Guess what? Guessing's good.

I was reading about guessing recently. In the context of multiple choice question (MCQ) exams, guessing is seen as a source of error. That's because it's a reason for people gaining marks which don't reflect their knowledge in the subject being tested. I'll talk later about using this as a tactic for exams, but it got me thinking about guessing in real life.

Exams are supposed to perform a useful function - measure or predict something useful about a person. The theoretical construct of an exam, particularly an MCQ exam, seems to imply that certain things are 100% true or false, and that this is a useful thing to measure. In most walks of life, and especially in those areas where thinking and expertise is valued, one of the abilities which is most prized to being able to make judgements when everything is NOT certain. Deciding when there's insufficient information to be sure, or insufficient time to process the information, is what it means to be an expert. That's why it's easy to be an 'expert' in retrospect.

I think that another name for this skill - deciding under uncertainty - is 'guessing'. If you practice making decisions when you're not sure, the better you become at it, the better you are likely to function in the real world. It can also be a valuable exam skill!

Of course this isn't to say that 'blind guessing' is a valuable skill, or that professionals make wild guesses without thinking about them or considering the outcomes. You wouldn't go to a doctor who tossed a coin to decide whether or not to send you for a test! No, the real skill is in making informed, educated guesses, realising the limits of your own knowledge, and being prepared to deal with the consequences of being wrong.