Make an ASS out of U and ME

In 9th grade, I had a basketball coach named Mr. Bean. His name did not match his stature, though his large voice did. I had never experienced yelling in my direction like that before – and maybe haven’t since. The words he yelled weren’t harmful – it was just his way of communicating with his players in a gym. But it was hard for me to hear the actual words over the volume. It was intimidating and jarring to my freshman self and after a week or two of practices, I really wanted to quit. This was one of those times I now thank my parents for providing enough pressure to give it more time. It did quickly get to the point that I could actually hear what he was saying and I have fond memories of him and of that season. There’s one memory in particular that continues to resurface on a regular basis in many aspects of life. Of course, I didn’t appreciate it in the moment, but I guess that’s not surprising.

I’m not sure I remember the exact context he first said it, but I’m guessing it had to do with us moving too fast and making assumptions about what our teammates were going to do before waiting just long enough to reality check our assumptions. Anyway – my memory is that he surprised us all (the first time) by saying – in that deep, loud, bellowing voice – “DO YOU KNOW WHAT ASSUMING DOES?!!!” I’m sure we all looked at him with wide, questioning eyes – having no idea what answer he was looking for. He let the question hang in the air just long enough to make us a little nervous. Then, “IT MAKES AN ASS OUT OF U and ME!!” – with a little smile. If I remember correctly, it took a second or two for it to sink in, and then it just stuck. I assume (ha) the phrase is pretty common, at least in the U.S., but I have only heard it used a handful of times since that memorable first exposure.

Fast forward about 30 years and much of the time I feel like I’m swimming in a deep bottomless pool of assumptions, just trying to keep my head above water. Sure – assumptions related to Statistics (as I’ve hit on before here, here, and here and will continue to hit on in the future), but the pool extends far beyond those. There are the bigger assumptions underlying how we do science, what we value in our culture, how we go about our days. There are the little assumptions I make each day about my kids, my friends, my dog, and then the assumptions I, myself, make about myself.

Clearly we can’t go forward in living life without making assumptions – of various types and from many different motivations. They are necessary, but they are also tricky and even dangerous. I see the trickery and danger come in mostly when we are unaware of the assumptions we are making – either purposely ignoring them or unaware out of sheer ignorance. We humans are so good at ignoring the assumptions we make, or at least pretending as if they are facts or reasonable expectations, rather than artifacts of our own minds created to make life tractable. We all make mistakes through our assumptions on a daily basis, whether we admit it to ourselves or not. And I doubt there are many who would disagree with me on that.

I find it fascinating that we seem to believe (or assume!) that we can rise above the human challenge of recognizing and acknowledging assumptions when we really want or need to — like when we turn to doing science. We often pretend as if we can just write down all of our assumptions and go forward – we include the ones that are easy to write down (particularly those related to theory and/or mathematics) and largely ignore others. We fool ourselves with going after the goal of “objectivity” (or at least trying to convince others of it), rather than the goal of awareness and contemplation of assumptions — or spending real work on where might be fooling ourselves. In the practice of Statistics, there is a general expectation to try to “check” the low hanging fruit assumptions, but even that is often carried out under the wrong assumption that we can conclude whether the assumption is “met” or not by looking at a little data.

But my message for this post was supposed to be simple. My 9th grade experience keeps popping up into my consciousness – and there is something useful in here. It’s less of an accusation or warning and more of a simple question used to trigger reflection. How am I likely making an ass out of myself – or you – through my assumptions? I think we could benefit from having that question bouncing around in our heads more often (in all areas of our lives). Or maybe you prefer the wording in “How am I likely fooling myself?” – but it doesn’t have quite the same ring to it. A little mantra to remind ourselves to try a little harder not to fool ourselves.

When something big happens in our lives to make us realize how good we are at fooling ourselves and others, it’s hard not to then see it everywhere and start questioning everything. As long as the questioning doesn’t become completely overwhelming, it seems to me to be mostly a positive thing. Which assumptions are likely to make an ass out me or someone else? Is the risk, or benefit, of the assumption worth it anyway? Will openness and honesty upfront about assumptions at least take some of the sting out feeling or looking like an ass later? I think so. Our inherent overconfidence or arrogance toward an assumption is ultimately what leads to the sting – not the problem with the actual assumption itself. Sure, questioning can make us feel a little crazy, but it can also be embraced as just the way life is – including science and statistics. We will continue to make asses out of ourselves and others, but maybe less often or to a lesser degree?

We all know our lives and work depend on assumptions. The key is somehow figuring out which ones will eventually make an ass out of us. And that’s not easy. But it’s worth thinking more about.