FEYNMAN ON ELIMINATING ALTERNATIVE EXPLANATIONS. It seems apparent to me that there are a variety of factors which might affect the jam experiment (for example, is choosing among jams different from choosing hamburgers or cars?). Circumstances surrounding choices are very important, as is evident from the enormous sums of money that are spent by marketing experts in investigating how to influence consumer choices. Richard Feynman (the great physicist who wrote SURELY YOU’RE JOKING, MR. FEYNMAN) , in a commencement address at Caltech in 1974, emphasized the importance of replicating experiments and of eliminating alternative explanations. He told how he had advised a psychology student investigating alternatives to an experiment that somebody else had done to begin by repeating that experiment in her lab— “to do it under condition X to see if she could also get result A, and then change to Y and see if A changed. Then she would know that the real difference was the thing she thought she had under control.” He singled out for praise an experiment by a man named Young in 1937. Young was trying to train rats to open the third door on a corridor. Feynman describes how Young painted the doors carefully to make sure the textures of the doors were the same; he applied chemicals after each run so that the smell of food couldn’t influence the rats; he put his corridor on sand so that the sound in the corridor could not influence the rats. Feynman says that “from a scientific standpoint, that is an A-number-one experiment.” But, says Feynman, this wonderful experiment and Young’s papers “are not referred to, because he didn’t discover anything about the rats. In fact, he discovered all the things you have to do to discover something about rats.”
Archive for November, 2009
FEYNMAN ON ELIMINATING ALTERNATIVE EXPLANATIONS.
Monday, November 30th, 2009OTHER EXPLANATIONS OF THE JAM EXPERIMENT.
Sunday, November 29th, 2009OTHER EXPLANATIONS OF THE JAM EXPERIMENT. The comments on the Marginal Revolution post that I linked to yesterday offer several alternative explanations for the jam experiment. The first comment suggests that in recent years people may have become more comfortable with an abundance of choices (think of choices on the internet). The second points out that offering only a few kinds of jam may suggest that the jams are “artisanal.” Another points out that if people have only a limited amount of time—are in a hurry—they won’t want to consider a variety of choices. For many products, having a single criterion is a convenience—which may be an independent reason why having the lowest price is appealing to a customer (it makes the decision easier). One commenter says that his father had difficulty with the multiple choices at fast food restaurants. I was reminded of my post about the lady in Hong Kong who discussed with the server at lenght most of the items on the McDonald’s menu at before making her choice.
CAN LOTS OF CHOICES MAKE US UNHAPPY?—REVISITED.
Saturday, November 28th, 2009CAN LOTS OF CHOICES MAKE US UNHAPPY?—REVISITED. I posted here about the paradox of choice (and the book of that title by Barry Schwartz). That paradox says that having too many choices can make the process of choosing painful. There is a famous experiment in a supermarket which has been cited in support of the paradox of choice. The experiment seemed to show that consumers bought more jam if they were presented with fewer varieties to choose from. This article describes the experiment and extends the result to speed dating: “A grocery store alternated allowing customers to sample 24 different flavors of jam & 6 different flavors of jam. With 24, more people came to the table but 1/10th as many people bought jam. In Speed dating, you are more likely to select a match with 6 dates vs. 10.” Economists tend to be uncomfortable with this result. Stores should have a good idea of what their customers want; if stores are observed offering lots of choices, presumably this is what customers want. Now, this post on the Marginal Revolution blog quotes a Tim Horford article which describes new research that seems to show that the jam experiment cannot be replicated and that offering more choices doesn’t seem to make much difference either way.
FRENCH LOCALISM (COMMENT).
Friday, November 27th, 2009FRENCH LOCALISM (COMMENT). I have posted several times about examples of how long it took for France to overcome localism and establish a national identity. When I posted on another example a few days ago, Dick Weisfelder pointed out “that kids in the same grade throughout France (and even the colonies) were getting exactly the same material in class at the same time.” And in other ways, France has been considered to have had a strong central government going back a long way. Regions did not go to war with each other. I think onee reason that I post so often on examples of French localism is that they are so surprising to me.
WHAT IF THE UNION HAD DISSOLVED?
Friday, November 27th, 2009WHAT IF THE UNION HAD DISSOLVED? Before the Civil War, there was talk of secession from time to time by other regions as well as the South. What if the Union had dissolved? In the essay I linked to yesterday, Jay Cost points out that there is some historical precedent from the period of the Articles of Confederation. During that period, “foreign powers played state governments off one another,… no state had the power or authority to stabilize the economy, … the territorial integrity of our nation was under threat, …[and]… it appeared as though civil unrest would destroy America’s experiment in self-government shortly after it had begun.” One can imagine an America consisting of two or more countries with territorial wars and foreign countries playing the American countries against each other. Of course, another historical precedent would be Canada.
EXOTIC AMERICAN FOODS.
Friday, November 27th, 2009EXOTIC AMERICAN FOODS. For our Thanksgiving dinner, Mary Jane made our traditional side dish of green bean casserole. My mother made it every Thanksgiving just as I imagine many American cooks did in the 1950’s and 1960’s. The important ingredients are frozen green beans, Campbell’s cream of mushroom soup and a can of dried fried onions. We have a dear French friend who told Mary Jane once that she was so amused by the idea of the green bean casserole that she told a lot of her friends about it and intends to get a photograph to send to France to prove that it exists. I think the idea of buying a can of fried onions rather than frying it yourself may be one of the things she finds amusing. I am reminded that I have a friend who was born in England who has never been able to bring himself to eat pumpkin pie.
LIBERTY AND UNION.
Thursday, November 26th, 2009LIBERTY AND UNION. Jay Cost in RealClearPolitics has an essay commemorating the first Thanksgiving Proclamation, by Abraham Lincoln in November, 1863. Cost says: “Today is a day to put aside our differences, to praise God for the blessings of this American Union, and to remember with gratitude those Americans who labored to bring it into being and who saved it from the malevolent forces of secession and slavery.” He quotes Daniel Webster’s great speech in defense of the Union, including the passage: “…let us come out into the light of day; let us enjoy the fresh air of Liberty and Union….” Hubert Humphrey echoed Webster in his great speech in 1948, calling for Americans “to get out of the shadow of states’ rights and walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights,” Let us give thanks for this American Union.
UTOPIA AND THANKSGIVING.
Thursday, November 26th, 2009UTOPIA AND THANKSGIVING. We are an idealistic people, given to dreams of Utopia and devoted to progress and conscious of how far we fall short of our aspirations. It’s good that we have one day a year devoted to pausing and reflecting on what we have. Let us give thanks that the average expected life span at birth in 1975 was 72.6 years and the figure for 2005 was 77.8. Let us give thanks for the blessings of the internet. Let us give thanks for our families. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.
THE STANDUP SCIENTIST.
Wednesday, November 25th, 2009THE STANDUP SCIENTIST. I posted here about an economist who is a standup comic. A friend kindly sent me this link to a YouTube of a scientist doing standup comedy. It’s also educational. I found the first joke (”A virus walks into a bar…”) and the last joke (”Schrodinger’s cat walks into a bar…”) particularly enlightening. ADDENDUM: After discussing this post with Mary Jane, I realize I should have captioned it “LADIES AND GERMS….’
WHY DOCTORS AND BANKERS DRESS CONSERVATIVELY.
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009WHY DOCTORS AND BANKERS DRESS CONSERVATIVELY. Years ago, in my introductory economics class, Meyer Burstein observed that doctors and bankers tend to dress conservatively to distract attention from the fact that their professions dealt with large risks on a regular basis. The article by Rebecca Smith quotes a doctor who says: “I think it’s more presentable to be dressed up” and another who says: “Neckwear conveys ‘respect for patients’ and shouldn’t be jettisoned.”
