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If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
This could have a completely rational explanation: If you find yourself overmatched, then it pays to take risks. If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
The thing I would be very curious about is whether other activities have the same dynamic or rather, in what activities is "thinking" more necessary in even when one achieves competence?
That's another explanation.
This could have a completely rational explanation: If you find yourself overmatched, then it pays to take risks. If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
This could have a completely rational explanation: If you find yourself overmatched, then it pays to take risks. If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
That does make sense, but the article is saying that people screwed up because they overthought their current strategies and played worse than normally, not because they overcorrected in the other direction and took more risks.
Based solely on the above they draw their conclusions. I'm just pointing out that there is a simpler and more rational conclusion one could draw.
This could have a completely rational explanation: If you find yourself overmatched, then it pays to take risks. If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
This could have a completely rational explanation: If you find yourself overmatched, then it pays to take risks. If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
Indeed. This part constitutes the science: "When the superstar entered a tournament, every other golfer took, on average, 0.8 more strokes." The rest is speculation.
The article is a particularly idiotic example of uninformed speculation passing for science journalism.
This could have a completely rational explanation: If you find yourself overmatched, then it pays to take risks. If I found myself playing golf against Tiger Woods, I'd try higher risk / higher reward shots, because if I stick to my typical game I'm surely going to lose. This would make my score worse on average, but who cares about that when once in a while the bet pays off and I win?
In golf, there are prizes for getting 2nd, 3rd, etc... So if you knew Woods was going to destroy you, you would still play your best game and try to get 2nd place.
Now, for the people who might get 2nd, 3rd, and maybe a few more top spots, they might want to try to best Woods. But people who have no chance would still play their regular game (if your theory is correct).
So I'd be interested to see if the drop in score correlated at all with the average score across previous games.