The Undoing Project: A Friendship that Changed the World

I think is one of those important books that people really should read. It does not only show us what is a general trend in contemporary thinking but it reveals the real people behind those trends. Ideas do not just appear but are thought by real people living lives and this book brings this truth to the fore. There are several threads running through this book and each is equally interesting. Firstly, and perhaps most importantly, is the revolutionary ideas developed by Kahneman and Tversky. Humans make judgements and prediction all the time, they are at the very center of human agency, and yet it seems we do it, by this account, badly. Prejudices, miscalculations, aversion all stop humans from being able to make good judgements and prediction. These thinkers quickly show how this old way of thinking is letting us down and what we can do to improve it. This conclusion has obviously affected just about every element of our lives. Most importantly it has outlined a task for government if it is acknowledged humans are not particularly good rational beings. The second element is the trajectory of two lives. Two lives that have been at the very epicenter of the turmoils that have shaped the 20th century. The author nicely, although not always convincingly, draws lines between events in these people's lives and the conclusions that they have reached. How lives, thoughts, are impacted by experience is important and not always explored. ideas are seen too often as the result of genious minds when it should always be remembered they are genious minds living in a real world suffering real experiences. How who they are has affected what they think remains mysterious but the author makes bold proposals that should be taken seriously. Finally, there is a story about companionship. This is a story about two lives woven together in such a way that there final product cannot be disentangled. They could not have written what they did without each other. It is, if not most importantly but most, but finally, a book about this relationship and how important such a relationship can be. This is a very good book. I recommend it.