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TylerLivy
Short Philosophy Paper
This paper’s purpose is to investigate three specific areas of cognitive science;
cognitive biases, memory, and the self. All three of these areas contain limits or
constraints upon our cognitive capacities for processing information or other such
functions. These constraints, however, are often unnoticed by the average person, as well
as the connections between them. First, I will briefly introduce each area of interest, and
how they relate to each other. Next, I will explain why I believe this trinity can be
problematic. Finally, I will endeavor to impress upon you that this issue is of worthy
concern, and that cognitive science can provide potential solutions.
First, there is the self. But there is more than one “Self”, as Daniel Khaneman
proposes in his book, Thinking Fast and Slow. He holds that human beings opperate on
two systems. The first system is much faster, almost automatic in nature. From it comes
our ability to assess the emotional content of voices, compute basic mathematics, and
perform other simple tasks. Then there is the second system. This system is comparable
to a battery; it requires energy (attention) in order to work properly. In addition, the
system can be switched off if ones attention is not on the task at hand. Those tasks
include any function which requires a step by step process, or requires more attention.
According to Daniel Khaneman, man spends far more time in the first system, and
far less time in the second. If this is true, it is no wonder that memories of human beings
are so faulty; we barely pay attention to the day-to-day events of our existence.
Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons discussed in their book The Invisible Gorilla.

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Humanity remembers and pays attention to much less than it gives itself credit for. In a
notable example in their book, a woman mistakenly remembered that her father read a
book to her throughout her childhood; in reality, the book was published the year after
her father died, in 1957. In addition, our memory is effected by our emotional state, and
how our memories end.
And yet, when we scan our memories, they appear to be fully detailed, with no
clear gaps. This is due to the mind’s ability to fill in these gaps in our perception. Such
fillers serve an evolutionary role. These delusions allow us to take action with relative
certainty; if we were less certain, would we have endured as a species? There is another
possible reason. We know only ourselves, so we overinflate ourselves, while any other
people we underestimate, because we know not what they are, only that they are like us.
This is one of multiple cognitive illusions that are held by many members of the
population. There are two other cognitive illusions worth mentioning. The first is a
tendency of people to overestimate their abilities. It is in part due to this tendency that we
are unable to notice our own cognitive defects, our lapses in memory, or how little we
pay attention to the world. Another cognitive apparition is hindsight bias, which is what I
am succumbing to even as I write this paper. Hindsight bias is a tendency to perceive a
conclusion, result, or finding as obvious in hindsight. While I recognize that I was as
ignorant as any other person at one point, hindsight and an inflated estimation of my own
abilities makes it hard for me to recognize and admit it. Several others exist, and I will
explain them as we go.
The problem, as I see it, is this; in all of our potential actions with each other, we
are generally unable to realize or recognize our own faults, due to the combined effects of

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these three factors. Generally, we overestimate our own worth, we think ourselves
smarter than we actually are, and we think we remember more than we actually do. These
characteristics do have their values, but our capacity to cooperate with each other seems
to be increasingly strained.
Ware gradually losing our ability to switch between the two systems of self, and
are increasingly using the first one. The first system, that of automatic, quick processing,
is being promoted due to the social construction of time constrains and the influx of
instant-answer technology. It is also in this first system that our cognitive illusions are far
more difficult to combat.
For example, I believe that there is a widespread aversion to reading in the
Philosophy classes. I have heard that students will look up summaries of the readings
rather than take the time to purview the readings themselves. While this could be
attributed to multiple factors, such as lack of emotional investment, a character trait of
laziness, or circumstances, I hold that all of these are subliminally influenced by an
inability or unwillingness to use the second system. To attribute this pattern to a character
flaw is to submit to the actor-observer bias, in which one attributes others’ actions to their
character. The gradual fusion of the two brain systems is not necessarily a bad thing, but
it makes it even harder for us to escape from our cognitive biases.
There are several reasons why solving this problem is important, for both
practical and theoretical reasons. I will go over the theoretical reasons first, and then the
practical reasons.

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The first practical reason is that the problem makes social and political
cooperation with others far more difficult. It is already difficult enough to work together
with others, especially when one considers how many factors may affect it; culture,
language, personality, characteristics, and values. But add in any of the biases, and it
multiples the difficulty. Take, for example, the bipartisan political system present in the
United States. Individuals with strong opinions, and a need to prove loyalty to a particular
political party, are made victims of biased assimilation and confirmation bias. Biased
assimilation is where we reject alternative opinions, and only accept information that
confirms what we believe. Taken with confirmation bias, where we only take in
information that confirms what we believe, U.S. politicians have almost no chance of
achieving anything. Now, imagine if the entire society was as inoperable as the U.S.
political system. Practically speaking, nothing could be accomplished.
Another reason is that such over-reliance on the first system could lead people to
be even more susceptible to advertisements and those with strong opinions. This would
be due to an unjustified amount of confidence in our own decision-making skills. This
problem is made worse by the fact that our automatic systems require instant information,
which usually implies internet usage. The internet, as we can probably guess, has
advertisements. By doing this, we are simply making a vicious cycle harder to break.
Yet another practical consideration is that people would become engrossed in
their own fantasy worlds. The biases, by their very virtue, allow people to simply ignore
all information that does not pertain directly to their own experiences and beliefs As a
result, while people can still be present in the world, they can also choose to opt out of it

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completely. This makes getting people to be concerned about the world or even
participate in it just that much harder.
There is one final reason to care about this problem. It has to do with memory.
You see, individuals who are engaged in this mode, in addition to being more susceptible
to biases, are even less willing to admit that their memory could be unreliable. This is
problematic because it makes us less willing to accept when others forget to do things. As
a result the general amount of tolerance for mistakes and failures goes down.
This is a pretty extensive list of reasons for why this problem needs to be
addressed. As for how? I don’t know. The issue with these biases is that some of them
work so nicely against conventional means of psychology. A recent study in October
2015 by Carey K. Morewedge and Co. called “Debiasing Decisions: Improved Decision
Making With a Single Training Intervention” found that interactive games expose and
reveal cognitive biases to the participants.
Despite the difficulty, there are several benefits for attempting to solve this
problem. The first and most obvious benefit is that we will be more aware of how human
and fallible we are. Learning all of this certainly made me far more forgiving and
humble, especially when it comes to faulty memory. Another benefit of countering this
problem is that cooperation with others becomes easier. When one recognizes that they
hold strong opinions simply because of an inflated sense of self-importance, it becomes
easier to compromise them for the sake of cooperation. One final benefit is that you are
more aware of when you are being more emotional and being effected by emotions.

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In conclusion, the self, memory, and cognitive biases is an inter-connected trap
that we should be aware of. This trinity could result in a plethora of potential hurdles,
including decreased tendency to cooperate. Thankfully, there are ways to combat the
issue this trio creates.

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Works Cited
Chabris, Christopher F., and Daniel J. Simons. The Invisible Gorilla: And Other
Ways Our Intuitions Deceive Us. New York: Crown, 2010. Print.
Kahneman, Daniel. Thinking, Fast and Slow. New York: Farrar, Straus and
Giroux, 2011. Print.
Morewedge, C. K., H. Yoon, I. Scopelliti, C. W. Symborski, J. H. Korris, and K.
S. Kassam. "Debiasing Decisions: Improved Decision Making With a Single Training
Intervention." Policy Insights from the Behavioral and Brain Sciences 2.1 (2015): 129-
40. Sage Journals. Web. 15 Nov. 2015.