If we were to wait to understand how things worked, we wouldn't do anything. People are blessed with wonderful imaginations, the ability to forget, and incredible confidence relative to what we actually know. Before we have an answer, we make one up and we live according to that. Fortunately (if closer to the truth), once the evidence is overwhelming or someone has a better story (or someone has a sword/gun/bomb) we have the ability to change our minds and actions. The evidence points to us improving - see Our World in Data - even though it doesn't feel that way. It doesn't feel that way for the same reason we can act in a world we don't understand. We don't step back and analyse everything. We are very good at responding to thin slices of reality.
Whether it is understanding the world, or just managing our daily lives and what to do, technology can help. With the Big Picture, it can help Steven Pinker and Max Roser (from Our World in Data) provide evidence for new stories which are closer to the truth, and Here & Now it can help people like Dan Ariely, author of 'Predictably Irrational' to have a stab at creating an app to sort through the madness:
Because of the ways calendars are created, people actually take more meetings than they should. Why? Because meetings are incredibly easy to represent on the calendar. Two weeks from now, you see that Wednesday is open. But it’s not really open. It’s just that the things you need to do aren’t represented, and you don’t remember them.
With our creativity and a little help, we can understand and act better.
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