Think for Yourself

 

CHAPTER 11

Navigating Uncertainty

The learned dependency and blind obedience described earlier in the book has been amplified by the increasingly obvious uncertainty that plagues our daily lives. Given our deep discomfort with uncertainty and the promise of expert-led optimal decision making (even in the face of such ambiguity), we are increasingly drawn to experts. Noreena Hertz, the woman who earlier encouraged us to push back against experts and ask questions, described the current predicament of expert dependency in a TED talk:

In a world of data deluge and extreme complexity … in an age that is sometimes nowadays frightening or confusing, we feel reassured by the almost parental-like authority of experts who tell us so clearly what ...