Thanks for the book suggestions. Me being a total bookworm (I don't really watch TV!), you recommending books in a double edged i) all recommendations are great ii) you are just adding to ever growing reading list .
simoan wrote:TheMotorcycleBoy wrote:You need to try and negate this as much as possible. Your task in 2020 is to read some behavioural economics books... Kahnemann & Tversky, Richard Thaler, Dan Ariely
Hmm.. Yes thanks I might start a book thread sometime and requote you if you don't mind. That is, so that you can confirm/deny the titles/links that Amazon throws up.
OK. Here are a few book suggestions for starters (in no particular order):
1. Kahnemann & Tversky: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Thinking-Fast- ... 0141033576
I've actually already got this! It's a tough read, I thought. Did you read it all? A few months back I got about a third of the way in. That is, I got as far as the chapters "The law of small numbers" (very good) and the one called "Anchors". I'm now trying to "get back into it".
My initial impressions of the book are that I believe DK definitely hits the truth with his System I and System 2 mental states (somewhat a shame his names are a little bland!). But in my opinion he is on the nose with the impulsive, intuitive System I, and the more slow, measured and lazy System 2. He then builds the concept of "cognitive ease and strain" onto this. This is something I can relate to all too well, since my job as a computer programmer requires an almost permanent state of "cognitive strain" and an activation of my system 2. I find it all too easy for S2 to get lazy and browse fora and online news!!
2. Dan Ariely: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00 ... tkin_p1_i1
Ariely has come with an oblique ref. from DSPP over here viewtopic.php?p=274579#p274579, so it could be worth a punt.
3. Richard Thaler: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Misbehaving-Be ... KAACHKB1Q2
It looks interesting.
Core premises of economic theory are that people choose by optimizing (rational choices) and that supply equals demand (price equilibrium). These premises assume that economic decisions are taken by a selfish and rational agent: the homo economicus, the 'Econ'. But, the models based on those premises can generate flawed results and a lot of bad predictions. Econs exist only in a fictional world, not in the real world inhabited by Humans.
The economists guild should earnestly reckon with human psychology and the social sciences. They should not exclude supposedly irrelevant factors (SIFs) in their analyses, like 'sunk costs' (money already spent) or 'loss aversion'. Other generally accepted axioms, like the precept that buying and selling prices should be about the same or that more choices are always preferred to fewer, belong to a virtual, not a real world. People have well-defined preferences and self-control problems, while professional economists are misled by theory-induced blindness.
I'm a little put off by the odd reviewer describing it as quite a hard slog. But then again, a lot of these types of books are, i.e. no pain no gain.
And for good measure, a book that has been really important for me and greatly reduced my contributions to public forums - see chapter 3 on the power of commitment and consistency
4. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Influence-Psyc ... N2Z7D9KZM5
This is another with really mixed reviews!
Can you possibly summarise what you got from ch 3. i.e. "greatly reduced my contributions to public forums". (FWIW my own anxieties re. writing own public forum stem from views of earlier OCD traits of mine, i.e. "are my contributions merely an attempt to exert my influence/control on other's opinions?". Then I realise the futility of this - i.e. most other contributors will *probably* have similar mindsets - thus I speculate whether how much of it is just mass self-gratification.)
Matt