Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error - Softcover

Schulz, Kathryn

3.94

6,997 ratings by Goodreads

9781846270734: Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1846270731 ISBN 13: 9781846270734

Publisher: Portobello Books Ltd, 2010

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Being wrong is an inescapable part of being alive. And yet, we go through life tacitly assuming (or loudly insisting) that we are right about nearly everything - from our political beliefs to our private memories, from our grasp of scientific fact to the merits of our favourite team. Being Wrong looks at why this conviction has such a powerful grip on us, what happens when this conviction is shaken, and how we interpret the moral, political and psychological significance of being wrong.Drawing on philosophies old and new and cutting-edge neuroscience, Kathryn Schulz offers an eloquent exploration of the allure of certainty and the necessity of fallibility in four main areas: in religion (when the end of the world fails to be nigh); in politics (where were those WMD?); in memory (where did I leave my keys?); and in love (when Mr or Miss Right becomes Mr or Miss Wrong).

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Review:

`In this lovely book the forbiddingly clever and vexingly wise journalist Kathryn Schulz argues passionately for the value of error' --Guardian

`A brilliant new manifesto urging us to reassess our relationship with our own mistakes' --Independent

`Firmly in the Gladwellesque genre of applying savvy journalistic technique to produce insights' --Financial Times

`An insightful and delightful discussion of why we make mistakes and why we don't know we are making them' --International Herald Tribune

'A compelling meditation on the human condition ... Schulz exposes the psychological tricks we play on ourselves'
--New Scientist

From the Back Cover:

To err is human. Yet most of us go through life assuming (and sometimes insisting) that we are right about nearly everything, from the origins of the universe to how to load the dishwasher. If being wrong is so natural, why are we all so bad at imagining that our beliefs could be mistaken, and why do we react to our errors with surprise, denial, defensiveness, and shame?

In Being Wrong, journalist Kathryn Schulz explores why we find it so gratifying to be right and so maddening to be mistaken, and how this attitude toward error corrodes relationships--whether between family members, colleagues, neighbors, or nations. Along the way, she takes us on a fascinating tour of human fallibility, from wrongful convictions to no-fault divorce; medical mistakes to misadventures at sea; failed prophecies to false memories; "I told you so!" to "Mistakes were made." Drawing on thinkers as varied as Augustine, Darwin, Freud, Gertrude Stein, Alan Greenspan, and Groucho Marx, she proposes a new way of looking at wrongness. In this view, error is both a given and a gift--one that can transform our worldviews, our relationships, and, most profoundly, ourselves.

In the end, Being Wrong is not just an account of human error but a tribute to human creativity--the way we generate and revise our beliefs about ourselves and the world. At a moment when economic, political, and religious dogmatism increasingly divide us, Schulz explores with uncommon humor and eloquence the seduction of certainty and the crises occasioned by error. A brilliant debut from a new voice in nonfiction, this book calls on us to ask one of life's most challenging questions: what if I'm wrong?

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