Cass R. Sunstein

Focuses specifically on system noise (which is different from cognitive biases). With implications on decision-making and all types of human judgments and systems. You'll learn:
• What is system noise and how it affects all types of decisions, from personal to professional judgments, individual to group decisions, and private sector to public sector;
• The difference between noise and bias, the components of system noise, how to evaluate the quality of judgments and measure noise;
• A range of strategies for reducing noise, including: how to do noise audits, find good judges, use de-biasing, and adopt various preventive decision hygiene strategies;
• Problems and limits to noise reduction, and how we can consider the “right” level of noise to accept.

Book summary at: https://readingraphics.com/book-summary-noise/… (more)

The author is called the most frequently cited American legal scholar in recent years, he is the former Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, he is a professor at Harvard Law School, and, in 1981, his boss asked him, as a young attorney in the Office of Legal Counsel in the Department of Justice, to write a formal memorandum on the Twenty-Fifth Amendment to the Constitution (that provides a mechanism for transfer of power in the event that the President is incapacitated). Ronald Reagan was shot, and incapacitated, one month after he completed the work. Professor Sunstein gives us citizens a review of the historical basis of impeachment, its significance to the founding fathers, a review of the schools of constitutional interpretation, a list of all the federal officers who have been impeached, and several imagined cases of what he believes to be examples where impeachment would be inappropriate, appropriate, or problematic. Some of his examples might have been taken from today’s newspapers. The book is clear, especially considering the complexity of the topic, and pertinent to current considerations.… (more)

While essentially an essay, and interesting for the most part, that author fails to convince me of his conclusions. The more interesting and telling part is the discussion on the psychology of rumors, why people accept them, and why they are so difficult to refute. The author then tries to discuss legal cases and statutes in which he implies that a softening of the First Amendment would be best for stopping the spread of falsehood, which I find troubling. A quick read, but one to take with more than one grain of salt.… (more)