Truth
How the Many Sides to Every Story Shape Our Reality
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4.0 • 1개의 평가
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- US$14.99
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"In a time when truth is under assault, Hector Macdonald is here to defend it. He offers clear-eyed, compelling guidelines for becoming a more accurate consumer and producer of information."-Adam Grant, author of Give and Take, Originals, and Option B with Sheryl Sandberg
For fans of Nudge, Sway, and The Art of Thinking Clearly, a fascinating dive into the many ways in which "competing truths" shape our opinions, behaviors, and beliefs.
True or false? It's rarely that simple.
There is more than one truth about most things. The Internet disseminates knowledge but it also spreads hatred. Eating meat is nutritious but it's also damaging to the environment. When we communicate we naturally select the truths that are most helpful to our agenda.
We can select truths constructively to inspire organizations, encourage children, and drive progressive change. Or we can select truths that give a false impression of reality, misleading people without actually lying. Others can do the same, motivating or deceiving us with the truth. Truths are neutral but highly versatile tools that we can use for good or ill.
In Truth: How the Many Sides to Every Story Shape Our Reality, Hector Macdonald explores how truth is used and abused in politics, business, the media and everyday life. He shows how a clearer understanding of truth's many faces renders us better able to navigate our world and more influential within it. Combining great storytelling with practical takeaways and a litany of fascinating, funny, and insightful case studies, Truth is a sobering and engaging read about how profoundly our mindsets and actions are influenced by the truths that those around us choose to tell.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Novelist and communications consultant Macdonald (Rogue Elements) encourages his audience to "spot and neutralize the misleading truths" in short, to think critically. A kernel of factuality is, he writes, what makes "competing truths" the "many sides" to a story so powerful and dangerous. The book contains a number of useful tools, such as a set of descriptions for various communicators (advocates, misinformers, and misleaders). Whether the example involves distinguishing between famous paintings and their forgeries or conditioning soldiers to kill by euphemistically reframing combat as "engaging" or "dropping" the enemy, Macdonald shows how slippery the truth can be and how context, values, and definitions have to be factored in when determining the truth of a statement. The text is peppered with thought experiments and citations of research studies, and each chapter concludes with insightful tips, such as asking oneself, "If your audience knew everything you know about your subject, would they think you had portrayed it fairly?" Macdonald declares that he is not interested in "lies, alternative facts, conspiracy theories, fake news," but his book is undoubtedly more relevant because of its relationships to these timely topics. Although not groundbreaking, this is a useful, commonsensical framework for making reasonable, responsible, and effective decisions.
