Something You Don't See Every Day

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Just a couple of months ago, a Nobel Prize-winning psychologist issued a retraction for claims he made in his most famous book.

The psychologist is Daniel Kahneman (ja), the book is Thinking, Fast and Slow (ja), and his retraction was published as a comment on a research blog entry by Ulrich Schimmack, Moritz Heene, and Kamini Kesavan. (Kahneman's book seems to be available as PDF from various websites, but as far as I can see these copies do not have appropriate licenses, and downloading them violates copyright law. Buy the book if you are going to read the book. If you search on Amazon you will also find several very inexpensive summaries of the book.) A summary of the dialog is on RetractionWatch.

First I will read Kahneman's comment and the author's reply, then you will read Kahneman's comment and the author's reply, and finally I will discuss what this is all about. For next week (REMINDER: class meets on Monday, May 1, due to Golden Week), read Chapter 10 of Thinking, Fast and Slow. We will read portions of it in class, and discuss it.

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