You Are Not So Smart
Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You're Deluding Yourself
Ratings35
Average rating3.7
15
Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You're Deluding Yourself
Ratings35
Average rating3.7
McRaney reveals that every decision we make, every thought we contemplate, and every emotion we feel comes with a story we tell ourselves to explain them. But sometimes those stories aren't true.
Reviews with the most likes.
Great read (listen)! Heck, I'm sure I'll do it again! I found it absolutely fascinating, but then I find stuff about how about brains work (or don't work) intriguing.
If there was a book about stereotypes for how the brain works this would be it. In most cases though, the stereotypes are true unless you're actively aware of the decisions you're making. This book elaborates on the decisions we make without knowing it. For most of them I was nodding along thinking “yeah, that's true, I knew that was a bias I held”, which left it mostly skin deep for me.
Basically just a bunch of blog posts turned into a blog - nothing original (other than the eponymous “You Are Not So Smart” tag lines sprinkled throughout... which add nothing). Go read Kahneman, Ariely, or any other more in-depth book if you want anything deeper than a blog post's perspective on behavioral science or cognitive biases. But if you like snarky comments and have no idea what behavioral economics is... go for it.
