narrative fallacy

The “narrative fallacy” is our human tendency to weave facts into a story line, a narrative, that explains the world to us, that helps make sense of things, that aids our memory. All well and good but we are also inclined to orient the story to fit our world view and in the future we tend to pick out facts that best fit the story we have come to believe and ignore or weight less information that (confirmation or observational bias) conflicts with our preconceived story line.

Be it overly broad generalization or excessive simplification or simply beginning to believe your own press clipping, the wise remain skeptical and wary. The map is not the territory; the neater the explanation, the more cautious the experienced become.

Closing Quotes:

The narrative fallacy addresses our limited ability to look at sequences of facts without weaving an explanation into them.” – Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan

“I am responsible for the world I see.” – A Course In Miracles

As always, I share what I most want/need to learn. – Nathan S. Collier