Julia introduces a metaphor of soldiers and scouts to describe two very different approaches to thinking. To illustrate these two mindsets in action, I tell the story of the Dreyfus Affair: how one man was wrongfully convicted of treason, and how another realized this fact and fought to exonerate him.

Julia Galef cofounded the Center for Applied Rationality, a nonprofit devoted to developing cognitive sciencebased strategies for reasoning and decision making. In addition to research, they run workshops for companies and talented individuals who want to use rationality to help them address global problems. Julia’s background is originally in statistics, and she did social science research at Columbia and Harvard Business Schools for several years before becoming a writer for venues such as Slate, Science, Scientific American, and more. For the last six years, Julia has hosted the Rationally Speaking podcast.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx