Osterlind Steven J. - The Error of Truth : How History and Mathematics Came Together to Form Our Character and Shape Our Worldview

This is the story of a remarkable idea that has shaped humankind beyond the scope of any single historical event or clever invention. It recounts the astonishing and unexpected tale of how quantitative thinking was invented and rose to primacy in our lives in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, bringing us to an entirely new perspective on what we know about the world and how we know iteven on what we each think about ourselves: our very nature and identity. The widespread and lasting effect of thinking quantitatively is truly that profound.

Quantitative thinking, at its essence, is merely but mightily our inclination to view natural and everyday phenomena through a lens of measurable events: from anticipating the days weather, to feeling confident that medications will do their job, to sleeping soundly about investments, to being calm when boarding a plane, as well as thousands of routine and not-so-ordinary happenings in our lives. The uncertainty for all kinds of events, previously thought to be random, providential, or unknowable, is now vastly reduced because of our thinking quantitatively.

Quantification is the noun I use for quantitative thinking and its concomitant worldview. It implies a level of rational thought and decision-making that is forward-looking since outcomes can be anticipated with more certainty than ever before. Consequentlyand significantlywith quantification, we need not impulsively react after something has happened. No longer do we perceive ourselves as beings who are at the whim of fate or providence or who do things because Thats the way its always been, with a resigned Thats what happens. With this new viewpoint, we live with an internal sense of odds and probability. Quantification is our moment-by-moment reality.

There is a kind of freedom born from all the new choices available to us. It allows people to choose daily and long-term actions among alternatives, knowing the likelihood of a desired result. No longer is impulse or habit our only choice for action. From our quantitatively informed viewpoint, we can take meaningful, advantageous action beforehand. We react to events in new ways and interact with others differently. We are more attentive to predictive markers, as risk is gauged in our brains instantaneously. Uncertainty in outcome still exists, but now it is evaluated. We are more confident in our decisions, less doubtful.

Moreover, with quantification, we have even reformed our assessment of what we previously thought to be unbending fact. The new quantitative thinking has caused us to challenge the veracity of what was once believed to be factual, accurate, and faithful to observation. Everything we know changed because we see everything differently. That is, quantification altered our conception of reality and what is, for us, trueindeed, the Truth. The change in outlook brings an inconsistency or a kind of inaccuracy to our formerly known Truth. As a philosophical conceit, it is an error of Truth. We explore this thought in detail as we go along. In fact, this epistemological shift is interesting to trace.

The new viewpointsummarized as quantificationcame into being because of a momentous human achievement: namely, we learned how to measure uncertainty, a direct consequence of the invention and development of the science of probability. For the first time in history, using the methods of probability theory, we can anticipate an outcome for almost any event or phenomenon. For all kinds of things, we can describe odds and the likelihood of occurrence. By calculating correlational relationships, we understand much better how things go together.

Amazingly (yet seemingly now commonplace), with probability we can even make calculations for occurrences of events that have not yet happened: reliable predictions. For instance, we can track hurricanes and forecast their likely direction, anticipate longevity for patients with cancer, and expect particular sales outcomes based on how resources are allocated. Even planned military campaigns can be strategically evaluated in terms of their likelihood of success. Knowing the odds of an outcome is quite ordinary to us today, but it was not always so.