Harvard's Mansharamani on New Book

done on a daily basis. It's a lot, and we are dealing with that deluge every moment of our day. Vicram Mancherani man sar Amani excuse me, is a lecture at Harvard University, and he's got a new book app It's really about how to step away from some of that. It's entitled Think for Yourself, Restoring Common Sense in an Age of Experts and Artificial Intelligence. And he joins us on the phone in Lexington, Massachusetts. Vicram, forgive me, I mangled your name and I really apologize for that. UM,

I need some data help on that. UM, tell us a little bit of about this book. Why write it? Sure? So? Part of it is that I think all of us are now suffering from not only this information overload and data deluge that you refer to, but it's recreating this desire for optimization and everything we do. And so that desire has led us to stop thinking. We've run headlong into the arms of experts and technologies that promised to help us overcome this fear of missing out on the

optimal choice, and so we've stopped thinking. And so my book is really a call to sort of take a step back and start reclaiming some of the autonomy we've given up in this process. And it's not just from technology. It's also from experts, whether they're your doctor or your financial advisor or etcetera. But it's to change the nature of those relationships. And one of the things you say, Vicram, is that we need to keep experts on tapped, but not on top. What does that mean? Yeah, look, that's

a great point. I mean the reason I say that is I think for too long we've bounced like a ping pong ball between complete dismissal of experts and blind deferral to experts. What I'm suggesting is a nuanced middle ground, one in which we are able to tap into the value that experts have and bring to the table. They obviously know a lot about their domains of expertise, more than a lot of us will ever know, and so

we shouldn't dismiss them. But at the same time, they don't have an appreciation for the context that each of us faces in our decision making, and so we shouldn't defer to them either. So neither dismiss nor defer. Keep

them on tap, but not on top. You know, it's so interesting, especially if you know, in a time where we're talking so much about inequalities and we're talking about how the data has shown that diversity makes a difference, you know, in terms of financial performances at firms, you know, having diversity of thought it's just so much more rewarding, certainly for a culture, but also financially for a company.

How do you find the balance between data and kind of gut and common sense, trusting your own data set of knowledge, Sure so, kind of. One of the things I say in the book, and that I really believe, is that every single perspective is biased, incomplete, and limited, and as such, the best way to proceed is to triangulate by using multiple perspectives. Now, in terms of diversity. That means anyone who brings a different perspective other than

your own is additive. And so I'm a big believer in diversity because it makes a great deal of sense in making better decisions. Uh So, so that's one thing. Now in terms of data and how we use it. You know, lots of people will say there are lies, damn lives and statistics, and there's a little bit of truth to that in the sense that a lot of the data can be manipulated. So it's the context of the data that really matters. It's they to connect the

dots across disparate data sets. That's where I believe the value is moving. And so rather than focus on generating dots, I think we should all spend a little more time connecting dots. Vicram teach us, help us understand how to be better in this world because we are, in fact inundated. We are facing this problem. I know I am, and I think I can speak for my partner too. What do we do well? You know, one of the things but not highly recommend all of us do, is to

always seek disagreement. So not just get the advice of one person, but get someone who can disagree with that expert and give you both sides of an argument. And I think it really is a useful way to sort of help people make better decisions in the face of uncertainty. And it reminds me of that that Alfred Sloan quote which is so famous. You know Alfred Sloane, the former chairman of General Motors. You know, he comes into a boardroom meeting and he has a discussion and he says,

General and want to take it. We're all in the complete agreement about this decision. And he looks around and he sees everyone's head this sort of nodding in agreement, and his answer is, well, then I propose we postponed further discussion on this matter to give ourselves time to develop disagreement and perhaps gained some understanding of what the decision is all about. And I think that captures the essence of it, that you really can't appreciate the complexities

if you have one side of a story. You know, it's so interesting. It's like journalism one oh one. And I feel like when I was kind of starting my career, I would do a story and it was imperative that you've got both sides of the story, and you presented that way to hopefully let the audience see both sides, or your viewers or your listeners and and make a decision,

but make an informed decision. You know, something's happened that Vicram in our world where people like we see this on colleges and universities, people are afraid to have diversity of thought speakers who are controversial, you know, students protest, and then the colleges don't have those speakers. And I thought,

isn't that how we open up our minds. We may not agree, we may you know, strongly disagree with someone, but isn't that what the world is supposed to be about, that we hear different thought, diversity of thought, and that we are all are smarter as a result. Yeah, Carol, I think you hit the nail on the head. I mean, this is really about critical thinking and being able to step back and see both the pros and cons of every decision, and so closing our eyes to different opinions

is not a useful process. And so I fully agree with what you're saying here that you know you should be open minded. I'm not suggesting everyone agree with everything that's said by someone they don't, you know, naturally tap into. But you should shoot the argument and then you make your own decision and then you think for yourself. That's why I love always seek a disagreement. I I think that is such a smart thing. You can always come to me, you can always come to make Carol, I

was gonna say, it's why it works. No, that's why it works. Um. So vickerm, I have to ask you. You know, we're living in this topsy turvy upside down world where you know, our communication is different than it was before. You know, Carol and I, who you know, spent a couple of years in studio together about six ft from each other, um, sometimes closer our desks. You know,

we work at Blueberg and we're all, you know, right together. Um. And now we are literally, you know, a hundred miles maybe not a hundred fifty miles away from each other and we can see each other via video conference. And

that's it. Um, what has this done to us? Granted we're connection connected by technology, but you know, part of thinking for yourself and taking in all of the interesting perspectives I feel like is being able to see those social cues and body language and all those different things. So how does this affect the way that we move forward here? You know, I think there's some cross currents here,

universally positive or universally negative. I mean, the fact that I can have in my class that I'm teaching virtually UH guests visiting from China or or from Latin America UH allows a diversity of thinking that I couldn't bring into an in class in person class. Yet at the same time, when you're virtual rather than in the classroom with your peers, you're learning differently. You're not getting the

same cues. So I think we're sort of expanding the pie of opinions at the same time as perhaps getting fewer of the cues that you might get in person. And so, you know, I think there's some cross currents. I don't think there's a universal answer to that question. So, oh, go ahead, Jason, Well, I just have one one question

that cue Wing like apart um, I mean, victorm. The one thing that does occur to me though, as you're talking, is this notion that if you are seeking a diversity of opinions, which is great, you can paralyze yourself though, And so how do you think you're out a way to be decisive while at the same time sort of aggregating these opinions. Yeah, so this is ultimately the part that I think we've started hinting at, which is one

needs to be mindful of the process you're using. So I'm okay with you deferring to your GPS device, just be aware that you're doing it. I'm okay with you listening blindly to what your doctor's recommendations are much and not blindly, but listening to your doctor's recognitions. But I want you to do so mindfully rather than as a

default operating condition where you don't think about it. And so, you know, in the book I mentioned, there's a professor at Stanford Universities names Baba shift Um, and he and his wife had a cancer diagnosis and they proactively decided to give up control, and so they spent I think more time thinking about who to give up the control too, rather than giving you know, fighting each decision. And so sometimes it's okay to take, you know, get out of

the driver's seat. So that's one thing. And the other thing I would suggest, which I don't think is particularly unique, but you know, thinking in terms of scenarios for the future, and then the part that I do think is more unique in my recommendation is imagine failure in each of those and areas. Because when you imagine failure and the path that could lead to potential future failure, you're less likely to fail because of those reasons. So it's sort

of twisting the logic on its head. It's sort of saying, hey, scenario plan and think about five possible scenarios of what might happen in the world to saying here's five possible choices you could make, and here's how they could all go wrong. And when you focus on the reasons they could go wrong, you're less likely to have those reasons go wrong. So that so so yeah, I mean those are some strategies that I recommended. Oh my god, we

could talk forever. Yeah, this is really and I feel like it's very applicable to the environment wherein right now, where we're being bombarded by so much information and trying to figure out the best and smart uh you know, decisions and way forward. So um, hopefully you can come back and we can continue this conversation. Vicram Mance Romani is a lecture at Harvard University. Check out his latest

book it's new. It's just out. It's entitled Think for Yourself, Restoring common sense and an age of experts and artificial intelligence.