A book, that talks about thinking mistakes.

As a thinking mistake, the author mentions a systematic deviation from rational thinking and behavior. In the book, he deals with 52 thinking mistakes, starting with overestimating ones knowledge and skills, which appears much more than underestimating ones knowledge. Secondly, he brings out the fact, that people start acting much faster when there is a risk of losing something, than hoping to win something.

Many start-up companies are blinded by the success of large companies and most young people are confident, that they will become top managers. While looking at statistics, only a small number of companies will go beyond the start-up state and most of them will either be finished in the first years or remain a small company with some employees. Since there are only big and successful companies in the picture, people have the impression, that if everyone is doing so well, then I will too. The same thing applies to musicians, actors, writers and other public figures. As success in everyday shows more than failure, the chances of success are continually overvalued.

The author also talks about happiness. It is mostly congenital. So looking at happy people, we may have the wrong impression, that what they do, makes them happy. In reality, they are happy most of the time, no matter what they do.

Models advertise cosmetic products because they are beautiful and are best suited for such work, and they have not become beautiful using these products. Whenever we confuse the selection criterion and the result, we have become victims of the illusion. Without it, however, half of the ads would not work. The same illusion works for many popular schools. It seems to people, that because they have good learning outcomes, they are better schools. In reality, however, it is often the case, that as these schools are popular, they can choose their students and that is why the learning outcomes are better.

The book speaks also from a so-called herd instinct, where people behave just like everyone else, although it may be absurd. The herd instinct causes stock exchange bubble and also stock market panic.

I read this book a couple of years ago and I remember, for example, the terms "collective slugging" or "worship of authorities", that the author speaks about.

In his book, the writer relies more on a skeptical approach to life and explains, how a more pessimistic view of things is more realistic than a positive, which often overvalues knowledge, skills and opportunities. The book is pretty concise and interesting, I have been browsing it from time to time and I recommend reading it.