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Comment on The Unparalleled Genius of John von Neumannparent

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I’m not trying to single you out but I think you are making an incredibly common mistake that I see everyone make all the time, and it almost never gets called out, so I’m going to do it here now:

Just because a study finds that some cause, on average, has some effect, I don’t think it is correct to start believing that that cause and effect will hold for you or any else in particular.

I’m convinced that for you noise is distracting, and that it is probably the case for most people, but I also totally believe that for some people it can work the other way around. I don’t think you can use the aggregate result of a study to argue against somebody else’s personal experience.

Just because a study finds that some cause, on average, has some effect, I don’t think it is correct to start believing that that cause and effect will hold for you or any else in particular.

Where did I say this at all? This is a straw man. The original comment stated, without any evidence at all, that noisy, chaotic environments aren't necessarily worse. I stated, with evidence, that it has been shown to have a negative effect on average. No where does this preclude that it may help some people or have no effect on some people.

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