Wrong: Why Experts (Scientists, Finance Wizards, Doctors, Relationship Gurus, Celebrity CEOs, High-Powered Consultants, Health Officials and More) Keep Failing Us---and How to Know When Not to Trust Them

Written by David H. Freedman

Narrated by George K Wilson

Our investmeents are devastated, obesity is epidemic, blue-chip companies circle the drain, and popular medications turn out to be ineffective and even dangerous. What happened? Didn't we listen to the scientists, economists, and other experts who promised us that if we followed their advice all would be well?

Actually, those experts are a big reason we're in this mess. Their expert counsel usually turns out to be wrong-often wildly so. Wrong reveals the dangerously distorted ways experts come up with their advice and why the most heavily flawed conclusions end up getting the most attention-all the more so in the online era. But there's hope: Wrong spells out the means by which every individual and organization can do a better job of unearthing the crucial bits of right within a vast avalanche of misleading pronouncements.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Jun 16, 2010
• ISBN: 9781400186594

David H. Freedman

David H. Freedman is a journalist specializing in business and technology. He is a senior editor at Forbes ASAP, and his work has appeared in Inc., the Atlantic Monthly, the New York Times, Wired, Science, and the Harvard Business Review. He is the author of two critically acclaimed books on artificial intelligence and (with Charles C. Mann) on computer hacking.

Reviews for Wrong

[newsieq · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A television-news watcher has only to consider the issue of health advice. One day, we are advised to take such-and-such vitamin to prevent this or that disease. The next, a study tells us that that vitamin actually causes said disease. What or whom are we to believe?After reading Wrong, I would say we shouldn’t believe any of it. And David H. Freedman gives readers chapter and verse about why we should take most such pronouncements with even less than a grain of salt.The most cynical reader may ask why we should believe David H. Freedman. Not to fear, he very thoughtfully includes an appendix entitled “Is this book wrong?”It’s not only medical doctors and studies that Mr. Freedman skewers. Also in the mix are “Scientists, finance wizards, doctors, relationship gurus, celebrity CEOs, high-powered consultants, health officials and more.” Particularly satisfying, in my estimation, is Chapter Six: Experts and Organizations, in which the author takes on -- in Dilbertian fashion -- all the business gurus (and all their buzzwords) that come and go in the corporate world.Wrong is a gem of a book, well-written, funny and right on target.

[bness2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excellent overview of the persistent problems inherent in relying on experts, regardless of their status. Although scientists are the most reliable experts, as careful study of the outcomes of expert advice, even from scientists, has shown, experts are often wrong. It's a jungle out there when it comes to knowing what advice is truly trustworthy, from diet and health advice to economic and political advice. The author concludes, that although there is no simple, straight-forward way to determine what expert advice is correct or not, there are some guiding principles that can b used. For example, f something is touted as a "breakthrough," it is actually more likely to be in error. When breakthroughs in science are published, it is often best to wait for further confirmation from additional studies before concluding that a breakthrough really is what it claims to be.

I did find the book discouraging to some extent, when he shares statistics on such things as levels of scientific fraud, which is probably more widespread than we often want to recognize. If scientists, who are the most trustworthy, are so prone to fudging, massaging or outright fabricating data, where are we to turn for sound advice. In the end it just means we need to always maintain a healthy degree of skepticism, while deciding what i true and what isn't, and always being ready to adjust as new evidence comes in.

[exfed_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Much of this book was interesting and an enjoyable read. However, after a while it became overly redundant and lost my interest.

[sheherazahde · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

A great disappointment. Not at all helpful or informative.

[infjsarah · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

It was an interesting read and readable once picked up but I did struggle to want to pick it up. Mainly I think because its theme was so negative. I agree that a healthy dose of scepticism is needed in the modern world but this book would make you think that you cannot believe anybody or anything. And I don't think that's true.

[detailmuse · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

David Freedman’s thesis in Wrong isn’t far from a flat-out pronouncement that all experts, advisors and gurus -- even the most prestigious in areas of medicine, psychology, finance, economics, law, ecology, business, popular culture ... and even those quoted in the most prominent sources -- are always wrong.According to Freedman, everyone involved with expert advice is motivated by self-interest: experts are biased toward results that perpetuate their body of work; the media is biased toward flashy results and personalities that increase ratings; and the public is biased toward simple, sure-fire, actionable advice. He writes, “Nobody is going to put [someone like Yale investment manager David Swensen] on TV five mornings a week with [his] sort of good, boring advice -- not to mention the fact that experts of Swensen’s levelheaded demeanor aren’t likely to chase that sort of gig.” Nor does today’s democratization of expertise (via blogs, rating/review sites, Google rankings) overcome these biases.Freedman even dulls the shine on research’s gold standard (the randomized, double-blind controlled trial) by exploring how sloppy mistakes taint the data; how the pressures of academic tenure, lab funding, corporate profits and consultancy contracts drive fraud (data invention and falsification); and how little of this is caught through the peer review process.This is an important topic and the book is conversationally written. But to be clear, it’s similar to the expert advice he skewers -- full of broad, sweeping statements and examples biased toward his thesis. (Freedman acknowledges this late in the book and amends his thesis, but only to, “there is some reason to suspect that most experts are usually wrong.”) During my reading, a pessimism grew into profound discouragement and then a spiraling hopelessness. There is no optimism; even his chapter, “Eleven Simple Never-Fail Rules” -- a summary of red flags about advice -- is the height of irony with its (seemingly) sure-fire, actionable content.And thus my advice: if you want to read this book, read it fast -- get in, get the overall picture, get out. Later maybe, read Appendix 2 -- a quick history of advice-giving from ancient Egypt to today’s messy confluence of information, communication and celebrity. Persisting readers might also be interested in Spin Sisters (about the media's efforts to generate envy, worry and helplessness for the sake of ratings) and the short, philosophical On Bullshit (for its reminder that, in this world of unlimited commentary, “[BS] is unavoidable whenever circumstances require someone to talk without knowing what he is talking about.”)(Review based on an advance reading copy provided by the publisher.)