Overkill

Abstract

This chapter considers an important caveat about the adaptive advantages of cognitive biases and looks at the argument that biases can be advantageous as long as they are manifested in appropriate settings and in moderation. It notes biases that become extreme or arise in the wrong contexts that are liable to be counterproductive and result in disaster. It also emphasizes how human cognitive biases are not extreme, but instead are tendencies that marginally steer behavior in some particular way and vary from person to person and situation to situation. The chapter considers how strong biases should be effective when the consequences become overbearing. It explores the red lines beyond which strategic instincts go too far by revisiting the Pacific campaign in World War II.