Imagine you’re a judge who must decide whether to release a suspect on bail. You’re offered either to simply review the dry facts of the suspect’s biography—or to meet and talk with him in person, look him in the eye and see how he reacts. Many of us would choose the second option, because we often believe that information obtained through personal contact is extraordinarily valuable. But, according to Malcolm Gladwell, the very reason for fatal mistakes, personal tragedies, wrong life decisions, and even world-scale catastrophes lies precisely in this.
A spy who worked for years at the Pentagon, passing data to Cuban intelligence. Politicians who failed to recognize Hitler’s double game—leading the world to catastrophe. Policemen who shoot innocent people simply because their reactions seem suspicious. Parents who can’t recognize in a sports doctor a rapist molesting their children.
The author analyzes all these stories and arrives at shocking conclusions. It turns out we can’t recognize a liar—even when we communicate with them for a long time. And all our usual assumptions about suspicious behavior, people’s facial expressions, gestures, and intonation are fundamentally wrong.
Malcolm Gladwell invites us on an intellectual adventure into the dark side of human nature. You’ll be convinced that our ideas about strangers almost never match reality, and misreading their behavior can have catastrophic consequences.