Evidence receipt / observation
Published · transcript-backedTim Harford: observation
12 Feb 2020 Conversations with Tyler Tim Harford on Persuasion and Popular Economics
“The vacuous reason was nevertheless persuasive. So, maybe the lesson is that the British have simply learned that it’s a good idea to provide a reason, and it doesn’t need to be a good reason.”
Source trail
Everything needed to verify it.
- Speaker
- Tim Harford
- Attribution
- Verified speaker
- Claim type
- observation
- Recorded
- 12 Feb 2020
- Publisher
- Conversations with Tyler
Transcript context
…Yes, that’s him. — and people cut in line. Sometimes people would just say, “Sorry, can I do this?” and would cut in line, and people didn’t like that. But if people gave a reason — even if the reason was utterly vacuous — people found that perfectly acceptable. So, if somebody cut in line and said, “Do you mind if I cut in line? I have to make some copies.” Well, obviously you have to make some copies because you’re queuing up at a photocopier. I have to make some copies, too, because I’m also queuing at the photocopier. The vacuous reason was nevertheless persuasive. So, maybe the lesson is that the British have simply learned that it’s a good idea to provide a reason, and it doesn’t need to be a good reason. So, under that hypothesis, the English are actually a more manipulative culture.…
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