All posts in Book Summary

I recently finished a very short book with an intriguing title: Why Greatness Cannot be Planned.

It’s an unconventional self-help book disguised as a computer science research exposition (that’s why the publisher is Springer). I strongly recommend reading it. Here is a taste of the book’s main ideas.

Objectives only work when your goal is one hop away from where you are

Setting a goal makes sense when you know how to achieve them. Let’s say you’re a published author working on your next book and you already have an agreement with a publisher. In this case, setting an objective for yourself that you should finish the first draft by a specific date makes sense because everything is in place for you to achieve it. ...  Read the entire post →

I’ve started reading The Capitalist Manifesto, a book full of data on how free markets generate prosperity.

The author is nuanced and uses data and logic to show how we should be rooting for capitalism (instead of bringing it down).

Income and wealth inequality created as a function of entrepreneurship is not a bad thing per se. Risk-takers and innovators derive a higher income when they create much more value elsewhere.

Nobody hands over a million dollars to someone else for free. Profit earned by someone in free markets is typically a surplus made available to them because they expanded the pie for everyone. (And not because they stole it from someone else. Capitalism is NOT a zero-sum game.) ...  Read the entire post →

Finished (well, skimmed) the book “Decoding the Why: How Behavioral Science is Driving the Next Generation of Product Design”. It’s a decent introductory book if you have not delved into behavioral science before, but if you have, most of the ideas in the book won’t come across as surprising or new.

Nevertheless, made some quick notes.

1/ Imagining the future as concretely as possible helps us align our actions towards the future self (otherwise, the future self remains an abstract, theoretical concept).

So, whenever you can, help people imagine the benefit of making a change in their life via your product. ...  Read the entire post →

Just finished reading Magic Words by Jonah Berger and my notes follow.

1/ Most of us spend a significant amount of time in assembling the thoughts we want to convey, but assume the words to convey them as a given.

2/ This book – written by a professor of business – takes the view that the specific words we choose to communicate have an enormous impact on the listener.

3/ Since words paint an image in the listener’s head, the same idea presented differently can paint a very different image. ...  Read the entire post →

Just finished the book that’s often called a deeper, and a more philosophical version of the popular book Deep Work by Cal Newport.

The Shallows by Nicholas Carr explores what the Internet is doing to our brains. Even though the book was written in 2010, it’s eerily accurate about what most of us have come to feel about the effects of the Internet and social media.

The most significant point the book drives home is that while the Internet makes us feel smarter, it is actually making us dumber. This apparent paradox is resolved when you get to the neuroscience of how our brain processes information. ...  Read the entire post →

I finished reading the book “The Mind is Flat” by Nick Chater and here are my notes.

1/ The core idea of the book is that our thoughts are not reflections of a deeper self. Rather they’re real-time fabrications of the mind trying to be consistent with previous fabrications.

2/ In this sense, the book advocates quite successfully, there’s no “unconscious”. There are no deep motivations guiding your conscious self. The conscious, real-time thoughts are all you’ve got. ...  Read the entire post →