Oh my goodness, where to begin? To avoid hatin’ like a hater here will be extremely difficult. I did not like this book. That’s really all there is to say as far as that goes. While his topic was interesting to me, his manner of explanation was incredibly dry. I remember a friend telling me, “I love these kinds of books because there is so much meat to chew on! ” My system 1 response would make me reply angrily because I don’t know anyone who could like this book! However, after thinking about it, I still hate this book, but she had a point.
The information may have presented with incredible dryness, but the information is indeed useful and legitimate. My only problem is, when I have been chewing on the same piece of meat for three hours straight, odds are, one of two things have occurred; either it’s not real meat, or its been overcooked past sky high ridiculous. In this case, the meat was way overdone. The main problem I had was just that; he used examples and facts to support his argument, but he had so many variables, and so many examples for each, and it supported it extremely well, but in turn it sucked the flavor out of the book.
I think honestly, it may not have been quite as bead if Kahneman had not expended seven thousand pages on a single aspect of system 1. Overall however, I’d conclude with the statement that I absolutely hated this book, but I am glad I read it. The best part about this book, is probably that it makes this the easiest application section I have ever written. The ideas of System 1 and 2 are such everyday things, it can help improve decision making skills. A great example is with human nature. In the current worry with the spread of the Ebola virus, contact is a prominent issue. For me, in the mornings on Wednesdays, I love to get Starbucks.
When I walk into the school, and a friend of mine sees me with Starbucks, a normal occurrence is that she will take it a take a sip from it. Of course, it’s such a normal thing for me, that System 1 would accept it without going into the idea that, she could be sick, or I am sick, and we’re still sharing drinks. That is what System 2 would deal with. Naturally, afterwards the thought did occur to me, and I told myself to start thinking more on that side. Everyday occurrences envenom System 1 and train it to see it as a norm. In order to improve that, we’d have to train the thoughts of System 2 to occur in a flash and become a System 1 response.