This book was about the reasons people make mistakes. Each chapter covers a different cause, for example skimming, give detailed examples, back it up with numbers, and attempt to explain it. Some of the causes were obvious, while some were more insightful. Similarly, several of them seemed to be clearly correct while in other cases the author's position was not completely convincing.
Discussion
I enjoyed this book. I think my favorite parts were where he demonstrated his points with challenges (which is the real penny, words to the anthem, etc), although how badly I clobbered the two I took may not have really helped his point all that much.
He avoided the repetition that some earlier assigned works struggled with, while still managing to find points to make that hadn't yet been made. I would consider this the best book assigned so far in this class, and probably second to Mythical Man Month overall (although that one seems to be tailing off at the end).
The hazards of a poor mental model. Source: Calvin & Hobbes, by Bill Watterson, found at site http://freewebs.com/calhobbes/sunset.gif via GIS.
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