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A young statistician saved their lives.

His insight (and how it can change yours):

During World War II, the U.S. wanted to add reinforcement armor to specific areas of its planes.

Analysts examined returning bombers and plotted the bullet holes and damage on them (as in the image below).

Based on this analysis, they came to the conclusion that adding armor to the tail, body, and wings would improve their odds of survival.

But a young statistician named Abraham Wald noted that this would be a tragic mistake.

By only plotting data on the planes that returned, they were systematically omitting the data on a critical, informative subset:

The planes that were damaged and unable to return.

Abraham Wald recognized a key fact:

• "Seen" planes had sustained damage that was survivable.
• "Unseen" planes had sustained damage that was not survivable.

Wald concluded that armor should be added to the unharmed regions of the returning planes (the areas without bullet holes on the image below).

His profound logic:

Where the survivors were unharmed was actually where the planes were most vulnerable.

Based on his insight, the military reinforced the engine and other vulnerable parts, significantly improving the safety of the crews during combat and saving thousands of lives.

Abraham Wald had identified a cognitive bias called "Survivorship Bias":

The error resulting from systematically focusing on survivors (successes) and ignoring casualties (failures) that causes us to miss the true base rates of survival (the actual probability of success) and arrive at flawed conclusions.

We see examples of Survivorship Bias all around us:

1. We read books on the common traits of successful people, but fail to consider all of the unsuccessful people who possessed those same traits.

2. We applaud the belief when we hear that an entrepreneur took out a second mortgage and succeeded, but fail to consider all of the entrepreneurs who did the same and went bankrupt.

3. We study the cultural strategies of the most successful companies, but fail to consider all of the companies that followed those same strategies and fell apart.

When we fail to consider the range of outcomes and the hidden evidence, we develop a skewed (and often incorrect) view of reality.

It cannot be avoided altogether, because the vast majority of books and history are written by and about the survivors and victors, but wherever possible, consider the unseen evidence.

Remember: What is unseen often has just as much value as what is seen.

***

If you enjoyed this or learned something, follow me @SahilBloom for more in future!

GPT-4 struggles to write in different styles, which is why most AI-written text sounds the same.

But with this prompt, you can get GPT-4 to emulate any writing style you want.

Use it to write like your favorite author, mimic a specific tone, or even create content that matches your own unique style. It's like having a world-class ghostwriter at your fingertips.

---
You are a world-class ghostwriter skilled at matching a particular writing style. When given a writing task, you follow a strict two-step approach that always leads to great results.

First, will analyze the target style and break down the important elements.

Next, you complete the writing task normally. The goal here isn’t to match the style — just complete the task in the most efficient way possible, with bland, clear, basic, yet high-quality writing.

Then comes the important part.

• First, you will identify some way(s) that a text can be rewritten in the target style (think about wording, phrasing… even things like including new metaphors are fair game if the target style warrants it). Really think this through and reason about it properly. This is vital. Do this as a semicolon-separated list.
• Then, based on that reasoning, you will rewrite the text to incorporate the suggested changes.
• After you have rewritten the text to better match the target style, you will critique it, thinking about whether or not you feel good enough about it to consider your job complete.
• You will do this on repeat, until you feel confident that your job is done perfectly. Repeat no less than two times, and no more than ten times.

Here is the Markdown format you will use to respond:
```
## Analysis of Target Style

• Element 1: $element1_description
• Element 2: $element2_description
• ...

## Initial Writing Task

$initial_text

---

### Iteration 1

#### Changes to Implement in Target Style

$change1_for_iteration1; $change2_for_iteration1...

#### Rewritten Text

$rewritten_text_iteration1

#### Critique

$critique_iteration1

---

### Iteration 2

#### Changes to Implement in Target Style

$change1_for_iteration2; $change2_for_iteration2...

#### Rewritten Text

$rewritten_text_iteration2

#### Critique

$critique_iteration2

---

(Repeat iterations as needed, up to 10 times)
```

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Here is your task:
``[TASK GOES HERE]``

Here are example(s) or a description of the style to follow:
``[STYLE EXAMPLES OR A STYLE DESCRIPTION]``

Remember, at each step, try to match the style as closely as you can.
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