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Loserthink
A review of

Loserthink

How Untrained Brains Are Ruining America

Scott AdamsPortfolio • 2019

Curmudgeonly Common Sense

by David Meyer

Dilbert creator Scott Adams offers slightly cranky advice for thinking clearly and productively.

Scott Adams created the comic strip Dilbert – one of the most popular newspaper comic strips of all time – after working for 16 years in the technology industry. His best-selling books include The Dilbert Principle and How to Fail at Almost Everything. Through his character Dilbert, Adams makes his living mocking bad business management practices. In this sincere, slightly cranky self-help book, he explains how many smart, educated, well-intentioned people engage in what he dubs “loserthink”: an unproductive mind-set in which a person cannot consider the world beyond his or her own knowledge “bubbles.” Adams urges you to break free of these “mental prisons” by considering how professionals in different fields solve problems. He cites psychologists, historians, scientists, entrepreneurs and economists.

Unproductive Thinking

Adams clarifies that loserthink describes a way people think, not people themselves. He cautions you to beware of experts in any domain that require complex thinking and huge sums of money.