When Instinct Trumps Reason - Jonah Lehrer

Complete video at: fora.tv/2009/02...
Jonah Lehrer, author of How We Choose, discusses the limitations of rational thought and explains that while the human prefrontal cortex is a "magnificent piece of machinery," it easily short circuits when given too much information. Conversely, he argues, there are many instances when it is wise to trust the instinctual part of the brain.
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Scientists are using the latest neuroscience tools to break open the black box of the mind to uncover the secrets of our decision-making process.
From CEOs to firefighters, how does each person's mind make decisions? And how can we make those decisions better?
Noted author Jonah Lehrer arms us with the tools to determine which part of the brain to lean on when we make decisions. -- The Commonwealth Club of California
Jonah Lehrer is an Editor at Large for Seed Magazine and the author of 'How We Decide' and 'Proust Was a Neuroscientist'. He graduated from Columbia University and studied at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar. He's written for The New Yorker, Nature, Wired, The Washington Post and The Boston Globe. He is also a Contributing Editor at Scientific American Mind and National Public Radio's Radio Lab.

[@foratv]

Incidentally, this is video marks our 1000th upload to CZcams. Yay for us!

[@TRayTV]

Amazing. I was comfortable with the idea that emotional and/or intuitive conclusions are sometimes perspicacious and sometimes delusional. From the video it is unclear how to know when to trust intuition. Is that in the book? Or is it just more "Look how weird your brain is." Either way, fascinating.

[@soundscapenyc]

Fascinating.

[@david_ngo]

Agreed that irrationality and subjectivism will use this as support for attacking the importance of rational thinking.
Just keep in mind, this guy had to use RATIONAL THINKING to come up with these results.

[@badnewswade]

Interesting!

[@politiek]

Isn't that card experiment also mentioned in 'Blink'?

[@portantwas]

I hate chocolate cake, so I might have stuffed up the test results!
I don't understand why, if my palms are sweating picking the 'bad' deck, this means (a) my emotional brain has twig it is a bad deck or (b) how my rational conscious brain interpretes that as "that is a bad deck"? It is really unclear.

[@billykim100]

there comes a time in every mans life....

[@heartion]

what if the students simply wanted a fuckin slice of chocolate cake over a shit boring salad?

[@Kreature8888]

@notv3rysocial Like what?

[@ubuibiok]

*****

[@merdufer]

i'd hate to see the irrational camp using these scientific studies as support for doing unscientific things.

[@spartacandream]

@mattjeff12 No wonder he's not doing such a great job. No wonder presidents grow old so fast. They have to keep track of 7 things while solving 7 others.