IRRATIONALITY STUART SUTHERLAND PDF

ISBN: ; Author: Stuart Sutherland; Details: | paperback | pp | Irrationality is a challenging and thought-provoking book that draws on . Stuart Sutherland’s hilarious dissection of everyday reasoning, Irrationality, should be in bedside cabinets the world over, says Nicholas. The Enemy Within – Irrationality by Stuart Sutherland.

These blinks reveal how people tend to be more irrational than rational, examines several reasons why and offers solutions as to how we can become a little suttherland logical in our decision making.

Reason to be cheerful

Sutherland has written a satisfying little book that opens the door to being slightly less irrational than we would have been. Of course, this is now more than twenty years old the first edition dates fromand probably nowadays there are many eqivalent books, but this one gives a good overview of many common pitfalls in decision making, illustrating many cognitive biases: They evolved, and evolution is a rather messy process: May 29, s rated it did not like it. I noticed right away some very strange factual errors that, at times, by light of new evidence that has since been gathered, completely defeat sutherlan points being given by the author.

So you wont’ get exposure to the latest developments on decision making, but the topics he treats are still current – Sutherland was a psychologist by trade, and he seems to know very well what he was writing about, adding to this a gripping writing style. A very surprising consequence is that we seek confirmation of our own opinions of ourselves, even when they are derogatory. It also provides methods on how best to make a rational decision and not fall into the common traps.

Otherwise it is just a book of commonplaces backed up by a lot of studies and anecdotes you’ve already heard about before. Feb 16, Uwe Tallmeister rated it it was amazing.

Bemoaning the reluctance of medical institutions to trust actuarial methods, he says: Everywhere he finds evidence that people who should use actuarial methods, sutherrland than intuition, to determine probabilities don’t irratilnality so.

Nicholas Lezard’s paperback choice: Irrationality by Stuart Sutherland | Books | The Guardian

stuary Dec 19, Jed rated it really liked it. Jul 07, Elif rated it liked it. It’s interesting to get irrationalitt expert scholarly but not heavy view on the various and many ways in which the human brain has irrational tendencies. Why do doctors, generals, civil servants and others consistently make wrong decisions that cause enormous harm to others?

The enemy within, a lay reader’s guide to the psychology of cognitive biases and common failures of human judgement. What’s more, the more prominent an effect, from the same action, the more we hold the agent responsible.

Urrationality myself find important that for all of us the word irrationality to mean the same so that semantic conflicts could be avoided, but it is far more important to identify all these different type of behavior to get conscience about ourselves, whether this is irrational or not.

Irrationality: The Enemy Within – Stuart Sutherland – Google Books

So you wont’ get exposure to the latest developments on de This is the first pop science book on rationality Sutherlnad ever read, and it made a great impression on me. Return to Book Page.

Of course, one can argue that rationality is a overrated and b irrationaliry ideological hinterland. Opening up the decision process to the public can alleviate this to some extent. Much of what is discussed should be common sense e.

Irrationality

Just a little harder to get ahold of. Connected to this is the boomerang effect, where people become more convinced that they are right when their public beliefs are challenged. This is the first pop science irdationality on rationality I ever read, and it made a great impression on me. The only slight irritation was the ‘raised finger’ approach that Mr Sutherland takes. Related are the halo and devil effect, if a person has one salient good, or bad, trait, it overshadows, coloring the person’s other properties.

Jan 11, Rob rated it liked it. Jul 14, Ben Pace rated it really liked it Shelves: May 04, Terry Clague rated it really liked it. Wonderfully suthdrland examination of human irrational behaviours and cognitive mechanisms; convincing, well researched and even with advice on how to watch out and try to minimise your own unreason.

In the end, only by breaking down the problem and applying some kind of rigorous-as-possible analysis, generally relying on mathematics, can a really rational decision be made. This reminded me of all the smokers who will quote one study that says that smoking is not bad for you at all and has nothing to do with lung cancer.

No trivia or quizzes yet. In this iconoclastic book Stuart Sutherland analyses causes of irrationality and examines why we are irrational, the different kinds of irrationality, the damage it does us and the possible cures. One thing I learned is: Otherwise, prejudice is maintained. The book is full of conclusions that are fairly obvious to skeptics and represent hard to convey truths in practice.