I Thought I Was Wrong, But I was Mistaken
“A person who makes few mistakes makes little progress.” — Bryant McGill
Welcome!
“Errors have strange ways of creeping into even the greatest of minds. Many times they sneak past even cast iron doors of infallible logic and reason.”
~ Syd K. ~
In Why “Seeing the Mountain”, we discussed how our perspectives are limited by our experience, education, and viewpoint. Then, in You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know, we discussed how little we know, take in, store, and remember. In Our Tribes And How They Shape Us, we discussed how we fill in the gaps of our knowledge and understanding through the groups we belong to. In Wisdom of the Crowd, Madness of the Mob, we discussed how those around us influence our decisions and behavior. Last week in Filling In The Blanks, we discussed how our brains fill in missing information in order to make efficient decisions.
In this issue we discuss some of the ways our brains behave imperfectly and processes the brain has to recognize and respond to its processing errors.
The imperfect brain
“To make mistakes or be wrong is human. To admit those mistakes shows you have the ability to learn, and are growing wiser.”
~ Donald L. Hicks ~
The brain is a vast electrical system comprised of 120 billion brain cells that create over 100 trillion synapses.
A brain cell, or a neuron, has a large main body, with small strands sticking out. So one neuron, the transmitter, uses a really thin strand called an axon. A second neuron, the receiver, can receive contacts along its main body, or along strands that branch out like a tree, called dendrites. When the axon tip of a transmitter connects to a receiver, that’s a synapse.
Neurons run on electricity. If an electrical signal passes down an axon, its tip releases chemicals called neurotransmitters into the synapse. These neurotransmitters tell the receiver cell to either activate its own electrical charge, which sends the signal to the next neuron in the chain, or tell the receiver cell to stay quiet.
The brain isn’t static. It’s a highly dynamic system that is constantly building new mental pathways to accommodate new information and experiences, as well as to rebuild after injuries (such as those due to drugs or trauma). This ability to constantly rewire the brain is called neuroplasticity.
These pathways can involve several, if not dozens, of the regions of the brain. All this electrical activity also generates “noise” which negatively impacts signals in the brain.
Random disturbances of signals, termed ‘noise’, pose a fundamental problem for information processing and affect all aspects of nervous-system function. …
Neurons perform highly nonlinear operations that involve high gain amplification and positive feedback. Therefore, small biochemical and electrochemical fluctuations (when considering systems at the molecular level we use the term fluctuation interchangeably with noise) can significantly alter whole-cell responses. …
Noise has recently emerged as a key component of a wide range of biological systems — from gene expression98 to heart function89. In neuroscience, we have shown how noise is introduced at all stages of the sensorimotor loop, from the level of a single signalling protein to that of body movement. Noise has direct behavioural consequences, from setting perceptual thresholds to affecting movement precision.
The brain’s limits
Just as you have a limited aerobic capability, your cardiovascular system limits how fast and far you can run, your brain has an upper limit to how much information it can take in and process. It adapts by shuttling most of its work to highly efficient subconscious systems, by narrowing its conscious processing to what is needed for the current tasks.
The findings suggest that mental exertion and cognitive fatigue lead to an accumulation of glutamate in the lateral prefrontal cortex. This would alter brain metabolism so that more energy is devoted to restoring proper glutamate concentrations and less to non-essential tasks, such as thinking — leading to actions that require less effort and impulsive decisions that lead to short-term rewards. …
As for mental fatigue, the best treatment — regardless of cause — is taking regular breaks and sleeping well.
Error correction
“Life is an error-making and an error-correcting process.”
~ Jonas Salk ~
Note to researchers: If you’re looking for an academic niche where you can make an impact and garner attention then investigate how individuals, groups, and societies ‘error correct’. Errors are inherently destabilizing, yet stability exists because of strategies and behaviors employed at the individual and group level. Academia has largely ignored this crucial element of human survival. There is opportunity for the young academic here.
Error recognition
“It is okay to not know everything. It is okay to be wrong. We learn, grow, and develop from our mistakes. They become building blocks for success defined by character, humility, honesty, perseverance, integrity, hope, and most of all faith.”
~ Sandra C Bibb ~
In 2023, researchers in Japan identified cells in the brain that signal when a mistake was made. When those cell were switched off, the brain failed to register the mistake and the mistake was made again.
Then, using a cutting-edge brain imaging technique they identified a specific group of cells (known as D2-neurons) in the nucleus accumbens, an area of the brain implicated in decision-making, that signaled when mice had made a mistake. Finally, using a genetic technique called optogenetics that allows cells to be temporarily “switched-off”, the team demonstrated that if signaling by D2-neurons was blocked during the part of the task when mice would ordinarily realize that they had made a mistake (i.e., when they discover the outcome of their decision), then mice were more likely to make the same mistake again in future.
Cognitive dissonance
“To live a creative life we must first lose the fear of being wrong.”
~ Joseph Chilton Pearce ~
The human brain issues a warning when there are internal inconsistencies — a phenomena called cognitive dissonance:
The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people are averse to inconsistencies within their own minds. It offers one explanation for why people sometimes make an effort to adjust their thinking when their own thoughts, words, or behaviors seem to clash with each other.
The uncomfortable feeling of cognitive dissonance is motivator for the individual to resolve the mental conflict (i.e. correct the error).
There are four strategies used to do reduce the discomfort of cognitive dissonance:
We change our behavior so that it is consistent with the other thought.
We change one of the dissonant thoughts in order to restore consistency.
We add other (consonant) thoughts that justify or reduce the importance of one thought and therefore diminish the inconsistency.
We trivialize the inconsistency altogether, making it less important and less relevant.
There are two other factors that influence the magnitude of cognitive dissonance: whether you had some choice over the inconsistency and whether you expect the inconsistency to have negative consequences in the future. The more choice you had over the inconsistency (Linder, Cooper, & Jones, 1967) and the worse the consequences (Cooper & Worchel, 1970), the stronger the dissonance will be.
When this error condition exists, we have a choice as to how we end the discomfort. We can resolve the error by reflecting on the source of the conflict and determining if our behavior violates a value, by changing the value, justifying the behavior, or ignoring the error.
The process gets short circuited when the person feeling the cognitive dissonance avoids the error correction process and lashes out at others (and sometimes themselves) to engage anger/righteous indignation to smother the dissonance. This often occurs due to insecurities and concerns about maintaining their reputation. The result is that the inconsistency is never resolved, leaving the error in place.
Stroop effect
“To understand a phenomenon, we need to make sure we understand the shape of its curve. By assuming we know how a curve continues beyond what we see, we will draw the wrong conclusions and come up with the wrong solutions.”
~ Hans Rosling ~
In 1935, J. Ridley Stroop published a paper that has since spawned hundreds of studies into how the brain handles incongruent information.
The Journal of Experimental Psychology reported that Stroop’s article introducing this phenomenon was among the most cited of the articles they’ve published in their first 100 years. In 2002 as part of its centennial issue, it stated “More than 700 studies have sought to explain some nuance of the Stroop effect; thousands of others have been directly or indirectly influenced by Stroop’s article.”
Stroop’s research included tests for measuring this effect:
Regardless of these variations, all Stroop tests deal with two incongruent properties of a stimulus and a resulting delay in its cognitive processing by the brain. Eventually, the more automatic process among the two gets access to selective attention and is processed, while the other is ignored.
The processes at play are still being teased out by researchers, but we can say with some confidence that the brain kicks information that it can’t process (much like a computer error code) over to other regions of the brain for a more thorough analysis.
Kahneman wrote, “When System 1 runs into difficulty, it calls on System 2 to support more detailed and specific processing that may solve the problem of the moment.” When it comes to the Stroop effect, System 1 (our automatic, fast thinking) seeks to find the quickest pattern available. Kahneman believes by understanding how our brains make connections, we can overcome them to reach more logical conclusions by calling on System 2, our controlled thinking, quicker.
Post error adjustments
Research in the last 20 years is finding that the brain makes adjustments when it consciously encounters an error. These changes in the brain are measurable, though the mechanisms and accuracy of these changes still needs more research.
When our brain detects an error, this process changes how we react on ensuing trials. People show post-error adaptations, potentially to improve their performance in the near future. At least three types of behavioral post-error adjustments have been observed. These are post-error slowing (PES), post-error reduction of interference, and post-error improvement in accuracy (PIA). …
The behavioral findings are not unequivocal with respect to accuracy improvements after errors. Several studies demonstrated improved accuracy directly after error commission (Laming, 1968, 1979; Marco-Pallares et al., 2008; Danielmeier et al., 2011; Maier et al., 2011). Klein et al. (2007a)reported improved performance only after errors that were consciously perceived by the subject, but not after unnoticed errors. Other studies did not find any difference between post-error and post-correct error rates (cf. Experiment 1; Hajcak et al., 2003; Hajcak and Simons, 2008) or even a decrease in accuracy following errors, at least in certain experimental conditions (Rabbitt and Rodgers, 1977; Fiehler et al., 2005). Carp and Compton (2009) showed that both ERN and Pe amplitude correlate with post-error accuracy, in that larger ERN/Pe amplitudes go along with better post-error accuracy.
Errors in error correction
“Our love of being right is best understood as our fear of being wrong”
~ Kathryn Schulz ~
Our brains have conscious and subconscious processes to identify and correct errors. Even our error correction processes have failure points. The brain conserves resources by repeating what it’s done before, that can include mistakes. You’ve likely encountered this if you rearranged your kitchen and find yourself putting something back in the wrong/old place.
Another common source of error comes from the brain’s reward system. This system evolved to keep our species alive and procreating.
After the rewarding experience, the prefrontal cortex (which plays a role in decision-making and planning) assesses the entire event. It connects the pleasure from the NAc with the original stimulus and the action taken.
The stronger the pleasurable response in the NAc, the stronger the reinforcement signal sent to the prefrontal cortex and other areas responsible for memory and behavior.
As a result, the individual becomes more inclined to seek out or engage in that specific behavior or context in anticipation of the reward. Over time, through repeated exposures, this leads to learned behaviors or habits.
The reward system does its job quite effectively in times of relative scarcity. As humanity has progressed, we’ve found ways to ‘tickle’ the reward system for pleasure. For some, this has led to addictive behaviors where an unhealthy action continues despite the consequences.
Not all errors are bad
“Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one's mistakes.”
~ Oscar Wilde ~
It’s not true that we learn best from our mistakes. Research indicates that we learn more from other’s mistakes and our own successes. We flinch at fully examining the reasons for our own failures. Nevertheless, becoming skilled requires the willingness to repeatedly make mistakes as we develop new pathways in our brains to successfully wield a new skill. You’re not going to shoot par in golf until you’ve shanked hundreds of balls.
“The findings suggest that learning may not require the changing of connections of neurons on each trial, as several other studies have suggested, and instead suggest that information about outcomes on each trial are held in a sort of buffer for guidance in the next attempt,” says Professor Howard Eichenbaum from the Centre for Memory and Brain at Boston University.
So, it turns out our history, piano and tennis teachers had it right all along, practice does indeed makes perfect. If you can get something right repeatedly, you're likely to keep getting it more right. In other words, “perfect practice makes perfect,” says Mark Histed, one of the co-authors on the paper published in Neuron.
Why we hate being wrong
“The Tudors hated to be wrong, and therefore never were.”
~ Jeane Westin ~
For most of human history, tribal members survived because they banded into groups. Remaining in the good graces of the tribe was essential to benefitting from its safety and resources. As a result, our subconscious reflexively works to protect our reputation. Being wrong, historically, correlates with being perceived as lower in the tribal hierarchy and therefore less important to the tribe.
Aside from group status, in primitive times being wrong could be fatal. Without the benefits of modern medicine, a hunting injury could lead to a painful death. Foraging the wrong mushrooms could kill the family. The drive to not be wrong, had survival benefits.
Our ego, or sense of self, finds comfort in our various identities. Just as we have fight, flight, or freeze instincts to protect our physical well-being, we defend our psychological sense of self when our various identities are threatened. This is why if someone makes fun of our favorite football team, city, state, country, music artist, political party, hero, religion, ideas, and so on, we feel a surge of emotion to defend them. In a way, this is quite curious. Why does our favorite football team or music group need defending? They aren't actually under any attack. They don't need our protection, yet we experience this almost irresistible urge to defend them. …
The greater level of psychological investment we have in an idea, a view, political party, cause, etc., the more inclined we will be to defend them when they are threatened. …
Thus, if we've championed a movement, cause, group, or belief, it is extremely difficult to back out and say, "Um, yeah, I was wrong for spending all that time, money, and energy promoting that cause for the past 10 years. I'm terribly sorry that I wasted part of my life, and yours, doing that!"
On top of that, if we have others within our social group with whom we are well-connected, there is a very painful social cost to admitting we are wrong. When we don't conform to our group's ideals and identity, we will be cast out. From an evolutionary standpoint, the loss of our group, our tribe, frequently meant death.
Embracing the mistakes
“Anyone can possess, anyone can profess, but it is an altogether different thing to confess.”
~ Shannon L. Alder ~
While we are wired against mistakes for self preservation, in the safer confines of modern society the urge to not make or admit to mistakes hinders individual growth. In our modern tribes admitting to a mistake is, counterintuitively, viewed positively as a sign of strength and self confidence. Those who are less afraid to acknowledge their errors are quicker to repair those errors and less likely to repeat them.
For too many, fear of failure prevents them from taking risks to advance in relationships, their occupation, and their personal growth.
“We want to live in the space where we embrace challenges where we don’t know if things will work. You get a whole lot of creativity when you stay in that stance; it’s the growth edge of approach motivation,” says Anne Browning, associate dean for well-being at UW Medicine.
Putting this all together
In previous Foundation articles we discussed how little we see, how little we know, how little we remember, and we discussed the imperfect tools we use to adapt to our limited knowledge and experiences. Here we covered processing errors our brains make and a some research on how our brains identify and adjust for these errors.
Neuroscience is a field that is still quite young. While the structures of the brain have been studied under the microscope for some time, it’s only been in recent years that technology developments have allowed scientists to ‘see’ how the brain processes information. We still know very little about processing errors in the brain and related adaptations.
We have clues from research performed in psychology and sociology. The philosophers have wrestled with topics since the ancient Greeks. Even in fields outside of neurobiology, there is little research on how error and error adaptations have shaped human behavior over time.
While there is so much more to be learned, recognizing that our brains make processing mistakes and send signals when error states are recognized can help us correct our resulting mistakes.
Exercises
Think of a time when you recognized your own cognitive dissonance. How did you react?
Think of a time when you induced cognitive dissonance in someone you had a disagreement with. How did they react?
Think of a time when you made an error and your brain had a hard time making sense of the error and working around it. What feelings did you experience during this event?
Finale
This is the sixth foundational essay. Last week we covered conscious and subconscious strategies humans use to fill their gaps in knowledge. Next week, we’ll discuss how missing knowledge and error affects what you read in this newsletter (and, by extension, elsewhere).
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Your friend,
DJ
I never ever make mistakes!
There was one time I thought maybe I had made a mistake, but I was wrong.