(Napoleon didn’t invade Russia because of cognitive bias. He’d already defeated Russia several times and “invaded” in 1912 with the object of forcing Russia to keep out of Poland and remain in the Continental System. Logistics killed Le Grand Armee.…
Napoleon was actually above average height for his time period… the rumor that Napoleon was short is due to a perhaps-intentional failure to convert French measurement height units into British units of the same name, and so there’s no basis for a “Napoleon Complex”.)
A more interesting question would be “What cognitive biases through history have led us to think of Napoleon as a short person?”
I was thinking more of overconfidence bias and planning fallacy: “I’ll just waltz in here and conquer Moscow in a few months...99% chance it works fine.”
(Napoleon didn’t invade Russia because of cognitive bias. He’d already defeated Russia several times and “invaded” in 1912 with the object of forcing Russia to keep out of Poland and remain in the Continental System. Logistics killed Le Grand Armee.… Napoleon was actually above average height for his time period… the rumor that Napoleon was short is due to a perhaps-intentional failure to convert French measurement height units into British units of the same name, and so there’s no basis for a “Napoleon Complex”.)
A more interesting question would be “What cognitive biases through history have led us to think of Napoleon as a short person?”
Illustrated!
I was thinking more of overconfidence bias and planning fallacy: “I’ll just waltz in here and conquer Moscow in a few months...99% chance it works fine.”