pseudomonas (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pseudomonas) wrote2015-06-22 09:07 am
pseudomonas) wrote2015-06-22 09:07 am
Shark Brain
New term, courtesy of kht: shark brain
The bit of the brain that doesn't understand probabilities and goes "ARGH IM GOING TO BE EATEN BY SHARKS" on the basis that it's not a physical impossibility that one can be eaten by a shark, to which one needs to (politely and respectfully) say "Dear brain, while I might get eaten by sharks if I went swimming off Cape Town wearing a bacon bikini, it's not actually very likely when I live in a landlocked county and have a sharkproof lock on my front door; also the last fifty times you said ARGH IM GOING TO BE EATEN BY SHARKS it did not come to pass, and so my estimate of the probability on that basis is low".
kht: shark brainThe bit of the brain that doesn't understand probabilities and goes "ARGH IM GOING TO BE EATEN BY SHARKS" on the basis that it's not a physical impossibility that one can be eaten by a shark, to which one needs to (politely and respectfully) say "Dear brain, while I might get eaten by sharks if I went swimming off Cape Town wearing a bacon bikini, it's not actually very likely when I live in a landlocked county and have a sharkproof lock on my front door; also the last fifty times you said ARGH IM GOING TO BE EATEN BY SHARKS it did not come to pass, and so my estimate of the probability on that basis is low".