我既单独询问专家，也鼓励专家在我面前展现深思熟虑的意见分歧，而且我可以问问题。通过这么做，我既降低了自己犯错的可能性，也学到了很多东西。当我和专家有分歧，或者专家彼此之间有分歧时，效果最为明显。拥有这种能力的聪明的人是最好的老师，比站在黑板前例行公事对你说教的教授好得多。我经常把由此获得的知识总结为原则并不断改进，以应用于未来出现的类似情况。 有时问题太过复杂，我难以在有限的时间内理解，这时我会让在这方面知识更丰富、可信度更高的人帮我做决策，但我仍然会旁听他们以深思熟虑的方式发表不同意见。我发现大多数人并不这么做，即使他们不具备做出相应判断所需的能力，仍还是更倾向于自己做决定。他们这是在向“较低层次的我”屈服。 By questioning experts individually and encouraging them to have thoughtful disagreement with each other that I can listen to and ask questions about, I both raise my probability of being right and become much better educated. This is most true when the experts disagree with me or with each other. Smart people who can thoughtfully disagree are the greatest teachers, far better than a professor assigned to stand in front of a board and lecture at you. The knowledge I acquire usually leads to principles that I develop and refine for similar cases that arise in the future. In some cases in which the subjects are just too complex for me to understand in the time required, I will turn over the decision making to knowledgeable others who are more believable than me, but I still want to listen in on their thoughtful disagreement. I find that most people don’t do that—they prefer to make their own decisions, even when they’re not qualified to make the kinds of judgments required. In doing so, they’re giving in to their lower-level selves.
