Thinking Like Lawyers

Thinking like a climate

Thinking Like a Modern Economist

What Kahneman Means for Lawyers: Some Reflections on Thinking, Fast and Slow

INTRODUCTION As academic lawyers, we are meant to extol rational thinking. After all, one of the main purposes of law school is to enable students to “think like a lawyer,” meaning logically, rationally, and unencumbered by “emotion” or irrelevant considerations. Law and economics is similar—it is predicated upon the premise that “economic man” acts rationally and consistently. In the case of l...

Does thinking make you biased? The case of the engineers and lawyers problem

In this study we examined the cognitive processes involved in engineers and lawyers-type problems, using a novel method (i.e., asking for liking ratings). We were particularly interested in how participants process information about personality descriptions and base rates, which are provided in the problems. In line with previous research, we found that people detect the conflict between descri...

Thinking Like a Tree (and Other Forms of Ecological Thinking)

In the rain forests of Costa Rica, there is an unusual type of tree known as a “walking tree.” It is a strange looking tree. At the base of the tree is a tangle of roots, rising about a meter above the ground. It looks as if someone yanked the tree straight up out of the ground, leaving about a meter of its roots exposed above ground level. According to rain-forest guides, the walking tree actu...