Everybody Lies

Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are

By: Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, Steven Pinker - foreword

Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon

Blending the informed analysis of The Signal and the Noise with the instructive iconoclasm of Think Like a Freak, a fascinating, illuminating, and witty look at what the vast amounts of information now instantly available to us reveal about ourselves and our world - provided we ask the right questions.

By the end of an average day in the early 21st century, human beings searching the Internet will amass eight trillion gigabytes of data. This staggering amount of information - unprecedented in history - can tell us a great deal about who we are - the fears, desires, and behaviors that drive us and the conscious and unconscious decisions we make. From the profound to the mundane, we can gain astonishing knowledge about the human psyche that less than 20 years ago seemed unfathomable.

Everybody Lies offers fascinating, surprising, and sometimes laugh-out-loud insights into everything from economics to ethics to sports to race to sex, gender, and more, all drawn from the world of big data. What percentage of white voters didn't vote for Barack Obama because he's black? Does where you go to school affect how successful you are in life? Do parents secretly favor boy children over girls? Do violent films affect the crime rate? Can you beat the stock market? How regularly do we lie about our sex lives, and who's more self-conscious about sex, men or women?

Investigating these questions and a host of others, Seth Stephens-Davidowitz offers revelations that can help us understand ourselves and our lives better. Drawing on studies and experiments on how we really live and think, he demonstrates in fascinating and often funny ways the extent to which all the world is indeed a lab. With conclusions ranging from strange-but-true to thought-provoking to disturbing, he explores the power of this digital truth serum and its deeper potential - revealing biases deeply embedded within us, information we can use to change our culture, and the questions we're afraid to ask that might be essential to our health - both emotional and physical. All of us are touched by big data every day, and its influence is multiplying. Everybody Lies challenges us to think differently about how we see it and the world.

WARNING: This audiobook contains explicit language.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2017 Seth Stephens-Davidowitz (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers

Very intriguing

The one magical thing about this book is that whenever I start listening, I could not stop. I wonder if the author has put it under some sort of AB testing (I'm saying this to prove that at least I've got through a significant portion of the book). As an academic who has experience with large datasets, I find that the biggest virtue of this book is that it brings stimulation to my brain. I find my brain racing fast to come up with projects that can be done using the datasets mentioned in the book. Although many of the questions I came up with has nothing to do with the field I'm in, I still find the experience very enjoyable and hopefully will eventually fruitful. As to some of the conclusions of the numerous studies mentioned in the book, I will have to look at the actual papers to form my own opinion on whether I agree with them, but that does not stop me from enjoying the book. Plus, I wish people in academia don't read the conclusion sections of papers, like readers don't get to the final chapter of books by economists, as I find it particularly hard to write the conclusion section of my papers. Yet prior experience tells me (and this I don't need big data to draw the conclusion) that people often only read the introduction and the conclusion of academic papers. And I'm only saying this to prove that I did finish the book.

Redundant and biased

According to Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, the author, by searching the Internet using a racist word, the searcher is racist, because black people, his opinion, don't add "er" to the n-word. That is one example of something repeated over and over in this book and it clearly details how one-sided the author is. Never once did he consider other factors for searches. Is a writer searching the Internet? Is someone curious about the word and looking it up? Is a parent searching to see what they're kid is searching? Are the statistics from the same people searching multiple times? None of this is touched on. Interesting that the author picks on how Obama searches involved racism, but not once does he mention the fact that a historical amount of black voters voted for Obama than any presidential candidate and that the decision to vote for him was based on his race rather than ability to lead a country. That is racist! Who is the audience for this book? Left-wing democratic voters. No one else.
The data brought up in the book are fascinating enough to keep someone interested, but I was beaten over the head with the author's bias and repetition of the same points.
Made it through 4 chapters. Then finally decided, what was the point in continuing knowing that the same points would be reiterated over and over. I started to feel like the author simply wanted to brainwash me over to his political views. The narrative of "of course side A is right" really annoyed me. If I'm looking at something for statistical evidence, I don't care to know the author's bias. Oh, and great way to give your own grandmother a backhanded insult in a book thousands of people will read, Seth Stephens-Davidowitz. After that snippet into your life, I understood why you couldn't find a date.

WOW

This validates quite a bit for me. I regret not reading it sooner, and every day that passes that I haven't capitalized on it's knowledge is a day wasted.

Data talks

Lots of great data science examples. Loved the witty concluding remarks at the end of the book.

El mejor libro de este año

Datos, historias curiosas, tecnologia, marketing y una increible manera de contar las cosas hacen a este libro el mejor de mi año.

Informative Read-Minus Authors Political Bias

This was a fascinating look into Big Data but the author has some clear political bias that made me questions some of his conclusions.

Worth the read but not a reliable text for the long-term and this the reason it won't have the staying power or impact of Freaknomics or Thinking Fast and Slow.

For fans of pop econ.

A well written and well read look at data science in the age of google- where big data is breaking ground and what its limitations might be.

Good on more points than you'd expect

I heard the plug for this book on a podcast. I immediately tuned to the points about using big Data to illustrate how racist the US was behind PC screens. As POC who is constantly told to "show the data," I welcomed the opportunity to listen to the book. Seth and Steven present very clear and concise information about not only race, but gender, and other points using social behavior science terminology which allows the information to be presented as fact as well as objective.

Despite arming myself with undisputed information I can now use to discuss Race and Gender inequality, the most rewarding takeaway from the book was actually the discussion about digital doppelgangers and how big Data can convince us that those woulda coulda shoulda conversations we have about past life changing moments aren't worth the grief or attention we give it.

Definitely worth a 2nd listen.

Intriguing.

Interesting theories on the use of big data. There is value for social science and psychology and by default the potential to better the lives of many.

The author does qualify his findings and warns of the possible miss use of such data and the need for much more detail studies. The author also does specifically mention not to jump too far into conclusions and keep in mind correlation v. Causation.

Over all a good taught provoking book. I'm sure Steven Levitt from Freakonomics would be pleased to know of his influence on the author. Lastly, I hope the author enjoyed having his beer and not waistline time on s long conclusion.

Interesting and Intriguing

Awesome book that discusses a new way to do research and find more reliable answers to very difficult and variance questions. I truly enjoyed this book and I look forward to the next Edition. The narrator has a great style that matches the content and made it more enjoyable.