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proportionality_bias
The tendency to assume that big events must have big causes. People find it psychologically unsatisfying when a major outcome is attributed to a minor, mundane, or random cause, leading them to prefer grand explanatory narratives.
Conspiracy theories about the assassination of a major political figure: 'Someone that important couldn't have been killed by a lone, insignificant person.'
When a massive financial crash occurs due to a series of small, compounding bureaucratic oversights, the public rejects this explanation and insists a powerful secret group must have orchestrated it deliberately.
After a popular celebrity suddenly dies of a common cardiac event, thousands of social media users insist there must be a cover-up, finding it impossible to accept that someone so famous could be brought down by an ordinary health failure.
Binary (yes/no) questions an LLM must answer to identify this aspect:
Is a significant or large-scale event or outcome being evaluated?
Type: binaryIs there an assumption that the cause must be equally large or significant?
Type: binaryAre small or mundane causal explanations being rejected in favor of grand ones without evidence?
Type: binaryThe tendency to assume that big events must have big causes. People find it psychologically unsatisfying when a major outcome is attributed to a minor, mundane, or random cause, leading them to prefer grand explanatory narratives.
The mind seeks proportional causation as part of its meaning-making function. Small causes for big effects feel chaotic and threatening to our sense of an orderly world.
Accept that complex systems can produce large outcomes from small causes (chaos theory, tipping points). Evaluate the evidence for causes rather than their 'size.'
Conspiracy theory formation, accident investigation, historical analysis, and medical diagnosis of serious conditions.
Use these tools to detect, analyze, or train this aspect.