You are shrunk to the height of a nickel and thrown in a blender. The blades start moving in 60 seconds. What do you do? If you want to work at Google, or any of America's best companies, you need to
The real-world value of knowledge in the mobile-device age.More people know who Khloe Kardashian is than who René Descartes was. Most can't find Delaware on a map; don't know what Frank Lloyd Wright d
From the author of Are You Smart Enough to Work at Google?, a fascinating look at how an equation that foretells the future is transforming everything we know about life, business, and the universe.In
You are shrunk to the height of a nickel and thrown in a blender. The blades start moving in 60 seconds. What do you do? If you want to work at Google, or any of America's best companies, you need to
The real-world value of knowledge in the mobile-device age. More people know who Khloe Kardashian is than who René Descartes was. Most can't find Delaware on a map; don't know what Frank Lloyd Wright
The real-world value of knowledge in the mobile-device age.More people know who Khloe Kardashian is than who Rene Descartes was. Most can't find Delaware on a map, correctly spell the word occurrence,
At least five U.S. presidential elections have been won by the second most popular candidate, but these results were not inevitable. In fact, such an unfair outcome need never happen again, and as Wil
In 1956 two Bell Labs scientists discovered the scientific formula for getting rich. One was mathematician Claude Shannon, neurotic father of our digital age, whose genius is ranked with Einstein’s. T
Learn how to succeed at interview mind games and win job offers at A‑list companies, with more than eighty difficult and devious questions, puzzles, and brain teasersEach year about 28 million America
Fascinating journey explores key concepts in information theory in terms of Conway's "Game of Life" program. Topics include the limits of knowledge, paradox of complexity, Maxwell's demon, Big Bang th
A practical guide to outguessing everything from multiple-choice tests to the office football pool to the stock marketPeople are predictable even when they try not to be. William Poundstone demonstrat
From the author of Are You Smart Enough to Work at Google?, a fascinating look at how an equation that foretells the future is transforming everything we know about life, business, and the universe.In the 18th century, the British minister and mathematician Thomas Bayes devised a theorem that allowed him to assign probabilities to events that had never happened before. It languished in obscurity for centuries until computers came along and made it easy to crunch the numbers. Now, as the foundation of big data, Bayes' formula has become a linchpin of the digital economy.But here's where things get really interesting: Bayes' theorem can also be used to lay odds on the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence; on whether we live in a Matrix-like counterfeit of reality; on the "many worlds" interpretation of quantum theory being correct; and on the biggest question of all: how long will humanity survive?The Doomsday Calculation tells how Silicon Valley's profitable formula became a contr
Irresistible, sophisticated trivia--Poundstone establishes objective ways of determining which really is the biggest, the highest, the greatest, and the best in a series of witty anecdotal and provoca
A practical guide to outguessing everything from multiple-choice tests to the office football pool to the stock market. People are predictable even when they try not to be. William Poundstone demonstr
The Book That Gives the Inside Story on Hundreds of Secrets of American Life --Big Secrets. Are there really secret backward messages in rock music, or is somebody nuts? We tested suspect tunes at a
Learn how to succeed at interview mind games and win job offers at A‑list companies, with more than eighty difficult and devious questions, puzzles, and brain teasersEach year about 28 million Americans begin a search for a new job. Many more live in the age of the permanent job search, their online profiles eternally awaiting a better offer. Job seekers are more mobile and better informed than ever, aspiring to work for employers offering an appealing culture, a robust menu of perks, and opportunities for personal fulfillment and advancement. The result is that millions of applications stream to the handful of companies that regularly top listings of the best companies to work for: Apple, Netflix, Amazon, Alphabet, Disney, SpaceX, Oracle, Pricewaterhouse-Coopers, and others. Tesla has received as many as 200 applications for each open position. How do selective employers choose which people to hire? It’s through interviews asking uniquely demanding questions testing imagination, persi
In Priceless, bestselling author William Poundstone reveals the hidden psychology of value and explores how we react to the most pervasive persuader of all: price. Charting the burgeoning growth of pr
We are hard-wired to believe that the world is more predictable than it is. We chase 'winning streaks' that are often just illusions, and we are all too predictable exactly when we try hardest not to
How do you predict something that has never happened before?There's a useful calculation being employed by Wall Street, Silicon Valley and maths professors all over the world, and it predicts that the