Written by one of the most creative minds in psychology and a noble price winner in Economic Sciences, 'Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman' is a book that does not disappoint in its efforts at helping us better understand from were our judgments and decisions stem.
The book is built on the premise that humans use two mental systems in analyzing and hence judging the occurrences in circumstances which they find themselves.
In the first part of the book Kahneman introduces us to the fast mental system and the slow mental system.
The fast mental system is unconscious and judge's events based on similar occurrences in the past.
One of its' shortfalls is that it has an equal likelihood of being wrong as it does of being right and is easily influenced by our emotions therefore frequent use of this system could lead to making poor choices.
The slow system, as the name implies, is very slow and rational in judgments, analyzing all available facts before decisions are reached.
The downside however, is that the slow system is difficult to engage in thinking, and if engaged, it is easily distracted.
Frequent use of this system often results in making more informed judgments and choices.
The author also goes on to explain why we use the fast system more frequently than the slow system, stating how metabolically demanding the latter is compared to the former.
This is noticed for example if we are attempting to multiply two digit numbers while performing an activity such as running, we would naturally slow down before we arrive at the answer.
If you like books on Behavioral Economics, Intelligence, and psychology, with knowledge on Bayesian theory and statistics then you have a book that ranks supreme in that category.
The book contains a lot of thought provoking and interesting anecdotes that could enhance the mental prowess of its readers.
One of such examples is that people tend to buy more cans' of soup when they see the sign "Limit 12 per customer" on display than if the sign wasn't there.
I wasn't disappointed even though there are a few areas were I don't entirely agree with the ideas suggested by Daniel Kahneman, one of such is, I do not prefer the use of algorithms to expert advice, the algorithms are made by experts anyway.
All I have talked about is just a little insight into the book as there are lots of chapters spread around about 500 pages of the material.
Get a copy for yourself and find out what Daniel Kahneman really means when he says "Thinking Fast and Slow"