A space to explore, share and shape the issues facing social and behavioral scientists
Our mixed feelings about reporting the deaths of vaccine sceptics, says Nick Chater, reflect the complexity of our moral selves – consequences, rules, agreements and virtues can pull us in different directions.
Crises rarely see human decision-making operating at its best. Politicians and policymakers have to make important decisions in unfamiliar circumstances, with vast gaps in the available information, and all in the full glare of public scrutiny. The psychology of decision making doesn’t just tell us a lot about the potential pitfalls in our own thinking – it alerts us to ways in which some of the world’s governments may go astray.
Imagine a crystal ball that could provide us with graphs of levels of house prices, migration, the value of the pound, or the number of EU laws, from now into the far future, suggests Nick Chater about the results of the Brexit vote. He suspects this crystal ball would not help many voters come to any firm conclusions.
