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0 pointsforest_dweller5y ago0 comments

> This is basically what's known as survivor bias.

The number of times this comes up on here it is a bit of a meme. So I will counter with the maxim of "If all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail".

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rvense5y ago· 2 in thread

I don't think that's a very good counter, and I don't think it addresses the substance of my post at all. I'd say the term comes up often because it's a very common phenomenon - much like the one about hammers and nails. I'm sure there are many other terms for it - the idea that "history is written by the victors" It's certainly older than the concept of cognitive biaess, and I could as easily have invoked that.

forest_dwellerOP5y ago

Yes it does. It isn't survivorship bias if the process has been going on centuries. Whenever people bring up "X has worked" you will have someone on this site say "survivorship bias".

It has become such a trope of this site I have heard other people mention it on discord discussions and I haven't brought the subject up.

If you start with a faulty premise we can just stop there (and one that is a complete trope).

rvense5y ago

I don't think the argument I was addressing can be summed up as "X has worked". It's more like "X has happened, therefore X is an inevitable consequence of Y which preceded it."

Also, tropes are often tropes for a reason. You can't dismiss something just because it comes up often.

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