Why People Behave Funny

Quote of the day:
“Life is difficult.”
--Scott Peck

Quote of the day no. 2:
"This just might be the biggest auction of anything anyone has ever held, with the potential to change the course of history for every player inn the communications-services business."
--Eric J. Savitz in today's "Barron's," referring to the FCC's upcoming auction of broadband spectrum.

If you're like me, during the holidays you are especially concerned about unusual patterns of behavior among co-workers, friends and family.

If you'd like to to find a way to label such behavior, there's an interesting Wikipedia entry called "List of Cognitive Biases." It sounds scientific, but it's actually rather entertaining to see people you know (and maybe yourself) described with such clinical precision. And, as I say, this entertainment might come as a needed relief during the holidays.

Imagine how "irrational escalation," "hyperbolic discounting" and "post-purchase rationalization" come into play during shopping.

Wikipedia itself is a fascinating phenomenon. Earlier I was doing research for an upcoming class and I read the entry on Raymond Brown, who was a Catholic priest and renowned biblical scholar. He wrote a definitive and exhaustive book on the birth stories in Matthew and Luke.

His Wikipedia entry (in which he did not participate, because he died in 1998) does not talk about his work as much as it describes the Catholic doctrine he may or may not have violated by publishing this and other books.

Like many Wikipedia entries, people writing and contributing to it have their own strong agenda. See "Confirmation Bias" in the "List of Cognitive Biases."