Omne ignotum pro magnifico

Book Review: Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein, "Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness", Penguin Books, 2009. Just over a decade ago, a book by the title Nudge took the world by storm. Today, there are numerous "nudge units" sponsored by governments (the most famous of which is the Behavioural Insights Team ), and one of the co-authors, Richard H. Thaler, won the 2017 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics. Nudge is also listed on the Hufflepuff rationality bookshelf . Given the status of the book, it's odd that I haven't read it earlier. But now I have, and below are my notes. Nudge begins by asking how the director of food services for a city's school system should tell the cafeterias to arrange and display the food choices, knowing that (a) people, including kids, are influenced by small changes in context, such as the order of items, and (b) there's no way to avoid organizing the food. The authors, Richard Thaler and ...

Book Review: Siemon Scamell-Katz, "The Art of Shopping: How we shop and why we buy", LID Publishing, 2012. The title of this book is somewhat misleading, as it might lead one to think that the book is about how to shop  -- until one reads the subtitle and blurb on the back cover. The book is actually about the world of shopper research agencies and the methodologies they use to help retailers sell more. As someone who works in marketing, I find this a relevant and interesting topic, but I also think that people who normally care little about business can find some useful nuggets in The Art of Shopping . After all, "everybody is a shopper", as the back cover reads. That said, I have mixed feelings about this book. On the positive side, the book is an easy read both because of its length (under 200 pages) and its clear language. It is also occasionally funny, for example when the author Siemon Scamell-Katz writes "nobody has ever adequately explained to me...

Book Review: Maria Konnikova, "The Confidence Game: The Psychology of the Con and Why We Fall for It Every Time", Canongate, 2016. When you find a book with an epigraph like this: How cheerfully he seems to grin, How neatly spreads his claws, And welcomes little fishes in With gently smiling jaws! -- Lewis Carroll, "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" ...then you know it's going to be a cynical one. Over the past week-and-a-half, I've been reading this book by Maria Konnikova about con artists, scams, fraud and other forms of deception. And indeed, the author does seem cynical: she writes in the introduction that "Given the right cues, we're willing to go along with just about anything and put our confidence in just about anyone." The confidence game is at its core a game of storytelling; one in which we find ourselves complicit because we want to believe -- to believe in justice, fairness, meaning and certainty, and to believe ...