Malcolm Gladwell embodies the entire subject of the book “Blink,” in both the title of the book, and the phrase “thin-slicing,” which is a person ability to accurately gauge what is important from a very narrow period of time. To put it simply, impulsive decisions can often be more reliable than well thought out decisions. Gladwell provided the reader with multiple examples throughout each chapter of the book to back up his thesis. My goal is to reconstruct each of these examples/arguments in a more convenient manner for the reader, to support Gladwell’s argument. Come with me on a journey into the world of snap decisions.…
In chapter five of Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking, in which Malcolm Gladwell has several main points of focus, which correlate previous chapters and bring new ideas into sight. In the previous chapters, he talks about “thin-slicing” (Gladwell Ch. 1, Section 2, Paragraph 7), which is finding patterns in narrow windows of experience and also how snap judgment can help you in situations in which quick reactions are used. In chapter five he focuses on the other side of “thin-slicing” (Gladwell Ch. 1, Section 2, Paragraph 7), showing that you cannot always trust it, how emotional involvement can…
In Outlier, Malcolm Gladwell argues an “opportunity” is the important key which lead people from one success to another success (5). He proves his point to the readers by an example that seems normal to a strong evidence about the “physical maturity” in which affect by the birth month gap (24). I agree with him about the meaning of an outlier who must “do things that are out of the ordinary” (17) and those “genuine outlier” hockey players “didn’t start out an outlier”, yet “he started out just a little bit better” (31). His viewpoint about those sport games not only precisely substantiate, but it also exactly justify the impact of family background that certainly affect individuals’ success. Gladwell makes me to realize that real life success…
Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers focuses on the concept of success. Through various case studies and examples he challenges the notion that an individual's Intelligence Quotient (IQ) is a direct predictor of an individual's success. Gladwell's carefully chosen case studies and the manner in which he presents them is how he is able to connect to his audience. In the span of these two chapter the author references several areas of popular culture, sprinkles in statics and historical tidbits, all the while emphasizing his stance that "success" is independent of…
In the book "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell, the central theory that Gladwell presents is that often the decisions and observations made in only a split-second, in the blink of the eye, are better than decisions which are made after extensive thought. To present and justify this idea Gladwell describes the lives of several people who make, or have made, important snap decisions with a high level of success or failure. He then explains the logic behind each story and relates it back to his original principle. The narratives include the story of a fake Greek statue and the debate of it's authenticity, a retired U.S. general who defeated the best of the military with quick thinking, and a group of police officers who killed an innocent immigrant because of a tragic misunderstanding, among many others. While I found many of these anecdotes interesting and do agree to a certain point that on occasion trusting your intuition is more effective than boundless thinking, many of the examples used in Blink oversimplify or misstate the importance of "those first 2 seconds" (8).…
Gladwell describes the main subject of his book as "thin-slicing": our ability to gauge what is important from a very narrow period of experience.…
As explained in Blink by Gladwell and Payne, unconscious discrimination is a type of discrimination that is very hard to recognize. We have all heard about explicit discrimination, which can take two forms: the individual level and the institutional level. At the individual level, people openly like. This can be seen in the case of bias hiring when an employer tells a postulant; “I will not hire you because you are a female.” At the institutional level, one of the most striking examples of discrimination occurs with the Nuremberg Laws in Nazi Germany. These laws restricted the rights of German citizens that were Jews. People working in the Nazi institutions had to enforce these discriminatory laws even if they disagreed with them. By discriminating against Jews, they were only “doing their job and following orders”.…
Throughout the novel, “Blink” by Malcolm Gladwell, Gladwell discusses the theory of thin slicing. Thin Slicing “refers to the ability of our unconscious to find patterns in situations and behavior based on very narrow slices of experience” (23) Gladwell convinced me of this theory because he provided many resources and many studies.…
I had an overall good reaction to this book. My first thought when looking at the cover was that it was going to be boring but as I began reading it, I realized that not only is it not boring, it's actually rather interesting, but it could also help me in my life as well. I have a tendency to over think even the simplest things and when I do make a quick decision, I always second guess myself. "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell is a book that really makes you think about the way you react to things and why you react that way. It shows that the decisions we make quickly are just as good as the ones that require a lot of thought. It explains to us why we should trust our instincts, however, sometimes it's not good to follow…
In the video “How Wolves Change Rivers” we are given the impression that the introduction to Wolves in Yellowstone caused a chain of events to occur. This chain of events includes, the growing of more grassland and willow trees, occurring because the deer population spends more of its time hiding. The introduction to the willow trees results in the increase population of the beavers. Since more trees and grasses were growing this strengthened the river banks which led to less flooding. All of this occurred, but did it occur because of the introduction to the wolves in Yellowstone? Or was it just a coincidence that these events started occurring around the time the wolves happened to show up? According to the article “Is the Wolf a real American Hero?” by Arthur Middleton, a study published in 2010, mentions that trees hadn’t begin to grow back even though the elk (deer) population decreased by 60%.…
Blink by Malcolm Gladwell explores the idea of “thin-slicing,” which is the act of the brain only using a small bit of information to make a decision. These types of snap judgements are sometimes thought to be inferior to well thought out and studied decisions. Gladwell shows that well researched decisions are not always better decisions.…
To convince his audience of that, however; Gladwell must first ensure that they are able to connect with his journey to discover the truth behind first impressions. The style choice of a personal narrative helps the reader get involved with the essay and makes the author more relatable. Gladwell informs the readers of his first impressions of Nolan Myers despite knowing they are unlikely to be accurate (5). The author starts forming a relationship with the reader early by showing his vulnerability and humanity. He acknowledges his own fallibility in believing his conversation with Myers allowed him to determine that Myers is a person he would like and that he will succeed in any position. Gladwell extends that relationship when he reveals that…
“Thinking without thinking” (Gladwell, 2005) is the subconscious mind at work rapidly disseminating information and honing in on patterns that really matter to formulate a quick decision or opinion. This decision making approach is recognized as, thin-slicing where small sound bites or snippets of information is quickly assimilated and then based on, experience and expertise the sub consciousness or unconsciousness is lead to formulate opinions or draw conclusions. This is contrary to the…
Malcolm Gladwell is a well-known journalist and non-fiction writer. In our assigned reading material “Outliers,” Gladwell explores different social and psychological phenomena and their implications for both businesses and individuals. Gladwell proclaims that success is shaped by external entities. The author argues that certain individuals are granted precise opportunities and advantages that not everybody is given by fate. However, even though Gladwell’s theory of attaining success holds some validity, he completely avoids and excludes the value of hard-work and determination. The core of success is always within the individual, and can be achieved by perseverance through difficult times and setbacks, as opposed to solely capitalizing on…
We make hundreds of decisions a day, some decisions are so important that they can determine the course of our lives. There are two ways a decision could be made, the average normal decision, and sometimes were presented with a dangerous gamble that takes a quite a bit of courage to accept. In the movie Jaws, everybody said that to capture or kill the monster of a shark “Jaws” it would be nearly impossible and only someone crazy would attempt to do such a thing. But it took an…