In Haribo gummy bears, the green ones are strawberry.
Now, that’s obviously ridiculous, but that’s not the point of this post. The point is that my six-year-old daughter told me this fact, and I immediately expressed incredulous doubt. How could such an absurd thing be true? She was quite certain, however. My doubt persisted until she obtained a package of them and showed me that I was incorrect.
Now, here’s the thing about all this: I actually wasn’t certain. If I’d spent 2 seconds thinking about it, I’d have realized that I couldn’t tell you what any of the gummy bear flavor/color combos are. It just seemed silly to me that strawberry would be green. Meanwhile, I had every reason to believe my daughter:
- She had volunteered the info, which clearly indicated a more recent expertise than I had.
- She has, in general, more candy expertise than I do.
- Most importantly, she has what I call “credible certainty.” I cannot recall a time she has ever expressed that level of certainty and been wrong.
Some people are over-certain. They express certainty when they shouldn’t (like I did!) with great frequency. When that happens, you shouldn’t take their certainty as evidence. But when someone (like my daughter) never expresses certainty unless she’s right, then you should absolutely update your thinking when that person feels correct enough to argue.
Lesson learned: I damaged my own “credible certainty” today. Fortunately, my daughter is as kind as she is smart, and forgave me.
The Opportunity Machine 