Thomas Fingar - Reducing Uncertainty: And Its Limits

Thomas Fingar - Former Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Analysis and Chairman of the National Intelligence Council

Marin Philosophical Society - October 19 - San Rafael

Reducing Uncertainty: And Its Limits

Philosophy has wrestled with uncertainty for more than two thousand years: Socrates, the Skeptics, Descartes, Hume, Peirce, and Popper are great examples.

While deductive reasoning can yield certainty, modern civilization depends greatly on inductive, abductive, and probabilistic reasoning, which yield degrees of confidence rather than certainty.

Thomas Fingar spent his career confronting uncertainty at the highest levels of national intelligence, where judgments involved degrees of confidence and consequences could be profound.

As Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Analysis and Chairman of the National Intelligence Council, Fingar oversaw the nation’s most consequential intelligence assessments and helped transform and integrate analysis across 16 intelligence agencies following the 9/11 and WMD Commissions.

Drawing upon his fascinating book, Reducing Uncertainty, Fingar will take us inside a world where information is inevitably incomplete, judgments must be calibrated to available evidence, and consequential decisions must nevertheless be made.

Join us for a rare opportunity to think deeply about uncertainty with someone who spent a lifetime confronting it when the stakes were high and the consequences were profound.

VenturePad, 1020 B Street, San Rafael – Monday, October 19, 12:00-1:30 (light snacks served) - Convenient public parking at Third & B Street