All of us, no matter how wise, have our cognitive biases. Indeed, there's research to show that elites are less likely to part with their biases than the ordinary person. This is probably because they believe themselves to be better educated and informed than the masses, which may well be true.

Yet many members of the elite were caught utterly unaware by Brexit and by the rise of Mr Donald Trump. These events simply did not fit the mental model of the world so many of us have worked with for the past several decades.