[jorvi]

I mean, that sounds very holistic in theory, but in practice just doesn't work out.

A few days ago I suddenly had my french press for coffee suddenly shatter and almost blast hot coffee over my upper body.

How am I supposed to start that call with "Hi, I'm jorvi and I made a mistake"..?

It's not like that is a unique situation either. And you can guarantee that if you tell customer service "I made a mistake", and it is clear they delivered a broken service / product (but often want to duck responsibilities), there is no way in hell they will not take the freebie you just gave them by admitting fault.

[CaptainOfCoit]

"Hi, I'm jorvi and seems I made a mistake or something, my french press just exploded in front of me! Can you help me figure out what went wrong?" is one way of putting it.

[ZeroSolstice]

I agree. If a part failed or broke unexpectantly it makes no sense to say it was `your fault` or `you made a mistake`. The goal is the solve the issue at hand and following the representative's instructions to either fix it or prove the item is defective is the easiest way to get there. If it was a mistake on your end you learned something new but I don't see any additional benefit by saying you made a mistake when you don't know what went wrong.

[bertil]

How can you be sure if you would never try?

[NateEag]

You can't, but it turns out acting reasonably under uncertainty is a better goal than being sure of things.