#539 Ralph Hertwig - Deliberate Ignorance: Choosing Not to Know
RECORDED ON JULY 19th 2021.
Dr. Ralph Hertwig is Director of the Center for Adaptive Rationality at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin, Germany. His research interests include models of bounded and ecological rationality; decisions from experience; the psychology of risk; lifespan development of decision making; and evidence-based public policy. He is the editor of Deliberate Ignorance: Choosing Not to Know.
In this episode, we focus on Deliberate Ignorance. We define bounded rationality, ecological rationality, and deliberate ignorance. We talk about the cognitive bases of deliberate rationality, and its relationship with biases and heuristics. We discuss how deliberate ignorance can occur in institutions. We talk about a possible evolutionary rationale for deliberate ignorance, what we know about its development in children, and also the cross-cultural evidence for it. We also discuss individual differences in deliberate ignorance, and the correlation with scores on the Big Five’s openness to experience. We discuss how deliberate ignorance manifests itself in science. Finally, we talk about when and why we should fight against deliberate ignorance.
Time Links:
Intro
Bounded rationality, and ecological rationality
What is (deliberate) ignorance?
Deliberate ignorance and bias
Deliberate ignorance on an institutional level
The evolution, the development, and the cross-cultural evidence for deliberate ignorance
Deliberate ignorance in science
Fighting against deliberate ignorance – when and how to do it
The positive role of deliberate ignorance
Follow Dr. Hertwig’s work!
Follow Dr. Hertwig’s work:
University page: https://bit.ly/3cgOMDR
ResearchGate profile: https://bit.ly/36D7IbZ
Amazon page: https://amzn.to/3hKFTVE
Deliberate Ignorance: https://amzn.to/3ceadoX