Daniel Kahneman
Nobel laureate for prospect theory and cognitive biases
Most quoted
"A general 'law of least effort' applies to cognitive as well as physical exertion. The law states that if there are several ways of achieving the same goal, people will eventually gravitate to the least demanding course of action."
— from Thinking, Fast and Slow, 2011
"The confidence we experience as we make a judgment is not a reasoned evaluation of the probability that it is right. Confidence is a feeling, which reflects the coherence of the information and the cognitive ease of processing it."
— from Thinking, Fast and Slow, 2011
"The sunk-cost fallacy is the idea that people are reluctant to abandon a strategy or course of action because they have invested heavily in it, even when it is clear that abandonment would be more beneficial."
— from Interview/Lecture
All quotes by Daniel Kahneman (309)
The human mind is a narrative-seeking machine, and it will create narratives even when there are no facts.
The human mind is a coherence-seeking machine, and it will create coherence even when there is none.
The human mind is a meaning-making machine, and it will find meaning even when there is none.
The human mind is a belief-forming machine, and it will form beliefs even when there is no evidence.
The human mind is a justification-seeking machine, and it will find justifications even when there are none.
The human mind is a confirmation-seeking machine, and it will seek confirmation even when there is none.
The human mind is a consistency-seeking machine, and it will seek consistency even when there is none.
The human mind is a simplification-seeking machine, and it will simplify even when there is no need.
The human mind is an efficiency-seeking machine, and it will seek efficiency even when it leads to errors.
The human mind is a shortcut-seeking machine, and it will seek shortcuts even when they lead to errors.
A reliable way to make people believe in falsehoods is frequent repetition, because familiarity is not easily distinguished from truth.
Losses loom larger than gains.
Humans are not rational agents, but rather are prone to systematic biases and errors in judgment.
The amount of attention that people pay to their feelings is a powerful determinant of their overall happiness.
The human mind is a story processor, not a logic processor.
The core of the illusion is that we believe we understand the past, which implies that the future also should be knowable, but in fact we understand the past less than we believe we do.
The main function of System 1 is to maintain and update a model of your personal world, which represents what is normal in it.
The experiencing self does not have a voice. The remembering self is sometimes wrong, but it is the one that keeps score and governs what we learn from living, and it is the one that makes decisions.
People are more sensitive to changes in their wealth than to absolute levels of wealth.
The measure of success in life is not the number of times you win, but the number of times you play.
Contemporaries of Daniel Kahneman
Other Psychologys born within 50 years of Daniel Kahneman (1934–2024).