Writer: Malcolm Gladwell
Genre: Non Fiction
The writer probably needs no introduction but it was not so for me. I picked up the book after reading the first paragraph at a friend's place . Yeah, it was effective enough to compel me to buy it!
The book describes the ability of our sub conscious mind. Although we all presume that we do things according to our consciousness, the sub conscious mind plays a big role in our spontaneous decisions, conflicts and even prejudices. The author terms this as 'thin slicing'. So in short, even the most spontaneous response is actually an organized and planned one. That’s the reason some people are so good with their guess work because they are good at thin slicing. That’s also the reason when given too much of information we generally lose our intuitive self and run around in circles often taking the wrong decision whereas less information could have been processed better and accurately by us. The author points out that better judgment can be executed from simplicity and frugality of information, rather than the more common belief that greater information is needed.
There are citations of various techniques, experiments used all over the world to help us understand the thin slicing. The ability of the sub conscious mind is very strong and it can be trained to help us in being a better judge of a seemingly hopeless situation is the note that the book ends on.
The book is a heavy read in spite of being tiny with respect to the number of pages. It requires some amount of patience to go through all the examples provided and yet keep on turning the pages. However, its definitely a great read. Hope to catch his other best sellers - Tipping Point and Outliers soon!
