Deadly Decisions: How False Knowledge Sank the Titanic, Blew Up the Shuttle, and Led America into War

by Christopher Burns

How did we get into today's financial mess that not only threatens America but the entire world? Remember Enron? Why did that debacle happen? How do groups privy to special knowledge and "truths" make decisions that lead to disasters like the Iraq War, the sinking of the Titanic, and the blow up of the Challenger Shuttle? How could such informed experts end up being so wrong? In Deadly Decisions, Christopher Burns―one of the country's leading experts on modern information management―searches the biology of the brain, "group think," and the structure of organizations for practical answers to the problem of virtual truth―internally consistent evidence and assumptions that purport to describe reality, but often are dead wrong!• How can we avoid wishful thinking, information overload, uncertainty absorption, and an unintentional twisting of the facts? • Why are startup groups agile and innovative while large organizations lumber along, bogged down in false knowledge? • How can societies rediscover the power of truthful communication?Burns suggests that, as individuals, we must learn to be skeptical of our own sly and beguiling minds. As members of a group, we need to be more wary of the omissions, inventions, and distortions that come all too naturally to all of us. And as consumers of information we have to hold professionals, politicians, and the media more accountable. As Deadly Decisions makes clear, only through a deeper understanding of how individuals, groups, and society process information can we succeed in those extraordinary endeavors that are the promise of the Information Age.

Genres: Nonfiction, Science

360 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 2008

About the author

Christopher Burns started his career as assistant to the Director of the Yale University Press, and at the Director’s suggestion, enrolled in IBM’s new course on the fundamentals of computing, intended to train professional programmers and systems analysts. During his years at the Yale Press, he wrote a major industry study on computerized production technologies and built the first database of books for the Yale Co-op bookstore. Years later, he designed the Onyx database of book data now used by Amazon and publishers around the world.

In the spring of 1968, after graduating from Army Officer Candidate School, he was assigned as chief of computer operations at a secure communications center serving the White House, the Pentagon, and other classified organizations on the East Coast. Then, as Command Information Officer for the 25th Infantry Division in Vietnam, he led a detachment of reporters and photographers putting out a weekly newspaper, a monthly magazine, and two books, one of which was later named the best Army publication of the year.

On his return, he joined the Harvard University Press where he launched the new Harvard Paperback series. He was later recruited by Arthur D. Little, Inc., a well-known Cambridge research and consulting firm, and began a long practice in the future of new information technologies, office automation, and online publishing. As a consultant and large-scale systems designer, he led the development of digital publishing systems for United Nations headquarters, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the governments of the U.S., Ireland, and Iran, as well as dozens of the country’s largest corporations.

In 1980, he went to the Washington Post Company as Vice President/Planning, still focusing on the future of computer technology and the media. And from there he moved to the management side as Senior Vice President (general manager) of the Minneapolis Star and Tribune. After three years he returned to systems design and technology consulting with his own practice, and for the next 25 years followed the rise of the internet and the birth of digital information services, deeply involved in the development of new online networks for several governments and most of the major companies in the information industry sector. He spent a year as Executive Editor of UPI, the worldwide news service, and served on the boards of the Information Industry Association and several information industry startups.

Mr. Burns has two patents on online information technology, covering the field of consumer networks and the emerging Internet of Things. In the last few years, he has turned primarily to writing, having published Deadly Decisions (Prometheus), The Seashell Anthology of Great Poetry (Random House), Vietnam Album, a history of the war, The New Old Age (Seashell Press), Immortal Poets (another anthology of poetry with history and biographies), and several novels.

Reviews

[Daniel Woodworth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Points for trying, I suppose? The problem the author identifies is real and pressing. His answer to it, however, is lacking, and at times appears to contribute to it. For example, he asserts that the rate of medical errors is rising dramatically, and as support gives statistics showing the number of medical errors in a recent year. That doesn't prove his point. It doesn't even prove that the number of medical errors are high, let alone that they're rising. That kind of sloppy thinking is, in my opinion, one of the myriad problems we're facing, and perhaps the most common among ordinary people.

There are useful components to this book, but it lacks a coherent, unifying view of either the problem or the solution.

[Krysti]

Well, here's the deal. It sounded like a great book so I checked it out of the library BUT I found a little mouse-like hole in the back of the book's cover, and me being the germ-a-phob I am, could not keep reading it. I tried holding it open awkwardly so I wouldn't have to touch it and was patient enough until about page 12 and then gave up. Will have to try another time... har har.