Can You Solve This?

How do you investigate hypotheses? Do you seek to confirm your theory - looking for white swans? Or do you try to find black swans? I was startled at how hard it was for people to investigate number sets that didn't follow their hypotheses, even when their method wasn't getting them anywhere.

:edit: This video was inspired by The Black Swan by Nassim Taleb

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Picture of Dmitry33 achievements

+6 1. Dmitry commented 10 years ago

That was very good, but I don't think it is a valid demonstration to show how people tend to stubbornly prove their own hypothesis, but rather that people overlook the most simple and obvious solution to a problem when they feel that a problem is challenging one.
Picture of kashinthebin24 achievements

+5 2. kashinthebin commented 10 years ago

I'm not trying to sound like a smart ass but I guessed it on my first try, probably just luck haha'
Picture of MindTrick43 achievements

+6 3. MindTrick commented 10 years ago

Point is that he already gives them a way to think, without them realizing it. It's how our brain works in most cases. He gives a sequence in increasing order, and because it's how we are taught to arrange numbers ideally, we follow him. If he had said 0,4,1, people would try to figure out why the last one didn't increase, and probably give answers based on the subtraction at the end instead. The whole expression "to think outside the box" is based on this very demonstration, that people rarely do think out of the box, unless they are specifically told so. We are normally programmed to follow rules, not breaking them.
Picture of bytebuster27 achievements

+1 4. bytebuster commented 10 years ago

The thing is that our brain tends to think simple when the challenge is simple and because we think that it is easy we can not think out of the box. Because the rule of him seems too easy to me, then I thought there should be some simple trick. I wanted to see someone saying 4-8-2, but no one did it.
Picture of cameramaster55 achievements

+2 5. cameramaster commented 10 years ago

I had this done to me years ago....my mate was totally pissed of at me 'cos I got it right first time. Just lucky for a change lol.
Picture of dave919145 achievements

0 6. dave9191 commented 10 years ago

I'm surprised how long it took people to get this. My mind went to even numbers, multiples of 2, then ascending numbers. And it was frustrating to watch that people didn't pick numbers to disprove the theory that they proposed.

Come up with a solution. Propose numbers that fit to confirm your solution works. Try to disprove that solution. Move to next idea.
Picture of Gringo_el_Diablo45 achievements

0 7. Gringo_el_Diablo commented 10 years ago

I was thinking decimals but still in ascending order. I probably would of been the one person yelling & swearing at him after awhile! XD