by David Robson
This kind of day-to-day variation can be seen in personality traits such as extraversion, Grossmann says, as each person’s behaviour varies from a fixed set point; a mild introvert may still prefer to be quietly alone at work, but then become more gregarious around the people she trusts. Similarly, it’s possible that someone may be fairly wise when dealing with a confrontational colleague – but then lose their head when dealing with their ex.
The question is, how can we learn to change that set point?
Benjamin Franklin’s writings offer anecdotal evidence that wisdom can be cultivated. According to his autobiography, he had been a ‘disputatious’ youth, but that changed when he read an account of Socrates’ trial.19 Impressed by the Greek philosopher’s humble method of enquiry, he determined to always question his own judgement and respect other people’s, and in his conversation, he refused to use words such as ‘certainly, undoubtedly, or any others that give the air of positiveness to an opinion’. Soon it became a permanent state of mind. ‘For these fifty years past no one has ever heard a dogmatical expression escape me,’ he wrote.
The result was the kind of humble and open mind that proves to be so critical for Grossman’s research on evidence-based wisdom. ‘I find a frank acknowledgement of one’s ignorance is not only the easiest way to get rid of a difficulty, but the likeliest way to obtain information, and therefore I practice it,’ Franklin wrote in 1755, while discussing his confusion over a recent scientific result. ‘Those who affect to be thought to know everything, and so undertake to explain everything, often remain long ignorant of many things that others could and would instruct them in, if they appeared less conceited.’20
Unfortunately, the scientific research suggests that good intentions may not be sufficient. A classic psychological study by Charles Lord in the late 1970s found that simply telling people to be ‘as objective and unbiased as possible’ made little to no difference in counteracting the myside bias. When considering arguments for the death penalty, for instance, subjects still tended to come to conclusions that suited their preconceptions and still dismissed the evidence opposing their view, despite Lord’s warnings.21 Clearly, wanting to be fair and objective alone isn’t enough; you also need practical methods to correct your blinkered reasoning.
Luckily, Franklin had also developed some of those strategies – methods that psychologists would only come to recognise centuries later.
His approach is perhaps best illustrated through a letter to Joseph Priestley in 1772. The British clergyman and scientist had been offered the job of overseeing the education of the aristocrat Lord Shelburne’s children. This lucrative opportunity would offer much-needed financial security, but it would also mean sacrificing his ministry, a position he considered ‘the noblest of all professions’ – and so he wrote to Franklin for advice.
‘In the affair of so much importance to you, where-in you ask my advice, I cannot, for want of sufficient premises, counsel you what to determine, but if you please, I will tell you how,’ Franklin replied. He called his method a kind of ‘moral algebra’, and it involved dividing a piece of paper in two and writing the advantages and disadvantages on either side – much like a modern pros and cons list. He would then think carefully about each one and assign them a number based on importance; if a pro equalled a con, he would cross them both off the list. ‘Thus proceeding I find at length where the balance lies; and if, after a day or two of farther consideration, nothing new that is of importance occurs on either side, I come to a determination accordingly.’22
Franklin conceded that the values he placed on each reason were far from scientific, but argued that when ‘each is thus considered separately and comparatively, and the whole lies before me, I think I can judge better, and am less liable to make a rash step.’
As you can see, Franklin’s strategy is more deliberative and involved than the quick lists of advantages and disadvantages most of us may scribble in a notebook. Of particular importance is the careful way that he attempts to weigh up each item, and his diligence in suspending his judgement to allow his thoughts to settle. Franklin seems to have been especially aware of our tendency to lean heavily on the reasons that are most easily recalled. As he described in another letter, some people base their decisions on facts that just ‘happened to be present in the mind’, while the best reasons were ‘absent’.23 This tendency is indeed an important source of bias when we try to reason, which is why it’s so important to give yourself the time to wait until all the arguments are laid out in front of you.24
Whether or not you follow Franklin’s moral algebra to the letter, psychologists have found that deliberately taking time to ‘consider the opposite’ viewpoint can reduce a range of reasoning errors,25 such as anchoring,26 and over-confidence,27 and, of course, the myside bias. The benefits appear to be robust across many different decisions – from helping people to critique dubious health claims28 to forming an opinion on capital punishment and reducing sexist prejudice.29 In each case, the aim was to actively argue against yourself, and consider why your initial judgement may be wrong.30*
* The thirteenth-century philosopher Thomas Aquinas, incidentally, used similar techniques in his own theological and philosophical inquiries. As the philosopher Jason Baehr (a modern champion of intellectual humility, who we’ll meet in Chapter 8) points out, Aquinas deliberately argued against his initial hypothesis on any opinion, doing ‘his best to make these objections as forceful or strong as possible’. He then argues against those points with equal force, until eventually his view reaches some kind of equilibrium.
Depending on the magnitude of the decision, you may benefit from undergoing a few iterations of this process, each time reaching for an additional piece of information that you overlooked on your first pass.31 You should also pay particular attention to the way you consider the evidence opposing your gut instinct, since you may still be tempted to dismiss it out of hand, even after you have acknowledged its existence. Instead, you might ask yourself: ‘Would I have made the same evaluation, had exactly the same evidence produced results on the other side of the issue?’
Suppose that, like Priestley, you are considering whether to take a new job and you have sought the advice of a friend, who encourages you to accept the offer. You might then ask: ‘Would I have given the same weight to my friend’s judgement had she opposed the decision?’32 It sounds convoluted, but Lord’s studies suggested this kind of approach really can overcome our tendency to dismiss the evidence that doesn’t fit our preferred point of view.
You might also try to imagine that someone else will examine your justifications, or even try to present them to a friend or colleague. Many studies have shown that we consider more points of view when we believe that we will need to explain our thinking to others.33
We can’t know if Franklin applied his moral algebra in all situations, but the general principle of deliberate open-minded thinking seems to have dictated many of his biggest decisions. ‘All the achievements in the public’s interest ? getting a fire department organised, the streets paved, a library established, schools for the poor supported, and much more ? attest to his skill in reading others and persuading them to do what he wanted them to do’, writes the historian Robert Middlekauf.34 ‘He calculated and measured; he weighed and he assessed. There was a kind of quantification embedded in the process of his thought . . . This indeed describes what was most rational about Franklin’s mind.’
This kind of thinking is not always respected, however. Particularly in crisis, we sometimes revere ‘strong’, single-minded leaders who will stay true to their convictions, and even Franklin was once considered too ‘soft’ to negotiate with the British during the War of Independence. He was later appointed as one of the commissioners, however, and proved to be a shrewd opponent.
And there is some evidence that a more open-minded approach may lie behind many other successful leaders. One analysis, for instance, has examined the texts of UN General Assembly speeches con
cerning the Middle East conflict from 1947 to 1976, scoring the content for the speakers’ consideration and integration of alternative points of view – the kind of open-minded thinking that was so important for Grossmann’s measure of wisdom. The researchers found that this score consistently dropped in the periods preceding a war, whereas higher scores seemed to sustain longer intervals of peace.
It would be foolish to read too much into post-hoc analyses – after all, people would naturally become more closed-minded during times of heightened tension.35 But lab experiments have found that people scoring lower on these measures are more likely to resort to aggressive tactics. And the idea does find further support in an examination of the US’s most important political crises in the last 100 years, including John F. Kennedy’s handling of the Cuban missile crisis, and Robert Nixon’s dealings with the Cambodian invasion of 1970 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973.
Textual analyses of the speeches, letters and official statements made by presidents and their Secretaries of State show that the level of open-minded thinking consistently predicted the later outcome of the negotiations, with JFK scoring highly for his successful handling of the Cuban missile crisis, and Dwight Eisenhower for the way he dealt with the two Taiwan Strait conflicts between Mainland China and Taiwan in the 1950s.36
In more recent politics, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel is famous for her ‘analytical detachment’, as she famously listens to all perspectives before making a decision; one senior government official describes her as ‘the best analyst of any given situation that I could imagine’.
The Germans have even coined a new word – merkeln (to Merkel) – that captures this patient, deliberative stance, though it’s not always meant flatteringly, since it can also reflect frustrating indecision.37 ‘I am regarded as a permanent delayer sometimes,’ she has said herself, ‘but I think it is essential and extremely important to take people along and really listen to them in political talks.’ And it has served her well, helping her to remain one of the longest-serving European leaders despite some serious economic crises.
If we recall the idea that many intelligent people are like a car speeding along the road without guidance or caution, then Merkel, Eisenhower and Franklin represent patient, careful drivers: despite their formidable engines, they know when to hit the brakes and check the terrain before deciding on their route.38
Franklin’s moral algebra is just one of many potential ways to cultivate wisdom, and further insights come from a phenomenon known as Solomon’s Paradox, which Grossmann named after the legendary king of Israel in the tenth century bc.
According to biblical accounts, God appeared to Solomon in a dream and offered to give him a special gift at the start of his reign. Rather than choosing wealth, honour or longevity, he chose wisdom of judgement. His insight was soon put to the test when two harlots appeared before him, both claiming to be the mother of a boy. Solomon ordered for the child to be cut in two – knowing that the true mother would rather renounce her claim than see her son killed. The decision is often considered the epitome of impartial judgement – and people soon travelled from across the land to receive his counsel. He led the land to riches and built Jerusalem’s Temple.
Yet Solomon is said to have struggled to apply his famously wise judgement in his personal life, which was ruled by intemperate passions. Despite being the chief Jewish priest, for instance, he defied the Torah’s commandments by taking a thousand wives and concubines, and he amassed huge personal wealth. He became a ruthless and greedy tyrant, and was so embroiled in his affairs that he neglected to educate his son and prepare him for power. The kingdom ultimately descended into chaos and war.39
Three millennia later, Grossmann has found this same ‘asymmetry’ in his own tests of wisdom. Like Solomon, many people reason wisely about other people’s dilemmas, but struggle to reason clearly about their own issues, as they become more arrogant in their opinions, and less able to compromise – another form of the bias blind spot.40 These kinds of errors seem to be a particular problem when we feel threatened, triggering so-called ‘hot’ emotional processing that is narrow and closed-minded.
The good news is that we can use Solomon’s Paradox to our advantage by practising a process called ‘self-distancing’. To get a flavour of its power, think of a recent event that made you feel angry. Now ‘take a few steps back’, almost as if you were watching yourself from another part of the room or on a cinema screen, and describe the unfolding situation to yourself. How did you feel?
In a series of experiments, Ethan Kross at the University of Michigan has shown that this simple process encourages people to take a more reflective attitude towards their problems – using ‘cool’ rather than ‘hot’ processing. He found, for instance, that they were more likely to describe the situation with more neutral words, and they began to look for the underlying reasons for their discontent, rather than focusing on the petty details.41
Consider these two examples. The first is from an ‘immersed’, first-person perspective.
‘I was appalled that my boyfriend told me he couldn’t connect with me because he thought I was going to hell. I cried and sat on the floor of my dorm hallway and tried to prove to him that my religion was the same as his . . .’
And the second is from the distanced viewpoint:
‘I was able to see the argument more clearly . . . I initially empathized better with myself but then I began to understand how my friend felt. It may have been irrational but I understand his motivation.’
You can see how the event became less personal, and more abstract, for the second participant – and he or she began to look beyond their own experience to understand the conflict.
Kross emphasises that this is not just another form of avoidance, or suppression. ‘Our conception was not to remove them from the event but to give them a small amount of distance, hold them back a little bit, and then allow them to confront the emotion from a healthier stance,’ he told me in an interview. ‘When you do this from an immersed perspective, people tend to focus on what happened to them. Distancing allows them to shift into this meaning-making mode where they put the event into a broader perspective and context.’
He has since repeated the finding many times, using different forms of self-distancing. You may imagine yourself as a fly on the wall, for instance, or a well-intentioned observer. Or you may try to imagine your older, wiser self looking back at the event from the distant future. Simply talking about your experiences in the third person (‘David was talking to Natasha, when . . .’) can also bring about the necessary change of perspective.
Kross points out that many people naturally self-distance to process unpalatable emotions. He points to an interview in which the basketball player LeBron James described his choice to leave the Cleveland Cavaliers (who had nurtured his career) and move to the Miami Heat. ‘One thing I didn’t want to do was make an emotional decision. I wanted to do what’s best for LeBron James and to do what makes LeBron James happy.’ Malala Yousafzai, meanwhile, used a similar approach to bolster her courage against the Taliban. ‘I used to think that the Tali[ban] would come and he would just kill me. But then I said [to myself], if he comes, what would you do Malala? Then I would reply to myself, Malala just take a shoe and hit him.’
People who spontaneously take a new perspective in this way enjoy a range of benefits, including reduced anxiety and rumination.42 Adopting that distanced perspective even helped one group of study participants to confront one of the most feared events in modern life: public speaking. Using self-distancing as they psyched themselves up for a speech, they showed fewer physiological signs of threat, and reported less anxiety, than a control group taking the immersed, first-person perspective. The benefits were also visible to observers judging their talks, too, who thought they gave more confident and powerful speeches.43
In each case, self-distancing had helped the participants to avoid that self-centred ‘hot’ cognition that fuels our bias, so that th
eir thinking was no longer serving their anger, fear, or threatened ego. Sure enough, Grossmann has found that self-distancing resolved Solomon’s Paradox when thinking about personal crises (such as an unfaithful partner), meaning that people were more humble and open to compromise, and more willing to consider the conflicting viewpoints.44 ‘If you become an observer, then right away you get into this inquisitive mode and you try to make sense of the situation,’ Grossmann told me. ‘It almost always co-occurs with being intellectually humble, considering different perspectives and integrating them together.’
And that may have a serious impact on your relationships. A team led by Eli Finkel at Northwestern University tracked 120 married couples over a period of two years. The initial arc of their relationships was not promising: over the first twelve months, most of the couples faced a downward spiral in their relationship satisfaction, as disappointment and resentments started to build. After a year, however, Finkel gave half of the couples a short course on self-distancing – such as imagining a dispute through the eyes of a more dispassionate observer.
Compared to typical relationship counselling, it was a tiny step – the lesson in self-distancing lasted about twenty minutes in total. But it transformed the couples’ love stories, resulting in greater intimacy and trust over the following year, as they constructively worked through their differences. The control group, in contrast, continued their steady decline for the next year, as resentment continued to build.45