https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow

It's a fault of us psychologists. The most interesting studies are those that are surprising, so that's what psychology classes are packed with. But we should know better, because that's just selection bias in action. Historically, this has led to intro courses consisting of 50%+ irreproducible studies.

But even after the reproducibility crisis cleanup, the selection bias still remains in place. There aren't a ton of fun studies about the typical accuracy of perception or how humans are often quite thinking and rational.

Of course, we also must be careful here because you're using your own faculties to judge the content of the psychology class (as were the psychologists who produces the content you were learning). Skepticism falls into special pleading, because in order to take a skeptical stance toward the human intellect as such, one must somehow transcend the human intellect to be able to make those sorts of judgements [0].

I would also not say that we are inherently and constitutionally irrational. I would say rather - to use the old cliche - that the intellect's facility is like a muscle that needs to develop, to grow, and to be conditioned to become strong. I would also say that some have greater capacity and potential on constitutional grounds.

Furthermore, the cultivation of virtue is essential, as errors of reasoning are shaped by our vices and not just cognitive limitations or whatever. Indeed, the more intellectual power someone has, the more essential virtue becomes, lest the intellect destroy itself with rationalizations and abuse [1].

[0] Of course, what constitutes correct reasoning is a teleological matter. Otherwise, there is no reason to favor one conclusion over another or any conclusion at all.

[1] A coward of high intelligence will the rationalize powerful. In Chomsky's view, for instance, the overwhelming majority of intellectuals have historically acted as servants of power, rationalizing the status quo, and manufacturing consent. Or as Adam Zamoyski said pithily when discussion Napoleon's relationship with French intelligentsia, intellectuals are mostly tarts for power.

Speaking of which, I noticed that the big market reversal during the beginning of the Iran war happened right around when ESLR requirements were due to relax. Is this a transmission mechanism for that? Did some of the big brokerages run a big promotion (0% APR on margin debt!) or something?

Click "edit graph" and change units to "natural log". Now look again. You'll see that the growth in margin loans is absolutely normal, and actually has only recently recovered from the dip caused by the 2008 financial crisis.

Do you honestly think this particular "cram AI in everything" isn't related to the current AI hype? Or that AI applications and companies providing things like this won't crash right along with the general llm AI hype and leveraged investments?

The only thing that happened here is that they didn't check it worked before firing everyone. That can happen with any automated system, AI or not.

So basically, it was the GameStop of the 1630s. Humans never change.

Great tip, but I didn't see "natural log" specifically. Perhaps "Compounded rate of change" is most applicable? That's still mostly above 0 historically, indicating margin usage is ever-increasing. The helpful graph would be margin usage as a weighted percentage of market participation.

Adam Curtis even suggests lightly that the takedown of priming in academia was paid for to bury its actual effectiveness (and liability by implication)