Intelligence is not only the ability to reason; it is also the ability to find relevant material in memory and to deploy attention when needed.

There are some conditions where you have to trust your intuition.

Banks are run by executives, and executives protect themselves, and that does not always mean that banks are going to behave rationally.

If people can construct a simple and coherent story, they will feel confident regardless of how well grounded it is in reality.

Hindsight bias makes surprises vanish.

I have always believed that scientific research is another domain where a form of optimism is essential to success: I have yet to meet a successful scientist who lacks the ability to exaggerate the importance of what he or she is doing, and I believe that someone who lacks a delusional sense of significance will wilt in the face of repeated experiences of multiple small failures and rare successes, the fate of most researchers.

Nobody would say, 'I'm voting for this guy because he's got the stronger chin,' but that, in fact, is partly what happens.