I read about 3/4 of Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely while flying a red-eye from San Francisco to Boston 2 weeks ago. Today, I finally finished reading the reminder of the book and am glad that I bought the book. The book is witty, engaging, and easy to read (no technical jargons). While we like to believe that we are making logically sound choices, the truth (as attested by the book) is that we usually don't. The book certainly gives an interesting insight to human psychology especially how it comes into play during a decision making process.

3/12/2008 2:10:35 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

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From Wikipedia, rationality is broadly described as "All that is required for an action to be rational is that if one believes action X (which can be done) implies Y, and that Y is desirable, he or she does X. The action would likewise be avoided were Y undesirable. Such arguments are logically valid but not necessarily logically sound." And being logically sound requires good human judgment.

So as humans do we make a decision based primarily our intelligence or impulse? As the title of his book Predictably Irrational may suggests, Dan Ariely thinks it is the latter. In a span of a week, I have seen or heard about the book from different sources. I first heard about the book when the author was being interviewed on NPR last week. Yesterday, I saw the book on the shelves in a bookstore in San Francisco. Earlier today, my friend Siobhan, sent me this link to the New York Times review of the book. The author is also one of the 2 co-professors of a marketing class I took at MIT 3 years ago (gosh, has it been that long). Here is the blog entry about my thoughts about his class.

As an economic junkie and a Freakonomics fan, I am attracted to the content of Ariely's book. Maybe I should go pick a copy up and read it on my red eye flight from San Francisco to Boston tomorrow.

2/27/2008 11:53:00 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

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