We are incredibly well informed yet we know incredibly little. Why? Because two centuries ago, we invented a toxic form of knowledge called \u2018news\u2019. News is to the mind what sugar is to the body: appetising, easy to digest \u2013 and highly destructive in the long run.<\/p>\n
Three years ago, I began an experiment. I stopped reading and listening to the news. I cancelled all newspaper and magazine subscriptions. Television and radio were disposed of. I deleted the news apps from my iPhone. I didn\u2019t touch a single free newspaper and deliberately looked the other way when someone on a plane tried to offer me any such reading material. The \ufb01rst weeks were hard. Very hard. I was constantly afraid of missing something. But after a while, I had a new outlook. The result after three years: clearer thoughts, more valuable insights, better decisions, and much more time. And the best thing? I haven\u2019t missed anything important. My social network \u2013 not Facebook, the one that exists in the real world consisting of \ufb02esh-and-blood friends and acquaintances \u2013 works as a news filter and keeps me in the loop.<\/p>\n
A dozen reasons exist to give news a wide berth. Here are the top three. First, our brains react disproportionately to different types of information. Scandalous, shocking, people-based, loud, fast-changing details all stimulate us, whereas abstract, complex and unprocessed information sedates us. News producers capitalise on this. Gripping stories, garish images and sensational \u2018facts\u2019 capture our attention. Recall for a moment their business models: advertisers buy space and thus \ufb01nance the news circus on the condition that their ads will be seen. The result: everything subtle, complex, abstract and profound must be systematically \ufb01ltered out, even though such stories are much more relevant to our lives and to our understanding of the world. As a result of news consumption, we walk around with a distorted mental map of the risks and threats we actually face.<\/p>\n
Second, news is irrelevant. In the past twelve months, you have probably consumed about 10,000 news snippets \u2013 perhaps as many as thirty per day. Be very honest: name one of them, just one, that helped you make a better decision \u2013 for your life, your career or your business \u2013 compared with not having this piece of news. No one I have asked has been able to name more than two useful news stories \u2013 out of 10,000. A miserable result. News organisations assert that their information gives you a competitive advantage. Too many fall for this. In reality, news consumption represents a competitive disadvantage. If news really helped people advance, journalists would be at the top of the income pyramid. They aren\u2019t \u2013 quite the opposite.<\/p>\n
Third, news is a waste of time. An average human being squanders half a day each week on reading about current affairs. In global terms, this is an immense loss of productivity. Take the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai. Out of sheer thirst for recognition, terrorists murdered 200 people. Let\u2019s say a billion people devoted an hour of their time to following the aftermath: they viewed the minute-by-minute updates and listened to the inane chatter of a few \u2018experts\u2019 and \u2018commentators\u2019. This is a very realistic \u2018guesstimate\u2019 since India has more than a billion inhabitants. Thus our conservative calculation: one billion people multiplied by an hour\u2019s distraction equals one billion hours of work stoppage. If we convert this, we learn that news consumption wasted around 2,000 lives \u2013 ten times more than the attack. A sarcastic but accurate observation.<\/p>\n
I would predict that turning your back on news will bene\ufb01t you as much as purging any of the other ninety-eight \ufb02aws we have covered in the pages of this book. Kick the habit \u2013 completely. Instead, read long background articles and books. Yes, nothing beats books for understanding the world.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Art of Thinking Clearly<\/strong><\/em> We are incredibly well informed yet we know incredibly little. Why? Because two centuries ago, we invented a toxic form of knowledge called \u2018news\u2019. News is to the mind what sugar is to the body: appetising, easy to digest \u2013 and highly destructive in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15795,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1","rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg",496,336,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg",496,336,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=300%2C203&ssl=1",300,203,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio-square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio-portrait":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio-landscape":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"menu-featured-post":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=345%2C198&ssl=1",345,198,true],"qode-carousel_slider":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=400%2C260&ssl=1",400,260,true],"portfolio_slider":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio_masonry_regular":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio_masonry_wide":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio_masonry_tall":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio_masonry_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"portfolio_masonry_with_space":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"latest_post_boxes":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=496%2C303&ssl=1",496,303,true],"woocommerce_thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=300%2C300&ssl=1",300,300,true],"woocommerce_single":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?fit=496%2C336&ssl=1",496,336,true],"woocommerce_gallery_thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/post-30.jpg?resize=100%2C100&ssl=1",100,100,true]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/author\/admin\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"Philosophy<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"We are incredibly well informed yet we know incredibly little. Why? Because two centuries ago, we invented a toxic form of knowledge called \u2018news\u2019. News is to the mind what sugar is to the body: appetising, easy to digest \u2013 and highly destructive in the...","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19097"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19097"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19097\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19098,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19097\/revisions\/19098"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15795"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lecturesbureau.gr\/1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nRolph Dobelli<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"