I mean most people I know that are "very smart people" including myself regularly exercise the cool customer vibe of "yea right, that'll never happen." I think it's a good parable. I mean, it's not really important, and I didn't learn anything, but it's a good reminder that "probably not" is a lot different than "definitely not."
It's only a good parable if you don't follow the author to the conclusion. The heuristics almost always work. Full stop. You should listen to them, because they almost always work. You should not in any case work off the assumption that you're in the 0.01% of the time that the heuristic is wrong.
You will get surprised 0.01% of the time, and that's fine. If you don't follow the heuristic you'll be surprised far more often by way of being wrong.
This gets further weighted by costs. If the cost of a false negative is high and the cost of a false positive is nothing, always assume the positive and do whatever is required: check the window, palpitate the whatever, etc. You are certain it is nothing, but the cost of being wrong is so high that you do it anyway.
The author's whimsical point about needing people who buy into fairy-tales isn't useful or valid. You make these decisions based mostly on the costs of being right and wrong, and within that you assume things based on the stats of occurring.
