How to Avoid Idea Averaging
Idea averaging is a wonderful thing, and you should probably do it way more than you already do, and it should probably be your default mode when looking to choose between ideas.<p>A lot of this is spelled out in the literature about why ensemble methods tend to be superior to individual methods in statistical inference, which has a lot of ties to why averages of non-expert opinions tend to be as accurate or even more accurate than small pools of expert opinions.<p>In the limit, when you reallocate credibility to a set of ideas in a manner that is fully derived from your prior beliefs and the evidence you have, it becomes exactly Bayesian reasoning. A posterior distribution is exactly an &quot;idea average&quot; where each idea (each potential outcome) gets as much (and no more) credibility as it deserves, according to the prior and the probability model at hand.<p>Here&#x27;s somewhat of a popular account of it:<p>&lt; <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&#x2F;business&#x2F;is-it-better-to-trust-the-best-expert-or-the-average-of-a-group-of-experts&#x2F;2013&#x2F;11&#x2F;15&#x2F;59cc716e-4b01-11e3-be6b-d3d28122e6d4_story.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.washingtonpost.com&#x2F;business&#x2F;is-it-better-to-trus...</a> &gt;<p>There is also the recent stuff under the marketing buzzword &quot;Wisdom of Crowds&quot; e.g. &lt; <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;onlinelibrary.wiley.com&#x2F;doi&#x2F;10.1111&#x2F;j.1551-6709.2011.01223.x&#x2F;abstract;jsessionid=58C236728B81FFF49A4E84DF1E3B65CB.f02t04" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;onlinelibrary.wiley.com&#x2F;doi&#x2F;10.1111&#x2F;j.1551-6709.2011....</a> &gt; or the Wikipedia article on it too (and many sources that point out potential problems and corner cases that are also important).<p>In general though, I think I have to disagree with the article&#x27;s premise. Unless two distinct ideas truly are mutually exclusive (most things aren&#x27;t), then it&#x27;s better to have a diversified portfolio over the space of all the ideas than to put all your eggs in one basket, and averaging ideas is sort of a humble heuristic that seems to work in a lot of areas.