evaluation, myth, politics, testing, truth, Veritas

Myths of the Veritas: The Sixth Ring of Empathy.

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The Four, as they were now called by the tribe, despite being rivals, achieved a high degree of esprit de corps. Partly, as they had discussed among themselves, She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives was, from their point of view, completely unpredictable in her tasks. Furthermore, all of them understood that the slightest hint of cheating, bad-mouthing, or even approaching the boundary of good taste might well be precisely that it would likely be the end of their candidacy. While the candidates were being tested primarily on empathy, it was well understood by the entire tribe that it was absolutely critical that the leader of the tribe must adhere to the very highest standards of ethical behavior. Why on earth would a tribe choose a leader of low moral fiber only to set a horrible example for the whole people? For these reasons and because, apart from any thought to consequences, winning at all costs, including dishonor, was simply not a way any of them wanted to live their lives.

Many moons passed and still She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives had not called them together to explain the trial of the Sixth Ring of Empathy. So far, it was a complete mystery. As could be expected, The Four speculated a great deal among themselves, but they realized they were merely wild guesses. The talked, and debated, and dialogued quite a lot about empathy, but they were in the dark as to the actual tasks they would next be judged on.

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The Shaman, She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives, for her part, walked here and there throughout the people; helping with what needed to be done; advising mainly by answering question with question; always generating warmth and wisdom by her example. Her being there, each knew in their hearts, was a great gift for all the people and they esteemed her and loved her greatly. Of course, they accepted that her seeking a successor was just another example of the great wheel of life moving around. Yet, it still saddened them to see her gone so they were in no way discomfited to see that the long time before the sixth trial even began stretched on and on.

Unbeknownst to either the tribe as a whole or The Four, the “trial” for the Sixth Ring of Empathy had begun the instant that The Four had been chosen and walked silently back to their tents. She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives knew quite well that everyone, including The Four, did not realize this. And she also knew that each of The Four was spending at least part of their time wisely, becoming better friends with each other and with the nuances of empathy through their mutual explorations and discussions. The Shaman planned to end the “trial” when she had enough evidence for her to decide on who precisely would continue to the seventh and final trial.

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The Shaman had been observing many things over the past many moons. She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives had been watching how The Four interacted with each other. Who listened well? Who spoke well? Who thought of things no-one else did? Who had a good heart? Who sought the truth and had the good of all at heart?

She listened to how everyone in the tribe spoke of everyone else, including The Four. She knew how to moderate words heard to the likely underlying truth because she understood the blind spots of everyone in the tribe. She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives had watched the reactions of everyone in the tribe as one or the other from among The Four came near. She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives sought out many conversations with those of the tribe. She would talk of acorns, for example, and then remark on how Eagle Eyes had studied how acorns fell because she had been interested in shapes. This was not the story that She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives was interested in. The Shaman wanted to see the story written in the face and eyes of the person receiving the story.

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{Translator’s Note}: At this point in the narrative, there are several more techniques that the Shaman used but those descriptions are filled with “technical terms” of the Veritas and, so far, no-one has much idea at all what, precisely, the Shaman actually did. It seems as though the Shaman is sensing how animals react to the candidates? But that makes no sense. And, it seems as though she is “reading” their faces and body language and, even, tuning into their auras? souls? voices? thoughts? responses? hearts? And, there is a passage that — well — I know it’s crazy, but she watches how music vibrates through these candidates? Or, how they resonate with various vibrations? None of the few remaining on this planet who claim to know anything about Veritas claims to have any knowledge of these arcane and possibly archaic arts. The oddest part is that the whole time I was trying to make sense of it, what came to mind were scenes involving the high-tech scanning from Star Trek!

Although much of the Shaman’s focus was on the most important task of her life; viz., choosing her successor, she also took note of the Friendship of POND MUD and ALT-R. She had hoped they could learn from each other, but she feared that this friendship had taken a turn toward the way of Not-Life where truth is sacrificed as easily as one pulls off an ant’s leg. There were now simply too many reeds of evidence — more than enough to make a basket — that POND MUD and ALT-R were not going to be re-entered into the seeking of the Rings of Empathy. The Shaman knew that they had agreed to disrupt the trial. Fortunately, their planning was still quite vague because, like the rest of the Village, the two of them had no idea that the trial was underway. ALT-R, however, was discovered to be perpetuating one scheme on his own: to sow the seeds of jealousy among The Four and also between POND MUD and Shade Walker. This could help him “control” POND MUD and could well disrupt the entire trial so that the chances of POND MUD and ALT-R regaining a chance at the Rings of Empathy would be increased.

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Though very bright, ALT-R was not among those of ever-alert eyes and ears. When he began calculating a plot, he had a tendency to pace while speaking aloud. In such a state, his cleverness peaked. However, in such a state, he could fail to notice such a noiselessly slow-moving person as She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives. The Shaman was shocked. There had been hot-tempered people among the Veritas and those who were occasionally less than truthful when describing their romantic involvements to others. But the Shaman was now observing what certainly appeared to be an actually evil person who was going to subvert the process of succession in order to grab power for himself. He did not see or did not care what such a grabbing of power would do to the tribe, to the people, to the earth.

The Shaman shuffled away as silently as she had come. Perhaps, the time had come for both POND MUD and ALT-R to be banished from the tribe before more evil spread. At this point, She -Who-Saves-Many-Lives happened upon a very perplexed looking young woman: She-of-Many-Paths. She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives stood still, held out her arms before her, hands up, smiled at the youth, and said, “Good Day. Or should I say, ‘Good Day?’ What seems to be the trouble?”

She-of-Many-Paths answered: “It’s nothing. It’s just. Shade Walker and POND MUD seemed to be about to fight over me. And I’m not. I don’t like POND MUD at all. I mean, not that way. But I do like Shade Walker. But Trunk of Tree is beautiful and large too. I just — but they can’t fight for me. I will choose who I want and what did you mean about our children pulling us together? Anyway, it’s really nothing and it’s — you know — just silly stuff among boys and girls, nothing that you’d…I mean that you’d be interested in.”

There was warm humor in the eyes of She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives as she answered. “It’s all right, She-of-Many-Paths, I know you were about to say that I wouldn’t know anything about young love because now I’m an old woman, in fact, a very old woman. Of course, you are quite right. I was never myself a baby or a toddler or a young girl or a very confused adolescent. I fell fully hatched out of a very old and very craggy willow. That’s why my skin is so wrinkled. The bark against my skin all those years before I finally fell out full-grown and blotches as you see me now. So, I would no nothing of the catching of the breath and the full-throttled beating of the heart nor the feeling of melting and the burning skin. But if I had been born a baby and lived a full life, I would tell you one thing and that would be that you may live through all that and some day be lucky enough to be an old lady such as I. But meanwhile, come here. Take my hands. Look into my heart and see what you see in my past.

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She-of-Many-Paths walked slowly forward to take the hands of She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives. As she stepped forward, her embarrassment subsided. Of course, everyone is part of the wheel of life, she thought. She imagined She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives as a youth. And then — there she was! She could see her plainly with long black hair and strong limbs. She was taller and her skin was smooth. And, she was in love. And again. And love was like the love that is the very foundation of life and love is terrifying and wonderful and much better than okay. It is Life. She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives grew out of such a love and her parents as well and her grandparents and She-of-Many-Paths felt now quite well-named and terrified at the same time! For she was traveling out in many paths backwards in time, floating through an endless tunnel so it seemed slowly like a maple seed twirling slowly. She-of-Many-Paths could see/feel/hear backwards in time to the first Veritas and beyond to the first humans and beyond and it became almost unbearable because she was no longer She-of-Many-Paths with human eyes and brain at all. She was something else. Animal. Smell. Fear. Eat. Mate. Mate. Mate. Of course she wanted to mate! Now, She-of-Many-Paths staggered backwards, letting go of the Shaman’s hands.

The Shaman spoke to reassure, “I see that you found the way to truly touch the tree of life through the heart of another.”

She-of-Many-Paths stammered, “What…what was that?! I could see, feel, what it was like to be you and … and before you… and it all started slow but then got fast and I was not even me.”

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The Shaman spoke again, “You learned to tie your empathy to your imagination in a feedback loop. It feels a bit overwhelming at first, but it is a useful tool.”

{Translator’s Note}: There is a thicker description in the original and, though I know it sounds crazy, the most accurate translation I could come up with is a Superheterodyne receiver.

“Overwhelming,” exclaimed She-of-Many-Paths, “indeed. But, did you actually look like that? Or, is it just how I pictured it?”

“Most likely some combination of those and also how I pictured myself.”

“Do you experience this? Do you … travel, see,” She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives. You will get better at it with practice though you may decide not to learn to use it.”

Shade Walker appeared around a bend and began walking toward them. She-of-Many-Paths looked about as though for an escape route, but it was too late.

The Shaman was the first to speak. “How does it go with you, Shade Walker? How are you and POND MUD getting on these days?”

“Well, actually…” Shade Walker’s eyes darted to those of She-of-Many-Paths. “He seems to want to fight me. Well, over She-of-Many-Paths. I am not afraid to fight him. But She-of-Many-Paths should choose who she wants. What does it mean to fight over her? Also, there’s something else, She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives. I don’t sense that he actually wants to. You well know that I have continued to study the way snakes can feel/see the heat of their prey. And, I sense all the heat coming, not from POND MUD himself but from ALT-R. But I don’t really think ALT-R wants…I don’t know what he wants. It just doesn’t feel right somehow.”

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“No, you’re quite right,” said the Shaman. “It isn’t right. I’m afraid something must be done but I am not quite ready to do it. Meanwhile, I need to find Trunk-of-Tree and Eagle-Eyes. Any idea where they might be, Shadow Walker?”

“She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives, I believe Eagle Eyes went to watch Fleet-of-Foot run. She wants to draw the way he runs. She’s talking about his form. It’s a little embarrassing. She’s not interested in his shape, I don’t think. I mean she is, but…let’s see. As for Trunk-of-Tree, he is practicing, as best he can, for the Sixth Ring of Empathy.”

“And, how, Shadow-Walker, does he propose to do that?” queried the Shaman.

“Exactly! We don’t know the next test.” Here, Shadow Walker paused and looked carefully at the Shaman for a hint or a clue. He found none. “Anyway, the way he is preparing is by practicing earlier tests. He doesn’t know what else to do.”

“I suppose not. And, where might he be practicing?”

“That is hard to say. I mean, I know where he is generally, but not precisely. He thinks you may re-ask us to do the first task, but this time testing a finer gradation of empathy. So, he is searching for places where the number of mountain peaks seen will depend on the height of the individual. Frankly, Shaman, it seems far-fetched to me. Of course, if that is the next trial, please don’t take offense. It’s just that every trial so far has been quite different so….well, I have no idea. Well, that’s not completely true. I have an idea but I don’t know whether it’s correct.”

She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives smiled as she asked, “And, what is this idea, Shadow Walker?”

“Well, I think. She-of-Many-Paths and I both think…” he paused to look at the young woman who nodded almost imperceptibly. “We both think that we are in the trial. All day. Every day. It’s not about what we do when we know we’re being tested. It’s about what we do all through our lives and how we relate to other people. At first, it seemed kind of a crazy idea, no offense, but the more we thought about it and discussed it, the more sense it made.” He glanced again at She-of-Many-Paths, who spoke next.

“Some people…some are quite good at dissembling empathy when they know they are being watched, but the real question is, what do they do when they don’t know they’re being watched. And, I have – we have – been thinking that you are somehow watching without being seen.”

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“An interesting, idea,” began She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives. “Very interesting. Your curiosity will soon be satisfied. I ask all four of you to come to council fire by my cabin tonight.”

So it was ordered and so it was done. After dinner, the four came to a small fire that the Shaman had set in a small octagon of logs. After everyone was seated, the Shaman began.

“I want to thank you all for coming. Tonight I will reveal the names of those who have successfully earned the Sixth Ring of Empathy. I can see that two of you are quite surprised — so much so that you are bursting with questions. What would you like to know?

Trunk-of-Tree was indeed beside himself and needed to talk, spewing his words forth rather quickly for him. “How can you have a result when we haven’t even begun the trial. We don’t even know what the task is. At least I don’t. What are we to do? Have we already done it? What? I don’t understand.”

Eyes-of-Eagle was equally taken aback but reacted more stoically. “I would also like to understand, She-Who-Saves-Many-Lives. What do you mean? When did we do a trial?”

The Shaman nodded. “These are good questions. As you know, the Veritas put a high value on truth. I have discovered that some among our tribe are attempting to deceive. And though that does not include anyone here tonight, nonetheless, I wanted to see how you employ your gifts of empathy — or not — on a day to day basis, when you are not being tested, but just going about your business hunting, fishing, gathering, conversing, exploring, arguing, helping others, making baskets and tools and so on. In other words, I wanted to learn not what you could do when tested but what you would do, when you were not being tested.”

“Well, I, for one,” explained Trunk-of-Tree, “was trying to improve my skills. My empathy skills. I did our tests over and over trying to see through the eyes of others and feel the hunger of others and see through the eyes of animals. I think I have improved all of these skills. And, also, I tried different ways of how-to. That’s what I’ve been doing. Improving my empathy.”

“Indeed, this is not a bad thing, Trunk-of-Tree. How have you used your skill — your improved skill — to help the Veritas or to help someone among the Veritas?”

“Well,” stammered Trunk-of-Tree, “would there not be plenty of time for that once, if I became leader of the Veritas? That’s your task now, but our task is to learn empathy, right?”

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The Shaman looked at the others, “Any other comments?”

Eyes-of-Eagle spoke next, “Well, we have been talking among us a lot about empathy and about what the trial might be. I thought it would involve shape-shifting. I thought we would actually have to change our shape in some way so we could imagine, what it might be like if we were smaller, or older, or more … but I can see your point. Yes, the best trial is the trial no-one knows is a trial. Shadow-Walker and She-of-Many-Paths thought you might trick us like that but I didn’t really take it seriously.”

She-of-Many-Paths spoke, “I did not say it was a trick. Nor did Shadow-Walker. That is how you and Trunk-of-Tree characterized it. I just thought it was a slim possibility since it was taking so long. But then, the more we discussed it, the more I thought about it, the more likely it seemed that at least one of the trials wouldn’t be identified as such. In this way, our natures and choices would be revealed more fully.”

“This is all true,” said the Shaman, “and was indeed my plan. However, I also discovered something I did not know. She-of-Many-Paths has a particular talent that is rare indeed. She can tune into the very Tree of Life through another’s heart. She can connect her empathy with her imagination. And then I discovered that Shadow-Walker can sense the origin passion of a plan. The development of these unusual talents is consistent with my observations that both of them have been thinking about empathy all during their activities. I am therefore giving the Sixth Ring of Empathy to She-of-Many-Paths and Shadow-Walker.

“I need to share one other thing with all of you. I have reason to believe that sometime soon we may have some treachery in our midst. I just ask all four of you to keep your eyes, ears, and hearts open. You can use a broad-net empathy to sense when bad things are about to happen. Use it wisely.”

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petersironwood

~ Finding, formulating and solving life's frustrations.

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Myths of the Veritas: The Sixth Ring of Empathy