Perhaps the most worrisome characteristic of humanity is our collective irrationality -- an observation that may not come as a revelation. Too often we don't consciously know what motivates us and, in the clarity of retrospect, we discover we have behaved with questionable
justification. Even worse, we pretend that we are rational and our key strategic decisions are based on logical, evidential thought. So, on the 40th
anniversary of our landing on the moon, we should not be surprised by the news that this magnificent technological achievement was primarily motivated by America's competition for prestige with the Soviet Union. No fundamental scientific principles were to be gained by a manned flight to the moon. No eminently practical justification warranted the expenditure of the billions of dollars to get there -- even had the moon been composed of the finest quality blue cheese, the cost of transporting it to market would have been prohibitively expensive. In essence, getting to the moon was the equivalent of one primate climbing to the top of the tallest tree and beating its chest the loudest. Or consider the recent global financial crisis. Virtually none of the complex mathematical models predicted such a collapse. Barely a handful of the world's economic gurus had an inkling it was coming. This was because, in the words of Richard Bronk -- his new book is called The Romantic Economist -- "Standard economics assumes that economic agents are perfectly rational." In reality, writes Bronk, "We all have passions, paranoias, dreams and delusions" that guide our judgment. In retrospect, we can now see that pseudo-science, "irrational exuberance" and collective delusion built a house of cards so easily blown down by a gust of reality. Consequently, new economic models are now drawing from other disciplines such as biology and psychology to predict the outcomes of particular monetary strategies. Which is to say, concludes Larry Elliott in The Guardian Weekly (Apr. 20/09), "it is virtually impossible to say where the global economy goes from here."
For further details visit as : http://www.canada.com/Reason+humanity+character/1868785/story.html
justification. Even worse, we pretend that we are rational and our key strategic decisions are based on logical, evidential thought. So, on the 40th
anniversary of our landing on the moon, we should not be surprised by the news that this magnificent technological achievement was primarily motivated by America's competition for prestige with the Soviet Union. No fundamental scientific principles were to be gained by a manned flight to the moon. No eminently practical justification warranted the expenditure of the billions of dollars to get there -- even had the moon been composed of the finest quality blue cheese, the cost of transporting it to market would have been prohibitively expensive. In essence, getting to the moon was the equivalent of one primate climbing to the top of the tallest tree and beating its chest the loudest. Or consider the recent global financial crisis. Virtually none of the complex mathematical models predicted such a collapse. Barely a handful of the world's economic gurus had an inkling it was coming. This was because, in the words of Richard Bronk -- his new book is called The Romantic Economist -- "Standard economics assumes that economic agents are perfectly rational." In reality, writes Bronk, "We all have passions, paranoias, dreams and delusions" that guide our judgment. In retrospect, we can now see that pseudo-science, "irrational exuberance" and collective delusion built a house of cards so easily blown down by a gust of reality. Consequently, new economic models are now drawing from other disciplines such as biology and psychology to predict the outcomes of particular monetary strategies. Which is to say, concludes Larry Elliott in The Guardian Weekly (Apr. 20/09), "it is virtually impossible to say where the global economy goes from here."For further details visit as : http://www.canada.com/Reason+humanity+character/1868785/story.html
