#The_Intelligence_Trap: Revolutionise your thinking and make wiser decisions – Review

     At a stage of life where we become experts in analysing errors others make, this book comes as a panacea for getting rid of the lingering thoughts on why people often stick to their thoughts stupidly or rather “Why do smart people act stupidly?”

     A fascinating and enjoyable investigation of what intelligence is and isn't, this book tells us about the details that can be sought to analyse why some people lack skills and fail to explain the mistakes they commit.  This thought-provoking and brilliantly researched guide to achieving true wisdom shows us how to be smarter - and how to protect ourselves from the cleverest fools.

     The author points out to certain events with ample examples and references to scientists, scholars, and thinkers on how to cultivate the required qualities to protect us from those errors. “We respect people who act quickly and to be slow is a synonym for stupidity”.

Intelligence is the ability to achieve success in life according to a personals life. And Cultural intelligence is a new term that can open us towards a new window – for instance, for studying abroad or enjoying holidays and maybe on Charity work. The author quotes a few good examples as a corollary to research which can go wrong if viewed by logic alone. “All insects need oxygen, mice need oxygen and, therefore mice are insects!”.  Scientific evidence for all carbon emissions from humans leading to global warming is another often misunderstood term.

Everyone commits mistakes that is not visible to them and even Einstein’s mistakes by behavior were glaring with his colleague Freeman Dyson who spent 8 years avoiding him on the campus! Likewise, Linus Pauling, the man behind the nature of ‘bonds’, falsely claimed that vitamin supplements could cure cancer!

Luc Montagnier’s case was very disgusting to read. He was one of the few scientists who helped discover the HIV virus. After his Nobel award, he was seen proclaiming the idea that highly diluted DNA can cause structural changes to water leading to the emission of electromagnetic radiation. So much he was advocating this that about 35 Nobel laureates signed a petition to strip him of the Nobel! Likewise, Thomas Edison, the discoverer of DC, claimed that AC was too dangerous since it led to death by Electrocution. Edison even dismissed Tesla’s ideas on AC transmissions. Steve Jobs also suffered from a dangerous skewed perception of the world.

In each case, the author permutes that greater intellect was always used for rationalisation and justification rather than logic and reason! 

            Below are some excerpts from the book with direct quotes:

Moral Algebra - dividing a piece of paper / writing advantages and disadvantages like pros and cons and then assigning numbers based on importance and then finding out the balance. Another simple strategy would be to consider the best/worst scenario for each situation offering some boundaries for our estimates.

Mindfulness meditation, which trains people to listen to their body’s sensations and then reflect on them in a non-judgmental way has found a mention along - the emotional compass.

The author maintains that taking up a practice like devoting 15 minutes a day to writing and reflecting on any subject may improve the deliberation process to rule out the most possible error in life. An example quoted was from a study in Bangalore, where a 23% increase in performance was noted after 11 days of rigorous practice.

About native language or importance of mother tongue: If you tell to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head and if you talk to him in his language it goes to his heart - Nelson Mandela

Many doctors make one error for every six patients they see and often these can be corrected before harm is done. Nearly 10% of the deaths in the US could be traced to diagnostic mistakes (that contribute to about 40-80,000 deaths per annum!).

Dunning Kruger effect (The skills you need to produce the right answer are exactly the skill you need to recognize what the right answer is!)  finds a mention in a distinct way though - Reduce over confidence by training or Increasing knowledge to understand the limitation. It also supplements the effect that losers have the delusion of grandeur.  Photos or rather images were supposed to increase participants’ acceptance of statements. It is not just what people think that matters but how they think.

About three Cognitive reflection examples in an arithmetic flavour have been mentioned that are interesting but may be skipped if one has tasted these tests earlier in some form or other. 

Writer Mike Shermer met a nutritionist who advised him to try multivitamin therapy - ingesting a month full of foul-smelling tablets and the result was one of the most expensive and colourful urine in America! I don’t know why this paragraph was mentioned but reading along, it made me laugh out louder.

Sceptical movement encourages the use of rational reasoning and critical thinking in public life. So, it goes about 9/11 that an insider’s job would point to the fact that jet fuel from planes could not have burned hot enough to melt the steel girders in the Twin towers whose melting point is 1500 ºC while the aviation fuel has an m.p of 852ºC.  The lesson is to beware of the use of anomalies to cast doubts.

On Richard Feynman: “He was never content with what he knew or what other people knew. He pursued knowledge without prejudice” -  James Gleick

Polish mathematician Mark Kac wrote in his autobiography.  An ordinary genius is a fellow that you and I would be just as good as, if we were only many times better. There is no mystery as to how his mind works. Once we understand what they have done, we feel certain that we, too, could have done it. It is different with magicians . . . the working of their minds is for all intents and purposes incomprehensible. Even after we understand what they have done, the process by which they have done it is completely dark . . .Richard Feynman is a magician of the highest calibre.

General intelligence, curiosity, and conscientiousness are together Three Pillars of academic success – a Psychologist. Here’s how it can be. A man throwing plates and catching them is an ordinary event for all, but, Feynman put it into an equation and saw parallels with the electron’s orbit leading to the theory of QED. His best quote, “I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it’s much more interesting to live not knowing anything than to have answers which might be wrong” is a factual provoker of thoughts.

A simple way to boost curiosity includes, being more autonomous while learning this can be writing out what you already know about the material to be studied and then settling upon the question you really want to answer.  I remember more when I feel like I am struggling that when things come easily (rote learning).

By splitting our studies into smaller chunks, we create periods in which we can forget what we have learnt, meaning that at the start of the next session, we need to work harder to remember.

Making of dream: Many Soccer times were losing games despite having top-ranking players. To find out if this was a common phenomenon, social psychologist Adam Galinsky first examined the performance of soccer teams in the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.  Galinsky’s team found a ‘curvilinear’ relationship; a team benefited from having a few stars, but the balance seemed to tip at about 60 percent, after which the team’s performance suffered.  The Dutch football team offered a perfect case in point after disappointing results in the Euro 2012 championships and the coach, Louis van Gaal, reassembled the team – reducing the percentage of ‘top talent’ from 73 percent to 43 percent - and they won several matches post shuffling.

Underline each person’s expertise at each meeting and their reasons for appearing in the group.  Google CEO Sundar Pichai wrote, “Let others succeed must be the top role of a leader”.

#If you have ever worried that your work environment is dulling your mind the best way to protect yourself is to stop imitating mistakes (individual thinking errors).

#For many varied reasons employees simply aren’t encouraged to think. Some companies allow- accidentally or deliberately - functional stupidity within their offices

#German word FACHIDIOT is a one-track specialist who takes single-minded inflexible approach to a multi-faceted problem.

#Nokia's engineers were the best in the world and they were fully aware of the risk ahead and the CEO had said that he was paranoid about all the competition.

#Mindset was if you criticise what is being done, then you are not genuinely committed to it

Hydrocarbon leaks from NASA's disaster in both with Challenger and Columbia space shuttle is mentioned.  Columbia disaster Engineers knew this could happen when the insulating chunk broke off. The damage never occurred in the right places to cause a crash!

Concorde ran over sharp debris left on the runway causing a 4.5 kg chunk of tyre to fly into the underside of the aircraft’s wing - resulting shockwave ruptured fuel tank leading it to catch light during take-off. The plane crashed into a nearby hotel, killing 113 people. Subsequent analyses revealed 57 previous such instances, and in one case the damage was very nearly the same as for Flight 4590 – except, that the leaking fuel had failed to ignite.

     #People are far more likely to note and report near misses when safety is emphasised.  Hence you experience a near miss your risk tolerance will increase and you won’t be aware of it – the blind spot.  The intelligence trap often emerges from an inability to think beyond our expectations.