Rory Sutherland wrote an article for The Spectator titled The illusion of certainty.
« Both bureaucrats and businesspeople are heavily attracted to the illusion of certainty. »
« One problem with this pretence of certainty is that cost-savings are more easily quantified than potential gains — so business and government are increasingly geared towards providing people with more, poorer things at an ever-lower price. Yet much evidence suggests that people like fewer, better things at a slightly higher price. »
« …the difference between deterministic and probabilistic improvement… »
« Indeed one reason why the world is in a mess is because, for a long time, the ratio between ‘explore’ and ‘exploit’ has been badly out of whack. »
« Even insects have figured out this is dumb. »
« Bees are still around because they are part deterministic and part probabilistic in their behaviour. »
« Indeed there would be no bees without this ‘inefficiency’ »
Rory Sutherland is the author of Alchemy: The Dark Art and Curious Science of Creating Magic in Brands, Business, and Life.
See also Slack…the Myth of Total Efficiency by Tom DeMarco.
Articles of Interest 