As individuals, we have within us a map of reality. Different people have different maps, unique to each individual and always kept updated by the individual’s life experiences and cognitive processing.

There is a saying, “The map is not the territory”. Though originally exemplified as a way of suggesting that detail is abstracted out in every model, and providing a guardrail against adding too much detail in any comprehensible model of reality, I am applying it here to the use case of a person’s entire understanding of self, and other selves and all other concepts the individual is exposed to within the individual’s reach of experience.

The world, as it turns out, is a pretty complex place. At any given time, there are trillions of events taking place in it. While real things can be imagined to exist as events in a space time continuum, the sheer number of events taking place in the possible state space of the universe is incomprehensibly large. Within the limited structure each of us uses to comprehend a small fraction of this reality, we operate all of our everyday actions, thoughts and feelings. Since our minds are limited, we assign causes to effects to process information about the world. This process of dimensionality reduction is what is called the narrative fallacy.

Why is it a narrative fallacy? Let’s look at the two words individually. What is a narrative? It is a way of making an observation about the world. A story that provides a connection to some concept linked to ideas in our map of reality. A sentence that describes some event as it is taking place or took place at some time in the past. We understand connections between events by way of assigning causes to effects. Why an event takes place is just as important as the taking place of the event itself. We convey this idea to others and in the process form a narrative about the events that take place in the idea.

A fallacy is a mistake. An error or oversight that changes the idea from its true form to one that has been taken over by the meanings attached to the connections between sets of events. Thus, when we speak of a narrative fallacy, we are necessarily saying that our narrative is an incomplete description of reality. This applies to history as well as to current events.

Consider, for example, the following sentences:

1. The apple fell down from the tree.

2. The apple fell down from the tree as apples tend to naturally fall from trees.

3. The apple fell from the tree due to gravity.

The first sentence states a fact. It is an event describing the idea that there is an apple which grows on trees. And this particular apple fell down from the tree.

The second and third sentences ascribe a reason to the falling of the apple as per the prevailing knowledge of why apples fall from trees. But both are, in fact, scientifically incorrect as per modern physical theories.

The Relativistic Explanation As per relativity, the local clock on the Apple is running a bit faster than the local clock on the ground. When detached from the tree, there isn’t a reason for the apple to keep moving faster in time than its surroundings and hence it chooses to synchronize with the next stable state that is available to it. This causes a movement in space, translating the apple’s position from being at the tree level to the ground level, where it finds itself in sync with the local clock of the Earth.

If we look at things from Einstein’s point of view, the apple isn’t falling at all! It is simply synchronizing clocks, which causes motion on a straight line path in curved spacetime.

The Narrative Fallacy is perhaps better explained by another example. Nassim Nicholas Taleb, in his book, The Black Swan, explains it as follows: The narrative fallacy explains our limited ability to look at sequences of facts without weaving an explanation into them. I will quote from the book below:

One day in 2003, when Saddam Hussein was captured, Bloomberg flashed a headline at 13:01, “U.S. Treasuries rise. Hussein capture may not curb terrorism”.  Whenever there is a market move, the news media feel obligated to give “the reason”. Half an hour later, they had to issue a new headline as these U.S. Treasury bonds fell in price (they fluctuate all day long, all the time, so there was nothing special about that). At 13:31, “U.S. Treasuries fall. Hussein capture boosts allure of risky assets”. So, it was the same capture, (the cause) explaining one event and its exact opposite. Clearly, these events can’t be linked.

Explanation Treasury bills are generally considered safe assets. So, the initial headline provided a reason for the rise in people investing in safe assets as an artificially made up event: Hussein capture may not curb terrorism. The implication is, even if Saddam Hussein was captured by that point, it would not lead to a decrease in terrorist activities, and hence people are still flocking towards safe investments like the treasury bills.

Half an hour later, the second headline, as presented above, says that the same event “Saddam’s capture” now has incentivized people to move to risky assets (like equities, not mentioned), causing a decline in the price of safe treasury bills.

Human memories We tend to retrospectively assign causes to events that occurred in the moment at some time in the past. It is a natural human tendency and an extension of the narrative fallacy argument. However, one must put in the effort to see things for what they are as far as it is possible to do so. Even being slightly aware of such a thing could make or break your future.