Book Challenge #13: How We Know What Isn't So, by Thomas Gilovich

How We Know What Isn't So: The Fallibility of Human Reason in Everyday Life, by Thomas Gilovich

It's a popular belief that infertile couples who adopt will not infrequently be able to conceive after their adoption. Many people accept this as true, and some can provide anecdotal evidence. The problem, Thomas Gilovich explains, is that it's not actually true: there's no statistical correlation to indicate that couples having fertility problems who choose to adopt are more likely to conceive than couples having fertility problems who do not. Certainly, some couples who adopt because they cannot have children of their own do become pregnant -- but some couples who are having similar infertility problems who don't adopt also eventually become pregnant.

It's a popular belief that a run of successes predicts further successes -- that a player who has sunk three baskets in a row has 'hot hand,' and is more likely to sink a fourth than his teammate who missed two baskets, even if the two have similar season-long averages; that if the cards or the dice are going your way, they will continue to go your way. Again, Gilovich points out, this just isn't true. Runs of good luck are just that -- good luck: the likelihood that a player will sink the next basket has something to do with his skill and long-term average but nothing to do with his prior streak, or lack thereof; the likelihood that the next dice roll will come up in your favor is pure chance, assuming nobody's rigging the dice.

So why do these beliefs persist? That's what the book is about -- not why the beliefs are wrong (although Gilovich explains the statistical background used to determine the falsity of these beliefs), but why people believe them anyway. Why people know things, firmly and without question, that are simply not true.

The book has three sections: "Cognitive Determinants of Questionable Belief" (that is, what's going on in your brain when you assume something that isn't true), "Motivational and Social Determinants of Questionable Belief" (that is, what about human psychology and social networks rewards you for assuming something that isn't true), and "Examples of Questionable Beliefs" (brief rundowns of several common types of questionable beliefs -- belief in certain kinds of alternative health practices, belief in certain interpersonal strategies of dubious usefulness, and belief in ESP and psi powers -- along with examinations of the research into their utility, and why they likely remain popular beliefs despite the lack of evidence).

(One thing to note; the book came out in 1993, which means it's... geez, 16 years old now? It doesn't seem dated, but I don't know how much research in the past decade-and-a-half has happened about these topics, so.)

I don't want to spoil the book too much, but I will give some examples of the kinds of reasons that people believe these things, which fall into a couple of broad categories. One is, ironically, not so much that we're rational as that we're sort of hyperrational: we look for patterns and explanations for data that has no pattern or explanation, data that is random. We believe that three things in a row -- successful baskets, coins that come up 'heads,' whatever -- must mean something. Another is that we try too much to extrapolate from small amounts of data, and we privilege anecdotes. This is why one example of a couple who adopted and was subsequently able to conceive trumps all the statistic in the world, for many people. But mostly, we see what we expect to see, what we want to see, and what we think others will see -- or what we think others will want us to see.

The book was written in a brisk, entertaining style without being too colloquial (some people can pull off colloquial, but some can't, and I'd much rather someone not try than try and fail). It was very readable, and in fact was a fast, compelling read. I don't have the expertise to asses their research, and, as I said, it's likely this is some degree of out-of-date, but it was really interesting either way, and made me think a lot about... well, the way I think.

Running Tally:

Total Books: 13
Fiction: 2
Non-Fiction: 11
POC Author: 2

Happiness Meme, plus Sourdough Rye Bread Recipe

* The living room is CLEAN. In that way where it's clean enough that I wouldn't be embarrassed to have people over.
* The bedroom is ON ITS WAY TO BEING CLEAN.
* The roomba is adorable.
* I made a loaf of sourdough rye bread for sandwiches, and another loaf of sourdough rye -- in an artisan boule type shape, for eating out of hand or toasting or dipping in olive oil -- is in the oven.
* Did I mention that the living room is CLEAN?

Here's my recipe for no-knead sourdough rye, a mostly-wholegrain bread that has wonderful flavor and a great crust. If you can stir, you can make this bread, I promise.

( No-Knead Sourdough Rye Bread )

Book Challenge #14: Patternmaster, by Octavia Butler

Patternmaster, by Octavia Butler (Link goes to the "Seed to Harvest", the omnibus addition of all four books of the quartet.)

This was the first book of the Seed to Harvest quartet by publication date -- and the last one by internal chronology. I read it first for two reasons. One, unless I get a strong indication otherwise, I tend to read things by publishing order -- partly because I like to see the author develop, but also partly because there's more a guarantee that they make sense in that order, because they were presumably written to make sense to people who were reading them as they came out. (Unless they were very bad books indeed, but I don't expect that from Butler.) Two, because my general inclination was reinforced by other people, who said that they read better in publication order. And having read all four books, I think they were right, and I too would recommend that you read them in publication order rather than internal chronology.

I'm going to try to refer to each one without spoilers for the others, and then I'll post about all four of the books considered as a whole, because they stand along perfectly well but gain a lot of richness and depth when you consider them in context.

So: Patternmaster.

Patternmaster is set in... I can't actually tell how far in the future, because the changes to our world are so dramatic that it could be a hundred years or five hundred. (Indeed, I initially thought that it was set on another planet, the world was so different than the one I know.) Patternmaster is set in a future in which the human species has split into two... I was going to say "factions," but really, they're actually two new, separate species: the clayarks, people mutated by an alien microorganism, who are strong and tough and fast and make and use weapons and other technologies; and the patternists, who are psionicists of varying stripes, who use mental powers (including telepathy, telekinesis, healing/biomanipulation, and the ability to store memories in objects) instead of engineering as we know it. "Normal" humans -- people like you or me -- also exist; they're called "mutes" and are servants of the patternists. (There are no normal humans among the clayarks, because the clayark disease is extremely infectious.)

As you could probably guess from the title, Patternmaster is from the point of view of a patternist, Teray, who falls afoul of the strict rules of his traditional society and the political maneuvering therein, and becomes an "outsider" (essentially, a slave) to Coransee, an extremely powerful (politically and psionically) master of a House. The book is about his struggle to reassert his independence, and it's about the way he allies with an Independent -- a patternist who isn't subject to any House master, Amber. Amber is powerful, intelligent, and tough -- she's a healer, but she subverts the 'woman healer' stereotype by also being an extremely effective killer -- and, indeed, I think she's the strongest character in the book. The developing relationship between Teray and Amber serves as both the heart and the backbone of Patternmaster

Besides Amber, the most interesting thing about this book for me was the worldbuilding and the society, which is dystopian and yet fascinating, even for me (I'm picky about dystopian/post-apocalyptic futures). I find the nature of the 'disaster' really interesting: not one but two radical changes to humanity. (Indeed, I find it particularly cool that Butler put both the clayarks and the patternists in this world -- either idea could have spawned a series, but both together creates a richness and sense of conflict that would be difficult to achieve otherwise. The patternists and the clayarks both are extremely potent, but neither is quite strong enough to get the upper hand over the other -- and yet their very natures makes it impossible for them to stop fighting.) We see only glimpses of clayark society, because the protagonists see (indeed, for their own self-preservation, kind of have to see) the clayarks as inherently inimical, kill-or-be-killed. But patternist society is extremely interesting in its own right. Patternists live in Houses, run by powerful Masters, for their own protection against the clayarks. Within the house, there's a heriarchy: the Master on top, his apprentices beneath him, outsiders (slaves, but with psionic powers) beneath them, and mutes beneath them. (The position of women is more unclear to me: it appears that patternist women, in Houses with male Masters, are wives of varying degree of status -- it's not clear whether there are any female apprentices or outsiders who are not wives. It's also not totally clear what the status of men and women are in Houses run by women, which definitely exist.)

And then there's the Pattern, a really fascinating look at the way a telepathic society would exit. All patternists are linked together by the Pattern, although for the most part, only fellow House members are closely aware of one another. People who are sympatico, who are compatible in personality and metal attitude, are said to be close together in the Pattern, something that they can feel immediately and instinctively. It's a world in which you can tell immediately whether you're likely to get along with someone -- and that immediate awareness is acknowledged, and used.

( Spoilery stuff behind the cut. )

As far as recommendations go: Patternmaster is exceptional science fiction. It's not as good as the books in the series that would follow it, which in my opinion get better and better, but it's a good entry point to the series. (And I do recommend that you use it as the entry point: working in internal-chronology order rather than publication order would, in my opinion, be a mistake.)

Running Tally:

Total Books: 14
Fiction: 3
Non-Fiction: 11
POC Author: 3