But few of us really stop to ask ourselves what new information might change our minds, especially on questions of politics and identity. We fall int… - David Franklin

After pausing, the student continues: “There’s also an element of believing something because you want it to happen.” This betrays a second bias in which we believe what we want to be true. This is a form of confirmation bias, which exacerbates the distorting effect of availability bias. We seek out information that confirms our existing beliefs or desires, and ignore information that refutes them.

The Google team at Project Aristotle concluded that there were five main traits of a successful team. Psychological safety was the most important, and their research suggested that it underpinned the other four[xxvi]. The five traits were as follows: (1) Psychological safety: team members feel safe to take risks and be vulnerable in front of each other. (2) Dependability: team members get things done on time, and meet Google’s high bar for excellence. (3) Structure and clarity: team members have clear roles, plans, and goals. (4) Meaning: work is personally important to team members. (5) Impact: team members think their work matters and creates change.

The phrases ‘certainty is an illusion’ and ‘think probabilistically about the world’, both introduced in the first class, are the first two examples of high-level concepts which Dan calls airport ideas.