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Irrationality (Paperback)

by Stuart Sutherland (Author)
4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
RRP: £8.99
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"* "Extremely gripping and unusually well written." -Richard Dawkin, author of the Selfish Gene"

Oliver Sacks
Terrifying, sometimes comic, very readable and totally enthralling.

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26 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.2 out of 5 stars (26 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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146 of 148 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Still the best popular book on this topic, 5 Jan 2008
By Dr. M. L. Poulter "Bias and Belief" (Bristol, UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This is a wonderful achievement of science popularisation. Sutherland had a gift for succinctly and non-technically summarising psychology experiments. In this book he surveys more than one hundred and sixty different studies that expose failings of human reasoning and judgement. Overconfidence, conformity, biased assessment of evidence and inconsistency are among the follies given their own chapters. One chapter deals with organizational (bureaucratic) irrationality.

The point is not the banal one that there are stupid people about. It is that we all make systematic errors and biases that can lead to disaster in predictable ways. The example applications include reasoning about medical tests, military disasters, the paranormal, the Rorschach test, gambling and daft purchasing decisions.

If society took the recommendations in this book, we would give up job interviews, stop awarding school prizes, totally reform the procedures for criminal trials and change many of the incentive structures we use to motivate people. Each chapter ends with a set of personal lessons for minimising the damage of one's inevitable human irrationality.

This is a potentially very depressing book, but its humiliating lesson is one that, for a better public life and personal life, we need to learn. You can either learn it from a huge corpus of technical psychology literature or from this little paperback.
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89 of 92 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Essential reading - Changes your way of thinking, 24 Mar 2008
By Jack Percival (Surrey, UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
On reading this book you are a presented with everyday problems and the simply irrational way we make decisions- from leaving the cinema to international travel. This non-technical tale provokes thinking in a way that does not confuse the reader, but keeps them enthralled throughout- always wanting to read the next section.

To give you an idea- here is one of the simple irrationalities presented to us- You've paid to go and see a film, but don't like it- do you leave early? Whilst most people would say no, this book tempts us to say yes and shows us that this the logical way to do things. Essentially do we waste our time and money (and stay in the cinema) or just our money? Surely we should cut our losses and leave, but irrationality shows that in fact we don't we stick around in a way that shows our poor decision making.

Overall, irrationality presents solid arguments in a way thats easy to understand. A fantastic book.
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82 of 85 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Essential reading, 19 Mar 2007
By Ali B (London) - See all my reviews
`Irrationality - the Enemy Within' is essential reading for anyone who is interested in developing their thinking skills by becoming more aware of the numerous traps into which we can all so easily fall. The book presents many conundrums about which readers are invited to reach decisions, and time and again, in my own case at least, the correct, rational solution is surprising and enlightening. The twenty-three chapters comprise topics such as `Ignoring the evidence', `Mistaken connections in medicine', `The paranormal'. Each chapter ends with a brief coda headed `Moral' which summarises, often with wit, the main points we need to learn.

This book is scholarly, educational, extremely well written and continually entertaining. I am sure it will be appreciated by anyone who has enjoyed Dick Taverne's `The March of Unreason' - and vice versa.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Good read.
A very good book examining the irrational decisions people make. It also provides methods on how best to make a rational decision and not fall into the common traps. Read more
Published 17 days ago by Ryopinion

3.0 out of 5 stars A Catalogue of Experiments
Despite the fantastic reviews and endorsements for this book, it seemed to me that each chapter seemed to follow the format of describing psychological experiments and their... Read more
Published 20 days ago by M. Sperrin

4.0 out of 5 stars Caution - this book falls into many of the irrational traps it proports to show.
This book is worth reading even if you do not agree with its conclusion.
The book consists of demonstrating a number of logical flaws prevelent in human thought. Read more
Published 21 days ago by SteveM

5.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating and eyes-opening book!
A fascinating book!

Full with psychological experiments that keep your interest high throughout the book, this book offers a new perspection to the way you evaluate... Read more
Published 27 days ago by George Spiros

2.0 out of 5 stars Beware of cover puffs
Despite the glowing comments from Richard Dawkins and Oliver Sacks on the cover, I found "Irrationality" to be poorly written. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Christopher Vowles

5.0 out of 5 stars Think hard, because it's hard to think
It was Bertrand Russell who famously said: "Most people would rather die than think. And they do." The thinking process goes on (we think) as naturally and reliably as the... Read more
Published 1 month ago by Ian Smith

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, Literate, Popular Account
Stuart Sutherland's book examines the body of evidence for human irrationality amassed during close to half a century psychology research. Read more
Published 2 months ago by MD Healey

1.0 out of 5 stars Psychologists only
I was lulled into believing this was a lightweight book as Amazon linked it with "Bad Science" which I found facinating. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Harry B

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting and informative
Irrationality pulls in information from a vast array of experiments and psychological studies, presenting them in an interesting and easy to understand way. Read more
Published 4 months ago by T. S. Prince

5.0 out of 5 stars Thought provoking
I really liked this book and learnt a great deal from it. It's one of those books that explains certain human behaviour and you can always relate it to your own situations. Read more
Published 4 months ago by Mrs. J. K. Newell

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