The Undoing Project

I recall being so surprised when a psychologist named Daniel Kahneman received a Nobel prize for his research on decision-making. It made me really curious as to why decision-making would attract the attention of the Nobel committee. Then I saw that Michael Lewis (whose writing style is ALWAYS so compelling!) had written about Kahneman and his friend Amos Tversky......so I had to buy that book. I enjoyed it, and I learned from it.

I loved this book because it opened my mind to new ways of thinking about thinking and how we make decisions. We are not the rational beings we think we are. Michael Lewis has the gift of being able to take complex ideas and make them understandable, informative, and very entertaining.

The book is about psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Khaneman and their research into how people make decisions. Their story is riveting, and I couldn’t help but think about how I make decisions and how to frame questions to gain greater insight into that process.

This was a fascinating book that told the interesting story of the brilliant minds that pioneered behavioral economics. Even aside from the actual psychological concepts discussed, the story itself was great.

I found the part about the pushback from the more classically trained University of Chicago-type economists that the early behavioral economists got to be something I wouldn’t have thought would have been the case. The book also provided many examples that introduced the world of how behavioral economists think to me.

It’s a wonderful read for anyone interested in psychology or economics.

In addressing decision makers, an understanding of forces affecting human behavior is essential. The author provides a comprehensive view on the work of Kahneman and Tversky mapping their journey which lead to their highly impactful behavioral economic body of knowledge. The bias they address provides data scientists a widened perspective on their role and how to address organizational challenges. This provides a language to recognise and address bias inherent in human thinking. The book provides a very powerful set of tools for data scientists who want to see behind the numbers and understand forces affecting human behavior.

If I ever assumed my decisions were the result of a carefully reasoned analysis of factual information, The Undoing Project would derail that comfortable belief. It is the story of the creative collaboration of two remarkable thinkers, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, whose work would overturn an idea at the center of most prior economic theory, the idea that people’s economic decisions are based on rational self-interest. The intense working friendship of these two men is a gripping story, and Michael Lewis brings the personal side to vivid life while also conveying the essence of their revolutionary thinking in lucid… show more.

Great leaders need to understand the psychological aspects of decision making. This book tells the story of two giants in the field of decision making: Amos Tversky and Danny Kahneman. The book includes their dramatic personal stories and the deep friendship that led to Nobel-prize-winning discoveries.  An added bonus is that the book includes easy-to-understand descriptions of their studies that provide readers with insights into the field of behavioral economics.