Black Box Thinking
Why Most People Never Learn from Their Mistakes - But Some Do
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Narrated by:
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Simon Slater
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By:
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Matthew Syed
About this listen
Nobody wants to fail. But in highly complex organizations, success can happen only when we confront our mistakes, learn from our own version of a black box, and create a climate where it's safe to fail.
We all have to endure failure from time to time, whether it's underperforming at a job interview, flunking an exam, or losing a pickup basketball game. But for people working in safety-critical industries, getting it wrong can have deadly consequences. Consider the shocking fact that preventable medical error is the third-biggest killer in the United States, causing more than 400,000 deaths every year. More people die from mistakes made by doctors and hospitals than from traffic accidents. And most of those mistakes are never made public because of malpractice settlements with nondisclosure clauses.
For a dramatically different approach to failure, look at aviation. Every passenger aircraft in the world is equipped with an almost indestructible black box. Whenever there's any sort of mishap, major or minor, the box is opened, the data is analyzed, and experts figure out exactly what went wrong. Then the facts are published and procedures are changed, so the same mistakes won't happen again. By applying this method in recent decades, the industry has created an astonishingly good safety record.
Few of us put lives at risk in our daily work, as surgeons and pilots do, but we all have a strong interest in avoiding predictable and preventable errors. So why don't we all embrace the aviation approach to failure rather than the health-care approach? As Matthew Syed shows in this eye-opening audiobook, the answer is rooted in human psychology and organizational culture.
Syed argues that the most important determinant of success in any field is an acknowledgment of failure and a willingness to engage with it....
©2015 Matthew Syed (P)2015 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"Mathew Syed has issued a stirring call to redefine failure. Failure shouldn’t be shameful and stigmatizing, he explains. Instead, he shows that failure can be exciting and enlightening - an essential ingredient in any recipe for success. Full of well-crafted stories and keenly deployed scientific insights, Black Box Thinking will forever change the way you think about screwing up." (Daniel Pink, author of Drive and To Sell Is Human)
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In this groundbreaking work, Tim Harford shows us a new and inspiring approach to solving the most pressing problems in our lives. Harford argues that today’s challenges simply cannot be tackled with ready-made solutions and expert opinions; the world has become far too unpredictable and profoundly complex. Instead, we must adapt. Deftly weaving together psychology, evolutionary biology, anthropology, physics, and economics, along with compelling stories of hard-won lessons learned in the field, Harford makes a passionate case for the importance of adaptive trial-and-error....
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Hidden Agenda
- By Lawrence on 05-20-13
By: Tim Harford
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Would You Kill the Fat Man?
- By: David Edmonds
- Narrated by: Gareth Armstrong
- Length: 5 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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A train is racing toward five men, tied to the track. Unless the train is stopped, it will inevitably kill all five men. If a fat man is pushed onto the line, although he will die, his body will stop the train, saving five lives. Would you kill the fat man? As David Edmonds shows, answering the question is far more complex, and important, than it first appears. In fact, how we answer it tells us a great deal about right and wrong.
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Wonderfully Rendered Book...
- By Douglas on 01-25-14
By: David Edmonds
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In Defense of Troublemakers
- The Power of Dissent in Life and Business
- By: Charlan Nemeth
- Narrated by: Joyce Bean
- Length: 6 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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We've decided by consensus that consensus is good. In In Defense of Troublemakers, psychologist Charlan Nemeth argues that this principle is completely wrong: left unchallenged, the majority opinion is often biased, unoriginal, or false. It leads planes and markets to crash, causes juries to convict innocent people, and can quite literally make people think blue is green. In the name of comity, we embrace stupidity. We can make better decisions by embracing dissent. Dissent forces us to question the status quo, consider more information, and engage in creative decision-making.
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A Good Review of Group Thinking
- By J. Justice on 03-20-24
By: Charlan Nemeth
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Originals
- How Non-Conformists Move the World
- By: Adam Grant, Sheryl Sandberg - foreword
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders, Susan Denaker
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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With Give and Take, Adam Grant not only introduced a landmark new paradigm for success but also established himself as one of his generation’s most compelling and provocative thought leaders. In Originals he again addresses the challenge of improving the world, but now from the perspective of becoming original: choosing to champion novel ideas and values that go against the grain, battle conformity, and buck outdated traditions. How can we originate new ideas, policies, and practices without risking it all?
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Interesting, but not science
- By Lloyd Fassett on 03-14-16
By: Adam Grant, and others
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Friend and Foe
- When to Cooperate, When to Compete, and How to Succeed at Both
- By: Adam D. Galinsky, Maurice E. Schweitzer
- Narrated by: Tom Perkins
- Length: 9 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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In Friend and Foe, researchers Galinsky and Schweitzer explain why this debate misses the mark. Rather than being hardwired to compete or cooperate, humans have evolved to do both. It is only by learning how to strike the right balance between these two forces that we can improve our long-term relationships and get more of what we want.
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Unexpected
- By Garron Rose on 01-05-16
By: Adam D. Galinsky, and others
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Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Third Edition
- Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts
- By: Carol Tavris, Elliot Aronson
- Narrated by: Carol Tavris, Elliot Aronson
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Renowned social psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson take a compelling look into how the brain is wired for self-justification. When we make mistakes, we must calm the cognitive dissonance that jars our feelings of self-worth. And so we create fictions that absolve us of responsibility, restoring our belief that we are smart, moral, and right - a belief that often keeps us on a course that is dumb, immoral, and wrong. Backed by years of research and delivered in energetic prose, Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me) offers a fascinating explanation of self-deception.
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If you're a liberal hater - this book's for you
- By MRN on 11-13-20
By: Carol Tavris, and others
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Stronger
- Develop the Resilience You Need to Succeed
- By: George S. Everly Jr. PhD, Douglas A. Strouse PhD, Dennis K. Strouse PhD
- Narrated by: Sean Pratt
- Length: 6 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Professional athletes, surgeons, first responders - all perform remarkable feats in the face of intense stress. Why do they thrive under pressure while others succumb? What separates the two is attitude. Resilient people meet adversity head on and bounce back from setbacks. They seem to naturally exude an inner strength - but studies show that resilience is something that anyone can build.
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Inspiring stories but light on the science
- By Antony on 05-23-16
By: George S. Everly Jr. PhD, and others
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The End of Average
- How We Succeed in a World That Values Sameness
- By: Todd Rose
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 6 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Are you above average? Is your child an A student? Is your employee an introvert or an extrovert? Every day we are measured against the yardstick of averages, judged according to how close we come to it or how far we deviate from it. The assumption that metrics comparing us to an average—like GPAs, personality test results, and performance review ratings—reveal something meaningful about our potential is so ingrained in our consciousness that we don't even question it. That assumption, says Harvard's Todd Rose, is spectacularly—and scientifically—wrong.
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Good intentions, terrible execution
- By Kristofer Jarl on 05-06-19
By: Todd Rose
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In Pursuit of Elegance
- Why the Best Ideas Have Something Missing
- By: Matthew E. May
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 5 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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In this thought-provoking exploration, Matthew May defines elegance as the elusive combination of unusual simplicity and surprising power, and pinpoints the four key elements that characterize it: seduction, subtraction, symmetry, and sustainability. In a story-driven narrative that sheds light on the need for elegance in design, engineering, physics, art, urban planning, sports, and work, May offers a surprising array of stories that illustrate why what's "not there" often matters more than what is.
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I love elegance, but this book isn't elegant
- By Oliver Nielsen on 06-26-11
By: Matthew E. May
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A Bigger Prize
- How We Can Do Better Than the Competition
- By: Margaret Heffernan
- Narrated by: Margaret Heffernan
- Length: 15 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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From the cranberry bogs of Massachusetts to the classrooms of Singapore and Finland, from tiny start-ups to global engineering firms and beloved American organizations like Ocean Spray, Eileen Fisher, Gore, and Boston Scientific, Heffernan discovers ways of living and working that foster creativity, spark innovation, reinforce our social fabric, and feel so much better than winning.
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Margaret Heffernan is brilliant!
- By Eric Willingham on 06-09-16
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The Theory That Would Not Die
- How Bayes' Rule Cracked the Enigma Code, Hunted Down Russian Submarines, and Emerged Triumphant from Two Centuries of Controversy
- By: Sharon Bertsch McGrayne
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Bayes' rule appears to be a straightforward, one-line theorem: by updating our initial beliefs with objective new information, we get a new and improved belief. To its adherents, it is an elegant statement about learning from experience. To its opponents, it is subjectivity run amok. Sharon Bertsch McGrayne here explores this controversial theorem and the human obsessions surrounding it.
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Who is the intended audience?
- By Billy on 07-21-14
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To millions of readers and listeners around the world, Dr. Wayne Dyer was the beloved “Father of Motivation” - but to Serena, Saje, and their six siblings, he was simply “Dad”. When he died suddenly in 2015, the sisters were blindsided by grief and felt unprepared to navigate life’s challenges and conflicts without his guidance. In The Knowing, Saje and Serena share how they recommitted to the teachings of their father and, in doing so, created their own evolution of his principles that they teach today.
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The authors did a huge disservice reading the book
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What do you do when you are suddenly navigating a life you didn't sign up for? You never saw this pain coming, and you're facing a future you'd pass up if you could. Lisa Appelo understands deeply. She has experienced the raw emotions and uncertainty that come when everything falls apart. Lisa went to bed married and woke up a widow and single mom to seven children. She wrestled with impossible questions about her future—and then found life-changing answers that gave her the strength to move forward with true joy.
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This book led me to view my grief differently.
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Very eye opening
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Breadth of the subject
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Major Downer
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Cult of the Dead Cow is the tale of the oldest, most respected, and most famous American hacking group of all time. Though until now it has remained mostly anonymous, its members invented the concept of hacktivism. Today, the group and its followers are battling electoral misinformation, making personal data safer, and battling to keep technology a force for good instead of for surveillance and oppression. Cult of the Dead Cow shows how governments, corporations, and criminals came to hold immense power over individuals and how we can fight back against them.
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The struggle to perform well is universal: each one of us faces fatigue, limited resources, and imperfect abilities in whatever we do. But nowhere is this drive to do better more important than in medicine, where lives are on the line with every decision. In this book, Atul Gawande explores how doctors strive to close the gap between best intentions and best performance in the face of obstacles that sometimes seem insurmountable.
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A MUST read . . .
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After five years of writing The Profile, Polina Marinova Pompliano has studied thousands of successful and interesting people in the world and examined how they reason their way through problems, unleash their creativity, and perform under extreme pressure.
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Nothing New
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Everyone would benefit from seeing further into the future, whether buying stocks, crafting policy, launching a new product, or simply planning the week's meals. Unfortunately, people tend to be terrible forecasters. As Wharton professor Philip Tetlock showed in a landmark 2005 study, even experts' predictions are only slightly better than chance. However, an important and underreported conclusion of that study was that some experts do have real foresight.
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Great for Experts
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In How to Measure Anything in Cybersecurity Risk, Second Edition, a pioneering information security professional and a leader in quantitative analysis methods deliver yet another eye-opening text applying the quantitative language of risk analysis to cybersecurity. In the book, the authors demonstrate how to quantify uncertainty and shed light on how to measure seemingly intangible goals. It's a practical guide to improving risk assessment with a straightforward and simple framework.
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Crush It!
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Do you have a hobby you wish you could indulge in all day? An obsession that keeps you up at night? Now is the perfect time to take that passion and make a living doing what you love. In Crush It! Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion, Gary Vaynerchuk shows you how to use the power of the Internet to turn your real interests into real businesses.
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It was an okay book, but I preferred "The E-Myth"
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Barking up the Wrong Tree
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By looking at what separates the extremely successful from the rest of us, we learn what we can do to be more like them - and find out, in some cases, why it's good that we aren't. Barking up the Wrong Tree draws on startling statistics and surprising anecdotes to help you understand what works and what doesn't, so you can stop guessing at success and start living the life you want.
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Teaching to live a life, but how?
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The Cuckoo's Egg
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Before the internet became widely known as a global tool for terrorists, one perceptive US citizen recognized its ominous potential. Armed with clear evidence of computer espionage, he began a highly personal quest to expose a hidden network of spies that threatened national security. But would the authorities back him up? Cliff Stoll's dramatic firsthand account is "a computer-age detective story, instantly fascinating [and] astonishingly gripping" - Smithsonian.
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A story that stands the test of time
- By Todd on 08-11-20
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The Signal and the Noise
- Why So Many Predictions Fail - but Some Don't
- By: Nate Silver
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Nate Silver built an innovative system for predicting baseball performance, predicted the 2008 election within a hair’s breadth, and became a national sensation as a blogger - all by the time he was 30. He solidified his standing as the nation's foremost political forecaster with his near perfect prediction of the 2012 election. Silver is the founder and editor in chief of the website FiveThirtyEight. Drawing on his own groundbreaking work, Silver examines the world of prediction, investigating how we can distinguish a true signal from a universe of noisy data.
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Learn About Statistics Without All The Math
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What listeners say about Black Box Thinking
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Kathy H
- 03-17-17
intriguing, but repetitive
Started off strong.
Excellent at showing contrast between methods and processes
Very repetitive, Could have been 1/2 as long.
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- Achim Apweiler
- 12-02-19
Must read (listen)
Matthew Syed is using simple comparisons like aviation and health-care to talk about learning lessons
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- Cpoppy
- 09-26-21
why don't all industries do this
Understand that failure leads to progress, growth, and Innovation. the book provided a strong insight into periods in history where failure was covered and then identified the antecedents that pushed for understanding and building upon failure.
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- Craig C.
- 03-12-16
Nicely crafted
The cases illustrating the principles of blame game looking backward and the learning culture going forward were very powerful. It would have been useful to look at some other fields, such as law enforcement, who are more of a mixed bag, there are investigations from within the department, but there is still very much a blame involved with litigation overseeing the process. Learning from mistakes is a fundamental principle from science. Trial and error and Fire-Aim-Shoot are other ways to state the message.
The use of detailed accounts of football (soccer) players could have been shorter without throwing in all of the team names were a little more than was necessary.
The reader's voice was trying and a little difficult to understand. But, I enjoyed the effective narrative and recommend it.
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- alex
- 05-17-18
learned how to create reduce errors systematically
This is exactly what I needed to hear with imperfect humans being in the driver seat.s
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- Isaiah D.
- 11-22-21
very interesting mind opening book!
very muhc enjoyed the book.
Helps to explain the need as a society to be open minded and think outside of the box especially in terms of how we view a perceived failure and use it to grow
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- Loren
- 11-16-15
A multi-level message, well written and well read
When you begin this book, it seems as if it will be a straight comparison between the airline safety model of reviewing and learning from accidents (open) and the medical system model for covering up mistakes (closed), and it does describe few powerful illustrative examples from each of those fields. However, it turns out to have quite a few more dimensions and lessons, For example, it also turns its focus on the criminal justice system (closed) and the political system (closed). These analyses alone would make it a good book and support a strong argument that learning from mistakes is hugely important.
However, the author takes it a step further and looks at some of the psychological reasons why all of us find it so difficult to admit mistakes (cognitive dissonance), and how we so naturally create narratives that support our original decisions. Like some of the best books in this genre, the book forces us to admit that we also are subject to the same kinds of biases that make it difficult to create and maintain "open" systems that encourage us to regularly test our ideas, even while it provides one example after another of why mistakes are essential to learning.
Simon Slater is a good narrator: pace, accent, and expression contribute to an excellent audio book.
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23 people found this helpful
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- Hoffman
- 05-09-18
The culture we all want
This book concisely outlines the flaws in the way we react and what we need to do to progress a culture of excellence.
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- Andrew Smith
- 01-24-18
Fascinating, required reading!
As an anesthesiologist, the first example of this book strikes fear deep within me, about the death of a healthy young woman undergoing a routine surgery. But to able to learn from this mistake, and to apply it not only to medicine, but to the worlds of business, law, and education, allows the power of errors to be turned from things to be feared to powerful tools for improvement.
Case after case is made, showing how error (and trial & error) can be used for positive change in people and within organizations. From wrongful criminal convictions to designing vacuum cleaners, from airplane crashes to David Beckham’s penalty kicks, Syed presents a compelling argument that errors and mistakes should be embraced, and used as powerful tools for improvement. Just as evolution has turned random mutations into adaptation to environmental challenges, so should “failures” be seen as springboards for positive change.
This book is a must-read for doctors. But almost anyone can benefit from its lessons. My only complaint is that while listening to it, my mind was racing with ways to apply its lessons to my personal and professional life, and it was sometimes hard to concentrate on the book because it sparked so many ideas about how I can use its lessons to improve myself and my work.
Great narration, albeit a British one. Americans will have to translate.
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- Rosa Lydick
- 01-11-19
much needed information for the world today. I le
Much needed information from the world today. Very Educational I learned a lot of things I had not heard of. This book has educated me on Why people think the way they think I will apply this information to my own life.
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