May Contain Lies
How stories, statistics and studies exploit our biases — and what we can do about it
“Crisp, sharp, salutary” – Rory Stewart
“Powerful and punchy” – Gillian Tett
“Brilliantly researched and written” – Andy Haldane
“A masterpiece” – Katy Milkman
“Fascinating” – Raghuram Rajan
“A much-needed antidote” – Vaclav Smil
Amazon #1 category bestseller (UK and US)
Amazon Top 100 across all categories (UK)
Financial Times Business Books of the Month (April 2024)
“Crisp, sharp, salutary” – Rory Stewart
Gillian Tett
“Powerful and punchy”
Gillian Tett
“Brilliantly researched and written”
Andy Haldane
“A masterpiece”
Katy Milkman
“Fascinating”
Raghuram Rajan
“A much-needed antidote”
Vaclav Smil
Order your copy here
Featured In
Excerpted In
ChatGPT routine to evaluate a study using the book’s principles
Featured In
Excerpted In
ChatGPT routine to evaluate a study using the book’s principles
Our lives are minefields of misinformation. It ripples through our social media feeds, our daily headlines, and the pronouncements of politicians, business leaders, and best-selling authors. Stories, statistics, and studies are everywhere, allowing people to find evidence to support whatever position they want. Many of these sources are flawed, yet by playing on our emotions and preying on our biases, they can gain widespread acceptance, warp our views, and distort our decisions.
I wrote this book to help the reader separate fact from fiction. There are already good books on misinformation, but they typically list hundreds of ways in which people can deceive us; it’s hard to remember each one and put this knowledge into practice. My book introduces the Ladder of Misinference, which categorises misinformation into four missteps:
- A statement is not fact: it may not be accurate. Now we already know to check the facts, and many fact-checking websites now exist. But the punchline of the book is that checking the facts is not enough. Even if the facts are 100% accurate, they may still be misleading due to the other three steps.
- A fact is not data: it may not be representative if it’s selectively quoted. Apple is highly successful, and perhaps Apple did “start with why”. But there could be tons of other companies who started with why and failed, so a single anecdote doesn’t mean it’s the secret to access.
- Data is not evidence: it may not be conclusive if it’s correlation without causation. People who eat whole grains are less likely to have heart disease. But people who choose to eat whole grains may lead healthier lives in general, and this could be causing the lower heart disease, rather than whole grains being a superfood.
- Evidence is not proof: it may not be universal if it’s in a different context. The Marshmallow Studies showed that kids who resist eating a marshmallow (to get two later) do better in life. But they focused on Stanford University children. Kids of less wealthy backgrounds may be better off eating whatever’s in front of them, since it may not be there tomorrow.
The word ‘lie’ typically means an outright falsehood. But ‘lie’ is simply the opposite of ‘truth’. Someone can lie by hiding contradictory information, not gathering it in the first place, or drawing invalid conclusions from valid data. Even if books, studies, or talks are filled with facts, they should all carry the same health warning: They may contain lies.
Outline
Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” says how you should “know your enemy” before drawing up battle plans. So the book starts in Part I (“The Biases”) by learning about our enemy. We’ll take a deep dive into the two psychological biases – confirmation bias and black-and-white thinking – that are the two biggest culprits in causing us to misinterpret information.
In Part II (“The Problems”), we’ll study the effects of these biases. We’ll go through each step of the Ladder of Misinference, and develop a practical guide to help us discern whether a statement really is fact, a fact truly is data, data genuinely is evidence, and evidence actually is proof.
Part III (“The Solutions”) goes beyond the ladder. It moves past evaluating facts, data, and evidence to thinking critically more generally. And it goes beyond the individual to creating smart-thinking organisations that harness diversity of thought, overcome groupthink and embrace challenge.
Audience
I got into this topic through my day job as a business school professor, encountering flimsy case studies, articles, and books about business. But misinformation is everywhere, and not limited to business – the themes of the book include politics, science, health advice, personal development, and even parenting.
As Managing Editor of a leading academic journal for six years, I had to evaluate research and decide which papers to accept and reject. But we’re all affected by research even if we never read a single academic paper. Each time we pick up a self-help book, browse through the latest Men’s Fitness, Women’s Health or Runner’s World, or open an article shared on LinkedIn, we’re reading about research. Whenever we listen to an expert’s opinion on whether to invest in crypto, how to teach our kids to read, or why inflation is so high, we’re hearing about research. And information is far broader than research – our news feeds are bombarded not only with “New study finds that …” but also anecdotes like “How daily journalling boosted my mental health”, hunches such as “Five tips to ace your job interview”, and speculation like “Why we’ll colonise Mars by 2050.”
Regardless of the topic, and regardless of the information source, this book aims to help you think smarter, sharper, and more critically, to make better sense of the world and take better decisions. The posts on this website give examples of the themes of the book, although none is taken from the book.
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