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So the efficacy of our decisions are either benefited or hurt by snap decisions and benefited or hurt by longer more deliberated decision; the quality of our decisions depend on the context of the situation. But later in the book, Gladwell mentions how prejudices can cloud our judgment and how stepping back and analyzing the situation allowing time to be our friend is a better approach to making decisions, for example when a cop is faced with a potential criminal.
For other decisions, such as predicting the success of a musician and falling for the good looks of a presidential candidate, our intuition often fails us. Also, our preferences and why we do what we do often can not be articulated well and/or are rationalized in ways that don't make any sense.
For certain decisions, such as determining how likable Tom Hanks is and determining a person's personality by looking in their rooms, our intuition is quite accurate. In the beginning of the book, Gladwell states the premise that haste doesn't make waste and that sometimes quick decisions are better than decisions that have analyzed every angle.
For example, our verbally expressed preferences for a partner often don't jive with the actual partners we choose and our food product preferences are subject to marketing schemes but we are unaware of it. In essence, the book mentions that our decisions are subject to prejudices, past experiences, ignorance, psycho-biology, preferences, expertise, and a whole slew of other variables.
Also, he mentions how the body guards protecting former US president Reagan, didn't have enough time to react to the shooter who attempted to assassinate Reagan. Essence of the essence: Decisions are based on a crapload of stuff.
Blink provides a way to start thinking.without thinking.based on experiences. It was a recommended reading for me. I now make this a must-read recommendation for anyone wishing to understand his unconscious thinking.
The notion of intuitive repulsion is quite an interesting notion. "The Notion of intuitive Repulsion" You have got to educate your unconscious. The part about the mores code interception team developing an uncanny skill for pattern recognition was very interesting. Become good at pattern recognition. The author states you can develop this ability. Find out what "thin-slicking" is. Why people stay married why they get divorced.
I haven't read the rest of Gladwell's library yet, however, if the rest of his books meet the quality of this one, I'll pick them up. I was fascinated by the case studies used to prove his point of snap judgments- it really went a long way to explain how we can 'know' something without any empirical evidence.
I had great fun reading Gladwell's 'Outliers', so I bought 'Blink' and had a greater blast. The book is packed with mind provoking examples to illustrate vividly the challenge of figuring how to 'combine the best of conscious deliberation and instinctive judgment' in our daily lives. The newly added Afterword by Gladwell also put his original writing in a concise context, with pragmatic 'call to action'. I do hope that 'Blink' can encourage one to apply its insight in solving practical problems, it certainly has the power to lead me to do so.
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