# Poker Champion on the Science of Decision Making - Chris Sparks  ## Metadata - Author: [[Deep Dive with Ali Abdaal]] - Full Title: Poker Champion on the Science of Decision Making - Chris Sparks - Category: #🎙️ - URL: https://www.airr.io/episode/631093ec1671d6000d6ab27f [[Expected valuing]] Related: ## Highlights Speaker 1: how does this move set up my opponents, you know, weeks from now because because I'm playing with them every day, I have many, many opportunities to capitalize on something that I've set them up on, It's a very different Speaker 0: person. So it's more like, hey, if I fold right now, then they'll think that I'm the sort of person who folds under these conditions, which means four weeks from now. they'll use that data point to make a decision, which is actually gonna be bad for them. Speaker 1: Exactly. Speaker 0: And and, and Speaker 1: this is, you know, one of the other many definitions of a professional player is that everything has, you know, we call second order effects. So you're, you're already thinking about what of these options that I have now, what's the next layer on the game tree? What is going to be my opponent's reaction when I show this hand, what action ([Time 0:16:27](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e4c098b19287a2a3f2913)) Speaker 1: evens out. But if you say something more like All right, I'm going to pay you $2 if it's heads and you're going to pay me $1 if it tails. Okay, two times 50 cent. Two times 50% is one plus one times 50% is 50. So every time we do this I bet a dollar expect to make a dollar 50. So I'm making 50 cents every time we do it right? So expand this out. Every action that we take has an expected value. You have some form of risk and some form of reward. And so the way that my brain works through just getting punched in the face so many times in poker is just like is the is the risk worth reward or like all the options available to me, what has the highest expected value? And so that's anything like okay what restaurant am I going to go to? What am I gonna order at that restaurant? Who should I go over and talk to this person? Should I reach out to this person that I wanted? Talk to think about, okay well what's the upside of this? What do I what am I putting at risk? What are the other things that I could be doing instead the opportunity cost? And once you start to just where this idea of expected value like close you realize that everything is a bet you talk to people about, bo could be like oh well I don't gamble is like okay well everything you do is a bet, your every action that you take, your saying like this step forward gets me somewhere and so you're decomposing all your actions into like is this a good bet and that's the way the way I've sort of seen my life is just I'm taking all of these tiny calculated risks that I expected to get me one step closer to where I want to be, Speaker 0: that's great. This idea of plus C. V. I I guess ([Time 0:35:05](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e4c908b19287a2a3f3d15)) Speaker 1: how risky is this really? Everything that we do every encounter every time we bump up against reality, we learned a little bit more about what those actual probabilities, risk rewards are and so we get a better sense of like what risks are worth it and what rewards are worth it over time through this feedback that we're getting. So it's not just oh, this worked out, This didn't work out is how does what happen? How does that tell me about the assumptions that I came into during this decision. Right. Did I, was I a little, let's say that going back to this marketing agency call, was I a little bit too excited about this whole idea of a marketing agency taking over everything? Or was I like a little bit to under estimate of the cost, what I would have to do involved and you take a step back and say, okay, resume, this type of situation is going to be recurring. How do we change our approach slightly so that we make it something that's a little bit more use of our time. I think this is the critical variable to solve for in all of our lives is how do we solve what we call self organization? That processes automatically improve over time? Every time we do something it creates a jumping off point to iterate and improve that process every time we do it. So I think that's that's the real, that's the real learning is that the expected value. It's not just floating out there in the world that we have real control over these variables. Speaker 0: Yeah. It's like, I think I've heard tim Ferriss a few ([Time 0:38:52](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e4d258b19287a2a3f4b7f)) - Note: Don't assess the positive or negative aspects of a experience until you understand what your expected value of that activity was before you did it. If it was high, then maybe you just got unlucky. [[Lifestyle Design MOC]] Speaker 1: little bit too excited about this whole idea of a marketing agency taking over everything? Or was I like a little bit to under estimate of the cost, what I would have to do involved and you take a step back and say, okay, resume, this type of situation is going to be recurring. How do we change our approach slightly so that we make it something that's a little bit more use of our time. I think this is the critical variable to solve for in all of our lives is how do we solve what we call self organization? That processes automatically improve over time? Every time we do something it creates a jumping off point to iterate and improve that process every time we do it. So I think that's that's the real, that's the real learning is that the expected value. It's not just floating out there in the world that we have real control over these variables. Speaker 0: Yeah. It's like, I think I've heard tim Ferriss a few ([Time 0:39:23](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e4cce8b19287a2a3f4225)) Speaker 1: I think this comes up for me a lot when with boundaries. So we talked about like distractions and interruptions. A lot of it is like, well, I would get so much done if I didn't have to be in all these meetings or if my boss wouldn't hit me up on slack or text me all the time. It's like, well, have you talked to them? You know, do they know what they're what's happening that you would be able to do more deep work or get more things done if you weren't switching priorities all the time? Well, no, like, you know, they're, my boss was like, well, why don't you tell them? Why don't you have a conversation and finding o not only were they really supportive of that, that problem no longer exists only because I had the courage to speak up that a lot of these self perceived, well, I can't do that is like, well, what if you did that? What's the worst that could happen? What's the best that could happen? Speaker 0: And it comes Speaker 1: back to right? There's there's an experiment that can be done here to disprove these assumptions that we have about the world that really aren't all that well founded, ([Time 0:53:34](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e4ee68b19287a2a3f8377)) Speaker 1: that we have about the world that really aren't all that well founded, Speaker 0: nice experiments. You're big on the whole thinking and experiments thing, your pdf book book. Experiment without limits. It's great. I've actually referenced it on my other podcast with my brother a couple of times. Every time we need something to talk about like you know what, let's just look up chris pdf and just go through some how to figure out what to do with your life questions. I'm Speaker 1: the same way you talk. Speaker 0: So what's how how do you think about like experiments? Speaker 1: Great. So yeah, first the workbook that ali is referencing experimental limits. What's available for completely free online to find that forcing function dot com slash workbook if you prefer the uh to you know write things ([Time 0:54:24](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e4f238b19287a2a3f8c01)) - Note: Future Aiden save the world talk to me Speaker 1: So a lot of the temptation and psychology, we call this status quo bias is, hey, everything that I'm doing right now is pretty great. I'm just gonna keep on doing that. And I see this a lot when I lead workshops around a quarterly or annual review where people's goals tend to be, I'm gonna do exactly all the things that I was just doing plus 20%. So all those things I was gonna do, I'm gonna put up 20% more pounds on the bench press, I'm gonna write 20% more articles. I'm gonna sell 20% more packages and you know like, okay, great. Like where is that, where all those 20% is gonna come from? Like what are the things that you're no longer doing this? Like this like same, but more a tendency. And so a better way that I think about ([Time 1:03:16](https://www.airr.io/quote/631e50518b19287a2a3fb0ab)) - Note:  ^mkz6fk