You’re walking through a park and see a couple of 7 year old kids in the playground area. One walks up to the other and the latter, without provocation or even saying anything, starts hitting the former.
What would you think of this situation? What would you do? A normal reaction would be to stop the fight and reprimand the aggressor. Under a given situation, we make decisions or judgments based on the information we have, but it’s important to keep in mind that this information maybe out of context and incomplete or maybe even manipulated or incorrect. Here’s more information on the 7 year olds’ case:
John has been bullying Matt for the past year every day in school. Matt has had to make up stories at home to explain the bruises. Once his self esteem hit rock bottom and the anxiety was unbearable, he took the determination to face the situation: next time he saw John, he’d confront him, he’d show him that from that point on he would stand up for himself. He might win the fight or not, but he’d make sure to get the message across: the bullying was going to end.
What would you think of this situation now? And what would you do? Things now have changed, for the same exact situation. Making hasty decisions and judgements is something we do constantly:
- “I think my boss in not happy with my performance lately, he has been ignoring me and doesn’t even greet me when we cross in the hallway. I have seen talk to other people and there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with him.” Maybe the boss is having personal problems and is feeling low and/or irritated lately and only manages to pull some strength together to seem nice and polite when someone approaches him and talks one on one with him.
- “In todays news: a armed man has taken an ER hostage. Police are in negotiations with him but clain that the abductor is unwilling to cooperate. Special forces will probably have to intervene to prevent a blood bath.” This example is (lighty) taken from the movie John Q., where a father and husband whose son is diagnosed with an enlarged heart and finds out he is unable to receive a transplant because HMO insurance will not cover it, before he decides to hold up the hospital and force them to do it.
This happens in tabletop games too. A player might do something and you might think you know why, but maybe he could be bluffing or even made a mistake ;). Just bear in mind that when you make a decision with bad or insufficient information, you are incurring in risk: the worst the quality of the information, the higher the risk, and vice versa. So here are my words of wisdom for making good decisions:
- Identify the information you need to make a the right decision/judgement.
- Obtain the information (this is important and often belittled).
- Understand, acknowledge and assume the risk.
And to finish off the post, here’s a logic puzzle if you want to prove you can take your analitic/judgement skills to a higher level:
A group of people with assorted eye colors live on an island. They are all perfect logicians — if a conclusion can be logically deduced, they will do it instantly. No one knows the color of their eyes. Every night at midnight, a ferry stops at the island. Any islanders who have figured out the color of their own eyes then leave the island, and the rest stay. Everyone can see everyone else at all times and keeps a count of the number of people they see with each eye color (excluding themselves), but they cannot otherwise communicate. Everyone on the island knows all the rules in this paragraph.
On this island there are 100 blue-eyed people, 100 brown-eyed people, and the Guru (she happens to have green eyes). So any given blue-eyed person can see 100 people with brown eyes and 99 people with blue eyes (and one with green), but that does not tell him his own eye color; as far as he knows the totals could be 101 brown and 99 blue. Or 100 brown, 99 blue, and he could have red eyes.
The Guru is allowed to speak once (let’s say at noon), on one day in all their endless years on the island. Standing before the islanders, she says the following:
“I can see someone who has blue eyes.”
Who leaves the island, and on what night?
Cannibals ambush a safari in the jungle and capture three men. The cannibals give the men a single chance to escape uneaten.
The captives are lined up in order of height, and are tied to stakes. The man in the rear can see the backs of his two friends, the man in the middle can see the back of the man in front, and the man in front cannot see anyone. The cannibals show the men five hats. Three of the hats are black and two of the hats are white.
Blindfolds are then placed over each man’s eyes and a hat is placed on each man’s head. The two hats left over are hidden. The blindfolds are then removed and it is said to the men that if one of them can guess what color hat he is wearing they can all leave unharmed.
The man in the rear who can see both of his friends’ hats but not his own says, “I don’t know”. The middle man who can see the hat of the man in front, but not his own says, “I don’t know”. The front man who cannot see ANYBODY’S hat says “I know!”
How did he know the color of his hat and what color was it?
Feel free to leave your answer on the comments below.
Again, in these problems, all the information you need is given to you, but in real life, remember, this is rarely the case! Make the extra effort.