I'm Half Blind? Are You Serious?
And the Blind Spot of Bias
So, a little while ago I went to the doctor, and he told me that my eyesight was horrible. Seriously. The woman doing the test gasped at my results and they both stared at me (YES, I could see them stare) and were both like, “You drive?’
And I was like, “Yeah ... So?”
And they gasped some more and made me feel really badly and I thought, “Dudes. I know you are medical professionals, but I can totally see fine out my right eye. I mean, it’s not bionic, but it’s not blind. It’s good. It’s my good eye!”
And they basically tried to take my keys. I refused to let them have my keys, mostly because there’s a cool Darth Vader keychain on them. Plus, I had to get home. Plus, I thought maybe they were secretly coveting my ancient Subaru, Molly, or as I like to call her MOLLY THE CAR WHO SMELLS LIKE DOGS.
Anyway, I fended them off, kept my cars, paid for the appointment, and skedaddled out of the office before they could stop me.
I was left wondering, “Huh? Am I really blind and I just haven’t noticed?
For a moment, I considered the possibility. But then I had enough self confidence to think, “I think I would know it if I was actually blind.”
Yes, this took a lot for me. I am not the most self-confident person.
But I wondered. I mean, I had worn glasses as a kid. I had eye surgery before I was one. When I was born, the doctors told my mom I was blind.
“Turned out they were wrong,” she’d always said.
But what if they weren’t?
I worried. So, I took internet eye tests, which all agreed with me: I was not blind. Or even anywhere close. And then, I took the biggest step. I went to another health-care professional. This time it was an actual eye doctor and guess what he said?
He said I am not blind! And he scoffed at the other doctor! And he was like, “Wow.” And then he quietly scoffed some more.
“You’re not technically blind at all—in your right eye,” he said, “but you really, really, REALLY should be wearing some glasses because you truly can’t see much of anything with your left.”
“Does that matter though? I don’t use my left eye.”
“It matters for things like depth perception. Are you bad at tennis?”
“Terrible.”
“Parking the car in an empty parking lot?”
“Isn’t everyone?”
His chest puffed up. “No. Everyone is not.”
“Oh,” I said.
“Exactly,” he said. “You should really be proud of just how well you do.”
“I do walk into doorframes and people sometimes.”
“A lot?”
“Do I have to answer?”
“You’re still alive. Be proud.”
BIASES
So, I was thinking about this in a weird way this weekend. I was thinking about how I am sort of this walking, talking, bumping into things, real-world example of how we go out into the world thinking we see everything, thinking we know what’s going on and then . . . wham. It turns out we’re half blind.
How we think the world is? Well, it isn’t always how the world is. That’s not because we’re stupid or being willfully ignorant. It’s because the brain has created certain biases for us to survive and to work efficiently.
As Kendra Cherry on Verywellmind says,
“Attention is a limited resource. This means we can't possibly evaluate every possible detail and event when forming thoughts and opinions. Because of this, we often rely on mental shortcuts that speed up our ability to make judgments, but this can sometimes lead to bias. There are many types of biases—including the confirmation bias, the hindsight bias, and the anchoring bias, just to name a few—that can influence our beliefs and actions daily.”
Mental shortcuts.
Efficiency
Wanting to not feel ignorant.
It makes sense, right?
But the question becomes do we want to go around like I did, insisting that we can see really well? Or do we want to recognize that glasses can help us see better and put them on? That we might be, no matter how much we insist we aren’t, half blind?
SO MANY BIASES
These are two super cool images that I found on the internet, but can’t locate their original sources. If you know those origins, please tell me because I’d like to link back and give people credit.
There is a sort of comfort in having cognitive biases. You don’t have to worry about things shattering your world view, let’s say. They also help us not waffle too much when making decisions.
But there is danger, too, because you aren’t getting the full picture, of falling into a pattern of distorted thinking and conspiracy theories.
We can break this tendency if we want to.
LINKS TO LEARN MORE
Cherry’s really cool article on Very Well Mind
