Even beyond the wide gap in marketing savvy, fortune, and fame – SCN Encourager

There’s a big reason why Seth Godin and I aren’t alike.

I rely on gut instinct.

He backs up his observations with science and logic.

Before I give you an example of what I’m talking about  (the science and logic thing, that is… not my gut!), I’d like to re-affirm what a joy it is to read Godin’s ideas about marketing, education, our choices, and life.

As many of you know, his daily blog is a treasure chest of thought provocation.

I’m no slouch at “thought provocation,” either, if I do say so myself, but Godin has legions of followers who will publicly testify his prowess; I only have Cindy and our daughters.

Godin’s blog yesterday was entitled, “Are you feeling lucky?”

He wrote how we – as consumers and choosers – try to factor in the potential risk involved whenever we are called up to make an important decision.

Apparently, the great majority of us will typically choose a “lesser” option if it is perceived to be the more clearly defined and known than the potentially much more beneficial option, even if the odds of the beneficial option actually happening are pretty good.

This phenomenon perhaps explains why average class size and other straight-up “hard facts” are such a big deal for many school choosers.

They – like us – will usually lean toward the known and away from the ambiguous.

Godin tied all of this to a long-held theory called The Ellsberg Paradox and he provided a link to a complete explanation of it.

Being the conscientious communicator and scholar that I am, I clicked on the link.

(Why not? A little life-long learning now and then never killed anybody, right?)

The article about The Ellsberg Paradox offered the following math calculations.

And you betcha! These figures sure look correct to me!

Godin’s been proven right yet again.

Who could ever select the dreamy pie-in-the-sky option when you’ve got “hard data” like this in front of your nose?

Not me.

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