If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem
Posted by: adonis49 on: October 15, 2014
If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem
Passive Omission bias versus Action bias
Fatal consequences resulting from inaction seem more anodyne and less reprehensible than active decision
Federal Drug Administrators have this tendency of withholding drugs that kill 20% of the terminally ill patients but do save 80% from certain death. Why?
The dead patients will have tremendous media impact and you’ll be out of a job pretty quickly.
What’s the difference between the legal option of abiding by the “Do not resuscitate” and the active but illegal euthanasia?
Practically nothing: it is the moral distortion resulting from the passive bias that is at work.
Sitting passively on a bunch of miserable shares feels better than actively buying bad shares.
Neglecting to declare income tax feels less immoral than faking tax documents.
When asked to vote by raining hands, we wait to see where the vast majority stand so that our hand will be drowned: No harm done.
Public servants owe their position by refraining from taking drastic decisions, and they stick to this Omission bias.
There is a difference between Action bias caused by fuzzy and uncertain situations and driven by instinct and omission bias caused by intelligible situation.
We are the lousy and poor descendants of cautious ancestors: Who refused to dissent from the in-group consensus, moved with the tribe, and invented all kinds of excuses in order to be spared front line positions in battles.
We are the descendant of those who survived long enough to procreate
Adonis Diaries 
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