Being Wrong

Adventures in the Margin of Error

Audiobook

English language

Published June 8, 2010 by HarperAudio.

Audible ASIN:
B003OBDZCM
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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, …

3 editions

Subjects

  • Errors
  • Philosophical anthropology
  • Fallibility
  • Decision making
  • Psychological aspects
  • Error