Description

Boring, ineffective ad campaigns are almost always the result of data-worship.

Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman famously said,

“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”

He was talking about using data to make predictions.

Amos Tversky, one half of the Nobel Prize-winning duo* of Kahneman and Tversky, renowned for their discovery of systematic human cognitive bias (the tendency to fool oneself,) said,

“Man is a deterministic device thrown into a probabilistic universe.”

from Chapter 7: The Rules of Prediction,

in The Undoing Project by Michael Lewis.

To understand what Tversky meant, we’ll need to probe the terms “deterministic” and “probabilistic.” But before we do, I should warn you that exactly 54.2% of the people in America would be annoyed if they read what I’m about to say.

I sincerely hope you’re not one of them.

When Tversky said, “Man is a deterministic device…” he was referring to the deterministic belief system that underlies Newtonian physics:

“It’s an organized universe.”

“Everything happens for a reason.”

“Everything can be known in advance, as long as we have enough data.”

“If you don’t like the effect, just trace up the causal chain – change the cause – and you will consequently change the effect.”

The deterministic belief system is logical, rational, sequential, deductive reasoning. It is an incontrovertible religion to the 54.2% of the population who believe in it. And there’s nothing wrong with that unless you’re in advertising. Sadly, the majority of advertising professionals cling to deterministic beliefs. I call these people the data worshippers. At the center of their faith is the belief that success is due to “reaching the right people.” Data worshippers make no room for whimsical wit or flights of fancy. They give no place to the mystery of curiosity or the magic of storytelling.

I’ve never seen a business fail due to reaching the wrong people.

1. I believe every person can be “the right person” or knows the right person and has influence over them.
2. I believe in saying the right thing, engaging the imagination and winning the heart, knowing that the mind will follow. The mind creates logic to justify what the heart has already decided.
3. I believe in (probabilistic) bonding with the masses.

This causes deterministic marketers to say to me, “You’re hunting with a shotgun. We’re using a rifle with a scope.” And my reply never changes. “The goal is not to kill, but to capture. And you’re fishing with a hook. I’m using a net.”

When Tversky said mankind had been, “thrown into a probabilistic universe,” he was referring to the probabilistic belief system that underlies quantum mechanics:

“You can suspect what will probably happen, but you can’t know for sure, even when you have total information.”

“You don’t really know until you get there.”

Ninety years ago, at the Solvay conference of 1927, Albert Einstein (a determinist) objected to the theory of quantum mechanics, quipping, “God does not play dice.” Niels Bohr (a probabilist) told Einstein to “stop telling God what to do,” and won the day. (17 of the 29 attendees at that conference were or became Nobel Prize winners.) Niels Bohr had won the Nobel Prize in Physics 5 years earlier.

Deterministic scientists – and marketers – defend their decisions by pointing to predictive data. They prefer learning from expert advice and example.

Probabilistic scientists – and marketers – defend their decisions through outcomes. They prefer to learn from consequences.

In all of science, the two things most known to be true are (deterministic) Newtonian physics and (probabilistic)...