Ben Cohen’s book The Hot Hand: The Mystery and Science of Streaks revisits the long debated question of whether momentum exists in performance. Amos Tversky and his coauthors famously argued in the 1980s that the hot hand in basketball is a cognitive illusion. Past success does not influence future outcomes. Yet, more recent studies suggest otherwise. Cohen explores hot streaks across different fields, from Shakespeare and Van Gogh to Steph Curry. The consensus now is that the hot hand is real, though perhaps smaller than many believe. I wonder how many other so called “cognitive fallacies” might actually hold truth.
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