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5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
An Excellent and Timely Guide Mar 31, 2010
By Penelope W. Yaqub
"Fawzi M. Yaqub"
As responsible citizens living in a democracy, it's our duty to try to understand the issues facing us. Yet, no matter what question we consider -- whether deciding on a complicated and far-reaching issue like Health Care Reforms or simply finding what really happened before and after the current wave of Toyota's automobile recalls - we always find ourselves bombarded with a barrage of contradictory arguments that are presented by politicians, experts, and other professionals. Read by itself, each of these arguments seems convincing, and we are often left wondering which of them is valid and where the truth lies. Too many insiders with vested interests are working hard to influence our judgments. Even promoters of charities are not above using such tactics. In short, the question facing us is: what are our duties as citizens in a democracy and how do we go about performing them? Sherman Stein's book "Survival Guide for Outsiders" helps us deal with this question. It is based on the author's thoughts and analysis of common events as he watched them and tried to understand their impact on our lives. In a direct and very engaging style, he helps us understand what we are up against, and offers many helpful suggestions for coping with it.
Early chapters of the book describe how each of us already has an image of the world in our minds. This existing picture, which often is different from what actually goes on in the real world, is susceptible to change and influence by others. Using a variety of examples, both of his own observation and those of others, the author highlights our vulnerability and offers suggestions to guard against our manipulation by insiders. In later chapters, he discusses the choices available to us and the limits we often face. Making the right choice is sometimes difficult. Even attempts at using numbers - by trying to quantify various variables - and the scientific method have their limitations. The book also has an extensive discussion of "Experts": how to distinguish between them and shamans, and between forecasts and facts. Suggestions for what we can do to protect ourselves from politicians, experts and other insiders are scattered throughout the book.
This is the only book not about mathematics that Stein has written for the general public. It shows that his talent as a writer is not limited only to mathematical discourse. Actually, "Survival Guide for Outsiders" does talk about numbers and uses them, ironically, to show that they don't help us much in dealing with the issues raised in this book. However, the use of mathematics in this book is more in spirit than it is technically. This is evident from the comment that the author makes in Chapter 13: "I warn you that at one point there will be an equation with letters in it. You may skip over that bit. I know that in America it is customary and acceptable, even a sign of well-balanced personality, not to like mathematics."
Read this book. You'll learn much from it; it might even surprise you by the extent of our vulnerability; and, above all, you'll find it easy and pleasurable to read.
Fawzi M. Yaqub
Fredonia, NY
5 of 5 found the following review helpful:
In these shadowy times, a brilliant mathematician sheds some light! Mar 13, 2010
By Student of all the sciences
Professor Stein has done it again! As with his previous works such as "Strength in Numbers" and "Mathematics: the Man-Made Universe," Stein has created a book that enlightens, educates, and provokes thought. We all need to think more clearly and critically about our world and the viewpoints sold to us by so-called experts. Stein treats his readers as thoughtful and responsible citizens trying to make sense out of a rapidly changing world. Keep up the great work!
4 of 4 found the following review helpful:
Stein's Sceptical Tools Mar 22, 2010
By James P. Conlan
"The Survivor's Guide for Outsiders" will increase your powers of crap detection. Get ten copies and give them to friends and enemies. It may save the world.
Stein is a clear and good humored thinker and a shrewd observer of current events. He illustrates the fragility of human intellect and our common ignorance with surprising and sometimes disturbing examples from current events and history.
The book consists of 31 short chapters. The topics are related to the ways we mislead ourselves and are mislead by others.
Chapter 1: We have a natural compulsion to create hypotheses, models, and narratives. Our models often rest on flimsy evidence.
Chapter 2: We are far from original facts. We hear only simplified and perverted descriptions of actual facts.
Chapter 3: We outsiders are ignorant about the major issues of the day. Nevertheless we have our opinions.
Chapter 4: Facts may be omitted to influence our opinions. You never know.
Chapter 5: Facts are actively altered to influence our opinions. You'll recognize the examples from recent history.
Chapter 6: It is hard to have no opinion. Cultivate this skill.
Chapter 7: Apply two therapeutic principles to purported facts: First, assume the opposite is true. Second, assume most of what you need to know is concealed. At least you'll be alert.
Chapter 8: You may have to choose between incomparable options. Often, there is no right answer and no rational way to choose.
Chapter 9: Options are sometimes hidden. Making hidden options explicit changes the game.
Chapter 10: Be skeptical about numbers. (Stein is a first rate mathematician, he knows of what he speaks.)
Chapter 11: Sometimes, pairs of options can be ordered, but there is no best option.
Chapter 12: A single number isn't enough. Shape, color, taste, and intelligence can't be identified with a single number.
Chapter 13: Numbers like "consumer confidence" and "consumer price index" are used. You'll be appalled.
Chapter 14: You must deal with uncertainty. What are the chances and how do you know?
Chapter 15: Speak in probabilities. "An 80% chance of rain." is clearer.
Chapter 16: You may encounter the specious quantification of the unquantifiable.
Chapter 17: Some situations involve gigantic risk with a minute probability of occurrence.
Chapter 18: A job has two parts: the production station and the income station. They are only loosely related.
Chapter 19: There are two types of experts, the professional and the shaman. We need both.
Chapter 20: There is a grey area between the professional and the shaman. They sometimes merge.
Chapter 21: You can distinguish between a professional and a shaman.
Chapter 22: The shaman makes the impossible decisions so we laymen don't need to worry.
Chapter 23: It is difficult to audit the work of the professional or the shaman.
Chapter 24: Our decision have consequences. The impacts may be foreseen or unforeseen. The foreseen impacts are called costs and benefits. Stein observes that the unforeseen impacts are "side effects" and "spinoffs".
Chapter 25: Some issues that can be settled by scientific methods.
Chapter 26: We want forecasts in complex situations. We don't do audits well.
Chapter 27: Forecasts are not facts.
Chapter 28: The results of audits of forecasts are not good.
Chapter 29: Action requires commitment to an option. Commitment changes us, and not necessarily in a good way.
Chapter 30: Action, prediction, choice and perception are intertwined. We can be trapped.
Chapter 31: The last chapter recapitulates the book. There are limits to what we can know. The experts, the shamans, and we laymen must be humble in our ignorance and intellectual fragility.
There is no chapter 32. That bothered me for a while. But 31 is a prime number. That's a good place for a mathematician to stop.
Get this book. It will change the way you think.
Get ten copies and give them away. It might save the world.
3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Shiver my timbers Jun 27, 2010
By Martin Kanes
This is a book that will really make you shiver, as you laugh your way through. Serious and witty, uncompromising and funny, it is a tribute to our ability to confront nastiness without falling into a black funk. We need more Sherman Steins around, to poke holes in personal and corporate bubbles of hubris and greed.
3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
A Gem of a Book Jun 18, 2010
By Jan
This book is a little gem. It is a primer for the thinking person who lives in a democracy and wants to be an informed, contributing citizen. It wisely and humorously discusses both our human limitations and the forces outside us which seek to influence us. After reading it, one cannot help but see the world -- and ourselves -- a little more clearly. I've already bought ten copies as gifts for friends.
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