Las Trampas De La Mente: Por Qué Miramos Sin Ver, Olvidamos Las Cosas Y Creemos Estar Por Encima De Los Demás (2009) - Plot & Excerpts
I started out loving this book. The author had a lot of interesting insight on why people make mistakes and how to correct mistakes. I enjoyed his approach of looking deeper at the reasons for mistakes. It seems like so often people just want to blame mistakes on not paying attention or not trying, rather than really looking at the cause of mistakes. Even though I generally enjoyed the book, I rated it at five stars because it seemed to lose its momentum in the last few chapters. Having read several decision making books, like How to Decide and Sway, among others, I was a little disappointed in how many of the exact same studies were in this book, with nothing new to draw from them. Yet there were a number of footnotes that I thought...why didn't we hear more about that? Like a note that baby faced oeople are judged as less competent but tended to be more intelligent. And toward the end of the book, he throws in a Jet Blue story where they extended their flight crew's work shifts (without FAA approval no less) to see if they could fly safely without signs of fatigue...and he never told us what came of the study or if they got in trouble for conducting that little test. I thought at some point the little grey boxes highlighting a key sentence of the section might be explained as tying in to some aspect of psychology...but it was never mentioned. And the conclusion wasn't quite as helpful as I would have hoped: get sleep, be happy, but think negatively, get an outside view, etc (the 'be happy' tests there could gave been expanded upon too!) However there were plenty of interesting stories, like how we straighten out maps in our heads, anchoring as a sales tactic at grocery stores, the penny memory test, life satisfaction predictions and the sick or injured, and the native american story recall test. The section on setting consaints seemed like it should have been among the final recommendations. And there were some frightening examples of overconfidence backfiring on pilots, soldiers, and surgeons. It was still a fairly entertaining book and easy to read, so while I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to those who have read similar titles, it would be great for someone new to the topic.
What do You think about Las Trampas De La Mente: Por Qué Miramos Sin Ver, Olvidamos Las Cosas Y Creemos Estar Por Encima De Los Demás (2009)?
*It would be a mistake not to read this one*A highly engaging and informative read, _Why We Make Mistakes_ provides insight into our most common goofs. It turns out that the very traits that maximize our thinking processes and sense of efficacy--such as searching for meaning, making connections, seeing the big picture, and having an (overly) optimistic view of our abilities--are also the culprits behind many of our mistakes. As the author succinctly summaries: "We are blinded by the effects of habit and hubris and hobbled by a poor understanding of our own limitations." Luckily, an awareness of the origins of our common mistakes is the first step to their prevention. Hallinan does an impressive job of extracting the highlights of hundreds of psychology, medical, science, and economic articles and presenting them in a most readable and entertaining form. (No surprise that he's a Pulitzer Prize winner!) If you're interested in learning about the workings--and the non-workings--of the human mind, then reading this book will be anything but a mistake!
—Sparky
Really fun read that left me with a necessary helping of realism and humility. The most important thesis overlaps with a more concise chapter in "Stumbling on Happiness" about the automatic backfilling that is a part of how our memory operates. In fact, much of this book is a different perspective on the same things. But unlike "Stumbling on Happiness" this is much less academic and more entertaining, at the (arguably) expense of direct life advice.
—Yanet
Great book! Fun and filled with thought-provoking insights!
—Banano
