Malcolm Gladwell's Freakonomics

Improved Essays
I've discovered the economics field in my first year of high school but it never quite intrigued me as much as it does now for I thought it was mostly about numbers, rates…

Being a huge reader, I was recommended the book Freakonomics and that’s when I realized it was more than just stats; it’s the study of trends, group behaviors, how the world works and why mostly. It was intriguing and so eye-opening and I wanted to learn more. So I went through other books, Malcolm Gladwell, Jon Ronson, Noam Chomsky and it clicked right then: that’s what I would like to study.

Having travelled to most continents, met people from so many cultures, but the place I always feel the most at peace is England. The diversity of cultures we see in the UK

Related Documents

  • Decent Essays

    Malcolm Gladwell in chapter one of Outliers convincingly describes that some people are more advantageous than others due to when they are born. In this case, Gladwell talks specifically to rule creators and authorities of sports leagues and elementary schools, because they have the power to make adjustments to unfair advantages. By unfair advantages, hockey leagues in Canada fixed an age cut-off date for incoming players, and elementary schools positioning the oldest students within a class to higher academic levels. Overall that signifies the older, the more prestige a person gets. To prove his point, Gladwell implied in a simple and understandable statement that "players are judged on their own performance" (pg.17), but rebutes his claim…

    • 213 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Malcolm Gladwell is the author of Outliers: The Story of Success, which is a book based on people who become successful by doing things outside of what’s expected. “Outlier” is a scientific term to describe things or phenomena that lie outside normal experience.” (Gladwell) Gladwell’s perspective on Outliers are certain men and women who are accomplished and so outside of ordinary experience that they are puzzling to the rest of us who are just ordinary. When Gladwell was questioned on his book, someone asked what his definition of an Outlier was and he compared being an Outlier to the unexpected weather. His comparison is not only fitting but truly relatable to what his idea of an Outlier is, something out of the ordinary.…

    • 394 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    Have you ever found yourself saying, “something just doesn’t feel right!” or to some degree along those lines? The book “Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking” by Malcolm Gladwell starts out with a similar feeling. Blink opens with the introduction of “The Statute That Didn’t Look Right”, September 1983 an art dealer named Gianfranco entered the Getty Museum located in California. With him he had a brilliantly preserved piece of work that measured near seven feet tall, with a price tag “just under $10 million” (Gladwell, 2005, p.3).…

    • 1279 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Fate is the development of events beyond the person's control. To some fate is believed to be predetermined, but too others fate is believed to be determined by yourself, that you have control over your fate. Throughout the years poets, authors as well as scientists connote their opinions on whether fate is predetermined or in control, that whether we have free will or not. Two opposing titles, “Design” a modern piece of poetry, a petrarchan sonnet and the other “Outliers” a modern day expository text. The piece “Design” by Robert Frost demonstrates how Fate is predetermined by nature through the relationship between a spider and a moth utilizing metaphors imagery and comparison.…

    • 1072 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Jason Di Loreto Proessfor Causey English 1101 3 Demeber 2015 A Review of the book “Outlier” by Malcom Gladwell Malcom Gladwell has numerous bestsellers books under his belt, but what is important is the thought-provoking issues that he raises. To most he is good at applying scientific researches to drive his findings. The interpretations and conclusions he gives to those research studies are unique.…

    • 977 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Have you ever wondered about some of the most apparent yet unexplained phenomenons within our society? Such phenomenons as why certain names may be popular, why people deal drugs, and how certain ways of parenting are successful while others are not? Authors Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner ask these questions and write their answers and findings in the novel Freakonomics. The authors of this novel intend to shine light on the many unexplained and unexplored areas of society to teach their readers much about their own lives as well as the lives of many…

    • 97 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Nathan McArdle Mrs. Clark-Gonzalez AP Rhetoric September 8th, 2016 Gladwell, Malcolm. "1-3. " Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking. New York: Little, Brown, 2005.…

    • 586 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Story of Success Everyone in this world can be successful if she works on herself. Sometimes we lose the meaning of success and everybody has a different standard for being successful. These standards depend on personality, society that surrounds this one, and the determination to achieve a goal. Also, one of the most important parts to achieve success is spending the effort on what you want to do.…

    • 792 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Malcolm Gladwell's Blink

    • 865 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Malcolm Gladwell in his book, Blink, suggests that thin-slicing suggests that spontaneous decisions are either better of just as good as carefully planned and considered decisions. Gladwell supports his claim by using examples of how normal, every-day people have had experiences with thin-slicing. Gladwell’s purpose is to use examples of regular people and their experiences with thin-slicing in order to persuade readers that intuitive judgment is developed by experience, training, and knowledge. Gladwell adopts an informative tone for teens, adults, and teachers. Gladwell makes a few main points and uses a few main characters to help his audience understand his main points better.…

    • 865 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    According to Freakonomics “the science of economics is primarily a set of tools, as opposed to a subject matter” (Levitt. Pg. 13). The study of economics involves many different aspects such as societal mores, economic incentives, information asymmetry, and conventional wisdom, just to name a few. As time continues on though the study of economics boils down to humans respond to incentives. How and why do humans respond to incentives the way they do?…

    • 1794 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The opening sentence of 1984 "It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen." (1984, Pg.1) suggests the setting of the story. However, the opening sentence gives a sense of control or a strict society because of the military time. The name “Winston” means “from a friendly country” and “Smith” is a common last name which is irony because Winston is living in a dystopia.…

    • 196 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The world is very complicating and problems always exist to life. Every time, people keep continuing to find ways so as to solve their questions, and they also have many ways to get answers for them to choose. However, in uncountable ways of solutions, Steven D.Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner believed that thinking like a Freak might be one solution for each question. So that the book “Think like a Freak” was written in order to teach people a different way of thinking. In the book “Think Like a Freak”, the authors present many different suggestions on how to think like a Freak.…

    • 976 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Malcolm Gladwell’s non-fiction book, ‘Outliers: The Story of Success’, examines the factors that contribute to success, advocating that the complex equation of success consists of external confluences rather than hidden talent. This position appears well-received because of its overused rule that ‘practice makes perfect’ and there is no propensity that gives one individual a greater advantage than the other, However, it should be noted that Gladwell’s research may not be as dependable as we might want to believe. , Outliers continually stresses fallacious facts and selective evidence in place of solid research to build on the argument that social class, environment, and timing are the major components of success. Gladwell ascribes a major…

    • 914 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    a) Dagny considers John Galt to be the “destroyer” because he was the beginning of everything. He was the first person to quit his job and disappear. John Galt threatened that he would “stop the motor of the world”. Then the factories started closing and the great inventors and minds started disappearing. Dagny either needed the help of or was friends with some of these minds and resented Galt for taking them away from her.…

    • 385 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    After thoroughly researching and gathering knowledge to try and understand why some things spread like crazy, while others fade away Malcolm Gladwell proposes a theory called, the tipping point, which is the moment when issues reaches its peak or max capacity and begins to change. Gladwell provides the reader with a great example of this theory when he states, “New York City in the 1980s, a city in the grip of one of the worst crime epidemics in its history. But then…the epidemic tipped. From a high in 1990, the crime rate went into precipitous decline. Murders dropped by two-thirds”(3).…

    • 687 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays