Blink - Malcolm Gladwell

http://www.gladwell.com/ - Gladwell is the author of The Tipping Point (reviewed June 2007). His newest book Blink looks at the split-second instinctual decisions we make - how we make them, what intuition is all about, how to use automatic judging to our favor, and how to overcome it when it leads to improper bias. As a whole, I didn't find this book as enjoyable as The Tipping Point, but Gladwell grabbed me from the first page when he told the story of the Getty Museum's purchase of a supposedly ancient Kouros statue. This was one of my favorite cases from Art Law in law school. The Getty spent tons of money trying to determine whether the statue was authentic. They ran all kinds of tests and spent lots of time to confirm that it was not a fake. Yet, numerous art historians took one look at the statue and simple knew that something was wrong, even if they could put it into words or scientifically prove it. Ultimately, the problems began to emerge, and now the statue is listed on the Getty website as "Statue of a Kouros, Greek, about 530 B.C. or modern forgery."
(http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=12908) Gladwell unpacks how these experts could have "just known" - the feeling in the gut they experienced when they took one glance at the statue. Like The Tipping Point, Blink is full of fascinating stories to illustrate Gladwell's points. This is a great book to get you thinking about the snap decisions you make everyday - for good or bad - to teach you to learn to trust your instincts and also help you to overcome internal negative biases. I definitely recommend it.