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

Length: 7 hrs and 39 mins

Publisher's Summary

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

Leave out the politics please

The world is so full of politics, this book is no exception. I read books to get away from it. Whether you like Trump or you don't. This author has a bias against Trump. That's fine but why do you have to include it in the book? If it was all data based fine since that's what the book is about but lines like "take that Trump" is just childish and unneeded. Makes me questions his data since it is clearly slanted in at least one way.

Unnecessary Trump Bashing

Kind of a boring book with a lot of liberal Trump bashing thrown in for no apparent reason. I would not recommend this book or, due to the author’s politically charged agenda, any other book by this author. He should have checked his political opinions at the door and focused purely on the topic at hand, not trying to spread his leftist ideology and take jabs at others.

unbelievably biased data scientist

the author even tells you right up front that he's completely biased in his thought patterns, and that only by studying Google searches is he able to step back and see he may be wrong in his assumptions.

he then uses Google searches with a biased filter that is obviously anto capitalist, anti Trump and anti USA to proclaim that everybody lies.

oh, but not the author. the author knows the REAL truth because he analyzed some Google searches to slant things to his perspective.

a disgusting book to read.

Might be worth it to get the book

Overall, this audiobook has some interesting insights and explains methods clearly. However, there were a lot of visuals referenced that are lost in an audio-only version, so if this is a topic you're really interested in, probably best to get the book.

Disappointing

The gist of the beginning of the book...

“People in America often do google searches for the n-word, and since Donald Trump is such an avowed racist, that is why he was elected president.”

Some liberals will like this book. Some conservatives will hate it. But all those interested in reading/listening-to a book on technology and science will be disappointed!

I am returning this book.

Possibly the worst book I’ve ever read...!

This is an entire book of junk science used to push the authors political opinions. I seriously want my money back...

Total BS

This book is just another example of the liberal bias that lumps everything into racism and discrimination it is a despicable example of rewriting history

A high level overview of the potential use of big data analysis in the social sciences

Everybody Lies gives a brief overview of the potential uses of big data in the study of human behavior and the social sciences.
The examples given are simple and should be easy to understand to for most readers. However, the author gives the impression that the use of the scientific methods explored in the book are in their infancy and not being widely applied at least in academic circles.
I believe the use of these techniques are being applied more in the business and marketing disciplines than is implied in the book.
As a reader of non-fiction technical material I would have preferred that the author share more details about his workflow and data analytics processes.
In general, an easy, enjoyable read - no profound revelations though.

Pinker DID NOT WRITE THIS BOOK

Author seems very intolerant of certain races and groups all while trying to pretend he stands on the moral ground. Very surprised Steven pinker ( I like his other works) allowed his name to be put on this when in reality all he did was write a one page foreword and probably received a big kickback as you probably bought this book because you saw his name like I did. Avoid unless you think racism and classism against working class poor whites is a harmless way for the author to posture himself as some moral beacon of tolerance.

Exciting new insights

Great and interesting content. I read a lot of pop science and non fiction and sometimes it's hard to be surprised by anything as you come across a lot of similar themes. This book felt like a lot of genuinely new information.

It's very engaging and though the topics I found slightly less interesting as the book went on its definitely worth a listen.