Table of Contents

Foreword by Guy Kawasaki
Introduction
Decisions about Decisions 

 Section 1: Going for the Moonshot 

Chapter 1: Thomas Edison: the light bulb went on 

Chapter 2: Google x, the moonshot factory 

Chapter 3: Man in the moonshot: Elon musk 

Chapter 4: Lonely at the top: Lance Armstrong and Tyler Hamilton 

Chapter 5: The accidental moonshot: Tim Berners-Lee and www 

Chapter 6: Avoiding the stupidity of a moonshot 

Section 2: Surrendering to FOMO

Chapter 7: Wonder Woman, not: Theranos 

Chapter 8: Venture bros gone wild: Webvan

Chapter 9: Pied piper of crypto: Sam Bankman-Fried

Chapter 10: Avoiding the stupidity of FOMO 

 

Section 3: Relying on family and friends

Chapter 11: Going to college: Tiger mom vs Rational mom 

Chapter 12: Avoiding the stupidity of relying on family and friends

 

Section 4: Getting blinded by the upside 

Chapter 13: Blinders are on: the sinking of the cargo ship El Faro 

Chapter 14: The downside: former McKinsey chairman Raj Gupta 

Chapter 15: No options: Alabama football and coach Nick Saban 

Chapter 16: Avoiding the stupidity of being blinded by the upside

 

Section 5: Trusting the media 

Chapter 17: For real? Journalists who were spies for the cia 

Chapter 18: Talking heads: former military officials as television analysts, paid by the Pentagon 

Chapter 19: A million little lies: the story of James Frey and Oprah

Chapter 20: Avoiding the stupidity of trusting the media

 

Section 6: Using quick and dirty thinking

Chapter 21: You’re not so smart: misguided use of rules of thumb

Chapter 22: Why can’t i lose ten pounds? 

Chapter 23: Turn the tables: managing a high-stakes interview 

Chapter 24: Titan’s catastrophic implosion caused by investors? 

Chapter 25: Avoiding the stupidity of quick and dirty thinking

 

Section 7: Neglecting to measure twice 

Chapter 26: Can I be Frank?

Chapter 27: Unstable genius: Jeff skilling, Enron

Chapter 28: WeWork and WeBurn cash 

Chapter 29: Sex and danger: Gawker 

Chapter 30: Measuring twice, going big: Starbucks

Chapter 31: Avoiding the stupidity of not measuring twice

 

Section 8: putting it all together 

Chapter 32: Soviet general Petrov: the (almost) end of the world 

 Who are our stupidity-defying heroes? 

Acknowledgements
About the author
Praise for the author