Interesting discussion from the movie: World War Z. The Tenth Man To avoid unwanted surprises like The Yom Kippur war with Egypt and Syria in 1973, Israel had instituted a policy known as “the tenth man.” It goes like this: When nine people agree on something, it’s the tenth man’s responsibility to disagree no matter how improbable the idea. Here’s where the “tenth man” idea needs some work. In the movie, Israel assumes that the tenth man is right and they build a wall. Instead, you need to assume that he’s wrong. You need to do what researchers call “rejecting the null hypothesis.” Whenever you’re presented with a new claim, especially a strange one that seems improbable, the burden of proof is on the person making the new claim. Because humans are always looking for patterns and finding them where there are none, your tenth man should have some damn convincing evidence. Here’s another important difference. Unlike Israel, you don’t have unlimited financial support from the United States to blow on building walls There are times when you don’t have great evidence available, but that doesn’t necessarily mean something is wrong, dangerous, or ineffective. In these cases, the risk of trying the intervention should be minimal, and you should still be able to find some plausible indirect evidence that you can use to justify trying it. An Example of the Tenth Man in Action Let’s say you see a new supplement being marketed as the ultimate recovery tool. Let’s say it’s called Surge Recovery®. It looks convincing enough, and the dude at the gym who drinks it is huge, so you start to pull out your credit card. Then the tenth man pipes up: “Hold on there, bro. Are you sure this stuff is worth the money? What if it’s no better than chocolate milk? That’s cheap, tasty, and you drink it already.” So your credit card snuggles back into place, and you find an article called “An objective comparison of chocolate milk and Surge Recovery,” by some guy named Alan Aragon. Alan devours their claims like a ravenous zombie, your tenth man turns out to be right — and you’re $50 bucks richer.5 If you can’t find good evidence to support making a decision that involves a high risk or cost, don’t do it. “When you find yourself on the side of the majority, you should pause and reflect.” - Mark Twain A lot of people read that quote as “if you find yourself on the side of the majority then they’re obviously wrong because they’re part of conventional wisdom and Monsanto and big business and therefore my weird fringe idea with no supporting evidence must be correct.” Or something like that. The point of using the “tenth man” policy is not to do the opposite of what you think is right. It’s to constantly question your beliefs and force yourself to examine all of the evidence — not just the stuff that supports your ideas. You need to train your brain — at least a tenth of it — to act like an intellectual watch dog. That one tenth might be the most important part. If you enjoyed this article, please share it with a friend. Disclosures: None. References 1.Pitt B, Enos M, Kertesz D. World War Z. (Foster M, ed.). 2013. 2.Shermer M. The Believing Brain. St. Martin’s Griffin; 2011. 3.Schoenfeld BJ. The mechanisms of muscle hypertrophy and their application to resistance training. J Strength Cond Res. 2010;24(10):2857–2872. doi:10.1519/JSC.0b013e3181e840f3. 4.Johnston CS, Tjonn SL, Swan PD, White A, Hutchins H, Sears B. Ketogenic low-carbohydrate diets have no metabolic advantage over nonketogenic low-carbohydrate diets. Am J Clin Nutr. 2006;83(5):1055–1061. Available at: ajcn.nutrition.org/content/83/5/1055.long. 5.Aragon AA. An objective comparison of chocolate milk and Surge Recovery. The Alan Aragon Research Review. 2008:2–5. Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: broscience, chocolate milk, critical thinking, diet, exercise, fat loss, humor, hypertrophy, ketosis, logic, logical fallacies, muscle growth, nutrition, silliness, training, weight loss, zombies About Armi Legge Armi Legge is the editor and founder of Imprüvism. You can learn more about Armi and why you should be reading Imprüvism here. Comments Tim says July 10, 2013 at 3:34 am Hey Armi, Nice jab at Surge Recovery® ! One thing people appear to have a hard time with is evaluating the quality of the available evidence. So, a jacked dude’s anecdote may be considered by some to have equal weight to a RCT. It can also work the same way with qualifications. To some folks a PhD means instant credibility, no matter how outlandish the claim. As ever, skepticism is your friend. Cheers, Tim Reply Armi Legge says July 10, 2013 at 6:34 pm Thanks Tim, glad you liked it. You’re absolutely right that people have a hard time understanding the hierarchy of evidence — I did for a while. As you said, being skeptical of everyone and every claim is a good default position. Best, - Armi Reply david says July 11, 2013 at 1:51 am How can anyones personal experience be compared to a RCT? That makes absolutely no sense to me. The power of a case report is significantly lower than the power of a RCT. Just because a case report may be right, it takes a RCT to give that claim power. Reply Armi Legge says July 12, 2013 at 11:56 am David, I completely agree. Throughout human history, however, the most common way people have made decisions has been based on personal anecdote. The RCT, and scientific research as it is today, is pretty novel. There are still a lot of people who consider personal anecdotes just as valid as RCTs (they’re also wrong). We all do when we’re born, and continue to do so until we begin to understand the hierarchy of evidence. Some people never do (which is part of why I wrote the article). Thanks for the comment, and thinking critically. - Armi Reply david says July 11, 2013 at 1:54 am I get what you’re saying about the PhD argument because a lot of people are ignorant and they do not understand that the PhD is only specialized in ONE particular field, but to say a case report has the same weight as a RCT isn’t realistic in my opinion. Reply Armi Legge says July 12, 2013 at 11:57 am I agree again. I’d also argue that even if one has a PhD in a specific field, that still doesn’t matter if they can’t think critically or are
Posted on: Fri, 25 Oct 2013 05:32:38 +0000
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