This issue marks the 3rd anniversary of this column, and I'm here to reward myself again by writing some of my own prejudices. 

Einstein once said: "Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." 

Our common sense is actually obtained by induction. Through induction, we can understand the world based on experience. When collective experience accumulates, it will become our common sense. But is induction itself really reliable? We think induction is reliable because we have judged it through a lot of experience, which itself is induction, even if we can only use induction to prove that induction is reliable, it is a circular argument. The famous philosopher Russell satirized this common sense with the problem of turkey: A turkey has been fed by a farmer at 9 o'clock every day. Thus, the turkey thinks that the presence of the farmer means that there is something to eat. Until the day before Christmas, the farmer did not come to feed this time, but... 

We can't tell when common sense is wrong

What Russell wants to say is that who use induction to obtain knowledge are actually the same as the turkey. We will never know that our common sense will not work at that time. 

We build our common sense based on experience and the accumulated knowledge of others, but these experiences may be unique or incorrect, causing us to have cognitive biases and prejudices, and prejudices can become people's blind spots. It is easier to see other people's blind spots than to see your own. However, people cannot know everything, so blind spots must exist; the blind spots are hidden in the market, and the more blind spots are hidden in common sense, the harder it is to find. 

I remember being very ticklish when I was a child. My mother liked to tickle me to make me laugh. Every time she put her finger on my armpit or the sides of my abdomen, I would laugh involuntarily, and I couldn't stop. I believe that many people will have my experience, and it has even become common sense. But can't this be a prejudice?

By the time I was in my teens, I began to suspect that scratches weren't a given. Because no matter what strength and angle I use my fingers, neither can achieve the same itching. This may be just an illusion. After a period of thought practice and rebuilding my consciousness, I became no longer afraid of scratches. 

I have shared this experience with some ticklish friends, but they have not been successful, and they think it is due to my personal characteristics, so it will not work for them. But the same experience, when shared with friends who are not ticklish, they immediately resonate, agreeing that the feeling of itching is just an illusion and can be overcome. Based on this experience, I believe that you can only change if you believe that you can. If you don't believe it, you can always give yourself an irrevocable explanation.

Those who understand will naturally understand

Blind spots actually appear around us from time to time. We often judge things subjectively based on our common sense (prejudice), use intuition to judge how things should be done, and use intuition to judge whether things are right or wrong. But if we lack the ability to examine ourselves, it is easy to accept these blind spots without thinking, and even think that the existence of these blind spots is correct. Ultimately, blame someone else for that blind spot and give a different explanation for it. 

However, even when we know our blind spots, it can be difficult to fix them. It takes more courage to correct ourselves than to correct others. It may be because the habit of fear of making mistakes, or because of self-esteem, makes it difficult for us to correct ourselves. Unnecessary persistence is an obstacle to growth and will not have a positive impact on the department. On the contrary, people who face their mistakes positively will be more likely to adjust themselves in response to reality, and can even further develop their own self-correction ability to the departmental correction ability.

Simon So

Head of Digital Marketing