cute fuzzy bunny
Give me a museum and I'll fill it. (Picasso) Give me a forum ...
Wife and I had an interesting discussion last night inspired by a television character saying "Truth is relative...pick one that works".
I've opined previously on "hairballs" we all have that may interpret our observations and perceptions to create 'truths' that we believe in. A number of studies have demonstrated that fairly complex decisions are made frequently without the consideration of available facts...we already have a construction inside of us that has previously interpreted some aspect of the "problem" to be solved and has already come to a conclusion. I call these constructions "hairballs".
A great example is to sidle up to a depression era person and ask them if they'd like to buy some shares of stock. You'll see a nice hairball emerge pretty quickly. Even if what you were to propose to them was a very nice value and had a lot of things going for it, that "stocks bad - depression" link in them has made the decision already. Your subsequent facts will be of little interest to them as their hairball goes into overdrive.
So anyhow, I was recalling this...ummm.... "marketing workshop" I was involved in some years ago. Some details may be off, but the premise is clean.
There was an exercise where a bunch of people were recruited to take part in a two day survey. A sampling was rounded up, paid for their services, and put into a minivan to be taken to a central location for the study to take place. On the way, they stopped and hopped out at a convenience store to get drinks and snacks - paid by the driver to promote the whole thing. While they were within site of but far enough away from the register to do anything stupid, a couple of guys (all staged) came in and "robbed" the store. Quick in and out, cashier just handed them a wad directly from the open register. Everyone had a good 15-20 second look at them while a fairly decent color 'security camera' (way better than the 15fps black and white jobs) recorded the whole thing.
Everyone was settled down, moved back into the van and taken to the facility, where they were casually asked about the robbery (as if you needed to prod them to get them to start talking about it...). The time was about an hour past the incident.
Heres where variable truth comes to play. None of them accurately described the incident, the participants, or even the actual events. There was one guy, two guys, three guys, tall/short/black/white, it took 2 minutes, 10 seconds, the guy behind the counter looked like he knew them/was scared/looked like he was going to go for a gun...it was all different.
Talk about screwing up your faith in eyewitnesses. Now I know why a lot of cops suggest that an eyewitness is the least reliable source of information.
So they proceeded with the fake study stuff, then had the people come back in the next day for round two. Again while things were being "set up", they were casually asked about the events of the day before. Even further embellishment. Stories were tweaked, "improved", additional things remembered, details altered.
It was fascinating to see people create and progressively spin "their yarns".
What they didnt do (and I'd have liked to see it) is show these folks the actual tape of the incident and see how they responded to the gross differences between what their brains recorded and tweaked and what, in the absence of surprise and duress, actually happened.
The real twist? The workshop leader pointing out that our own brains had performed interpretations on the "reality" that we saw, and even created some pre-judgements about the individuals involved based on their appearance and behavior, and would further process those events over time to create differences in our perception of the whole activituy. In effect, we couldnt even say for sure that our own direct and independent observations would be accurate and remain so.
This was sort of an elaborate version of "the whisper game", to be sure.
Which brings me to the point of noting that we all have our hairballs, ways of looking at things, visceral reactions and progressive interpretations. A lot of the time these get in the way of communicating, learning and even getting along. Principally because our "truth" feels threatened when it encounters other "truths".
To wit: we've had some folks feel that other members feel a certain way when theres no obvious indication that they in fact do. Some folks feel that the whole board has a 'taint' or 'direction' to it, yet when the evidence is measured, its not really that way.
Perhaps if we spent a little more time considering our hairballs and those of others, and spent the time to really read and comprehend what they're saying rather than projecting on individuals and the group as a whole...we'd learn a lot more and be better for it.
I've opined previously on "hairballs" we all have that may interpret our observations and perceptions to create 'truths' that we believe in. A number of studies have demonstrated that fairly complex decisions are made frequently without the consideration of available facts...we already have a construction inside of us that has previously interpreted some aspect of the "problem" to be solved and has already come to a conclusion. I call these constructions "hairballs".
A great example is to sidle up to a depression era person and ask them if they'd like to buy some shares of stock. You'll see a nice hairball emerge pretty quickly. Even if what you were to propose to them was a very nice value and had a lot of things going for it, that "stocks bad - depression" link in them has made the decision already. Your subsequent facts will be of little interest to them as their hairball goes into overdrive.
So anyhow, I was recalling this...ummm.... "marketing workshop" I was involved in some years ago. Some details may be off, but the premise is clean.
There was an exercise where a bunch of people were recruited to take part in a two day survey. A sampling was rounded up, paid for their services, and put into a minivan to be taken to a central location for the study to take place. On the way, they stopped and hopped out at a convenience store to get drinks and snacks - paid by the driver to promote the whole thing. While they were within site of but far enough away from the register to do anything stupid, a couple of guys (all staged) came in and "robbed" the store. Quick in and out, cashier just handed them a wad directly from the open register. Everyone had a good 15-20 second look at them while a fairly decent color 'security camera' (way better than the 15fps black and white jobs) recorded the whole thing.
Everyone was settled down, moved back into the van and taken to the facility, where they were casually asked about the robbery (as if you needed to prod them to get them to start talking about it...). The time was about an hour past the incident.
Heres where variable truth comes to play. None of them accurately described the incident, the participants, or even the actual events. There was one guy, two guys, three guys, tall/short/black/white, it took 2 minutes, 10 seconds, the guy behind the counter looked like he knew them/was scared/looked like he was going to go for a gun...it was all different.
Talk about screwing up your faith in eyewitnesses. Now I know why a lot of cops suggest that an eyewitness is the least reliable source of information.
So they proceeded with the fake study stuff, then had the people come back in the next day for round two. Again while things were being "set up", they were casually asked about the events of the day before. Even further embellishment. Stories were tweaked, "improved", additional things remembered, details altered.
It was fascinating to see people create and progressively spin "their yarns".
What they didnt do (and I'd have liked to see it) is show these folks the actual tape of the incident and see how they responded to the gross differences between what their brains recorded and tweaked and what, in the absence of surprise and duress, actually happened.
The real twist? The workshop leader pointing out that our own brains had performed interpretations on the "reality" that we saw, and even created some pre-judgements about the individuals involved based on their appearance and behavior, and would further process those events over time to create differences in our perception of the whole activituy. In effect, we couldnt even say for sure that our own direct and independent observations would be accurate and remain so.
This was sort of an elaborate version of "the whisper game", to be sure.
Which brings me to the point of noting that we all have our hairballs, ways of looking at things, visceral reactions and progressive interpretations. A lot of the time these get in the way of communicating, learning and even getting along. Principally because our "truth" feels threatened when it encounters other "truths".
To wit: we've had some folks feel that other members feel a certain way when theres no obvious indication that they in fact do. Some folks feel that the whole board has a 'taint' or 'direction' to it, yet when the evidence is measured, its not really that way.
Perhaps if we spent a little more time considering our hairballs and those of others, and spent the time to really read and comprehend what they're saying rather than projecting on individuals and the group as a whole...we'd learn a lot more and be better for it.
