Quoted from a piece from Winds of Change, on how bias infects all of our thinking, and decision-making:
"So who's right - the decision-makers who claim objectivity or the citizens who roll their eyes? Research suggests that decision-makers don't realize just how easily and often their objectivity is compromised. The human brain knows many tricks that allow it to consider evidence, weigh facts and still reach precisely the conclusion it favors.... People realize that humans deceive themselves, of course, but they don't seem to realize that they too are human."
True - one reason that intellectual diversity is so critically important in public and public trust sectors like the academic social sciences, not to mention the media et. al. Claims that abstract 'professionalism' will trump these tendencies are simply not credible to common sense or human experience. One may realize that one's friend knows a lot about drugs given that she is a highly successful consultant who devises physician marketing programs, with Eli Lilly as her #1 client - but one would be wise to add a grain or two of salt to her explanations about, say, the safety of Prozac re: potential side-effects. Both experimental and anecdotal evidence suggest that this is justified, and wise.
Read his entire piece.
