The Art of Thinking Clearly by Rolf Dobelli

Summary

• Review of cognitive biases and how to counter them

How I discovered it

• Recommendation from a friend

How the book changed me

• There are so many cognitive biases....I think it has made me distrust my thoughts a lot more! Basically us humans are very poor at thinking and need guidance to even have a normal balanced viewpoint.

Details

• Here are some of the biases that i felt have relevance to my own thinking:
  • Only seeing survivors makes us believe that the odds of success are very high
  • We tend to think we have identified patterns even though none actually exists. Like how our favorite football team wins when we have coffee and cake at 5pm exactly that day.....
  • Avoid the Sunk cost fallacy
  • Don't accept the free drink! Understanding the Principle of reciprocity in advertising
  • Work hard to avoid Confirmation Bias. Try to seek conflicting viewpoints.
  • The Contrast effect changes how we judge
  • Beware of the Authority Bias
  • Humans always think in Story Bias
  • What we learn from Max Planck and his chauffeur: Chauffeur knowlege
  • We believe that we can control things around us even when we cant: Illusion of control
  • Dont pay your lawyer by the hour! Understanding the Incentive super response tendency
  • Understand Regression to the mean
  • Less is more - the Paradox of choice
  • Liking bias: we are likely to believe people we like
  • Beware of groupthink
  • We use Anchoring to decide if what somethings value is
  • Why do we feel loss more than we enjoy gain? Loss Aversion
  • Beware the Winners curse when bidding for something.
  • We view others through the Fundamental Attribution Error
  • How we judge others - the Halo Effect
  • We do not consider Alternative paths and risk not directly visible
  • Can we foretell the future? The forecast illusion
  • The linda problem, or The conjunction fallacy
  • How to overcome Self-serving bias
  • Avoid the Hedonic Treadmill
  • Be aware of the irrational Hyperbolic Discounting
  • Why it can be good to Justify your behaviour
  • If you have nothing to say say nothing
  • Is there such a thing as too much information? see the Information Bias
  • Beware your own appraisal of the value of your work: Effort justification
  • Want people to behave a certain way - consider the Rosenthal Effect - people become what you expect of them
  • Thinking uses energy
  • We decide complex questions based on Affect Heuristic - decisions by emotion
  • Don't always keep choices open - see why We need to close doors
  • Not everything new is amazing: Disregard the brand new
  • Why propaganda works: The sleeper effect
  • Help people to progress: Avoid the Social comparison bias
  • Do first impressions count? Primacy and Recency effects
  • Stuggling to apply what you learn? Could be you have Domain dependence
  • Dont trust your own mind: Falsification of history
  • Ambiguity Aversion what is the difference between risk and uncertainty?
  • We like stories more than facts: Personification highlight
  • The famous monkey business experiement: Illusion of attention
  • Have multiple mental models will help us make better decisions
  • Why a clear plan helps: Zeigarnik Effect
  • Why do things happen? Beware the Fallacy of the single cause

Quotes

• If Fifty Million People Say Something Foolish, It Is Still Foolish

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