Malcolm Gladwell's Blink: The Power Of Thinking Without Thinking
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The author of the book “BLINK : The power of thinking without thinking” Malcolm Gladwell considers himself as just a ‘writer’ or ‘journalist’, but I like to view him as a prosumer philosopher. And creation of different concepts on way of life is what a philosopher does. The author addresses an issue that is central to the field of judgement and decision making, namely the ability of people to make snap judgements that are accurate. Why some people good decision makers and others are not? Why do some people follow their instincts and always win? And why are good decisions made in the instant difficult to explain to others? Malcolm introduced the concept of “thin slicing” and explains the role it plays in judgements that are made in blink of an eye.
Key concepts of the book:
Theory of thin slices:
Thin slicing is the key concept of the book. This is nothing but narrowing down the information we have to be on the right track. The author explains that we can make accurate decisions if we have a thin slice of information rather than having a thick slice. Best decisions can be taken using few pieces of high quality information. Based on a study that’s conducted on college students and married couples it is shown how extremely accurate decisions can be made using a little amount of information when compared to large amount of information.…show more content… Our mind has the ability to thin slice the situation without us knowing it. That’s why in many cases it is difficult for us to explain how we arrived at that conclusion. The concept that Gladwell terms the “story-telling problem” demonstrates that we often invent wholly incorrect accounts of our behaviours and choices. Humans seem to be naturally ill at ease with ambiguity, so we unconsciously create stories that account for decisions we make or actions we take as a result of thin-slicing our