Why do I want to do easy and instant/entertaining things (like how to best save/grow money in bank account, read predictably irrational) and not hard and long-term things (study PROSE work, TLA+)
Sorta from Prospect_theory#Example and http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/prospect.htm
| Guaranteed $1000 | $2500 if heads |
|---|---|
| Sweet, $1000 guaranteed! | $0 if I lose, no way! |
| Guaranteed $1000 | $7500 if heads |
|---|---|
| Sweet, $1000 guaranteed! | Now I don't feel so bad about “betting the house” |
| Guaranteed 10 * $1000 | $2500 for each head of 10 flips |
|---|---|
| Sweet, $10K! | Oh wait…50% * 25K = $12.5K, low variance gaussian, ok, sure |
| Guaranteed $1000 loss | $2500 loss if tails, $0 if heads |
|---|---|
| Man, that sucks | I have a good chance of this sucking less Even though it will likely burn you more |
http://psych.hanover.edu/classes/cognition/papers/tversky81.pdf
| Music Player | New Car | |
|---|---|---|
| Discount | $20 / $50 | $20 / $20,000 |
| Outcome | Man, I need to drive across town to get that deal! | Whatever, I'll just get it closer to me. Not worth the drive |
| “Rationale” | Me: I'm going to make a killing into their profit margin / it's a really good deal. It's rare and unusual. | They're basically the same price. Why bother? Oh, a $1000 leather seat upgrade, that's not so bad either…throw that on too! |
| Irrationality | $20 is still $20. We think in relative measures to our peril to sales teams. |
More to come here…