This is an outstanding little book -- very insightful and thoroughly enjoyable. I am a pediatrician who has been involved with writing practice guidelines to prevent a very low probability but devastating outcome (brain damage following jaundice in newborns). The discussion of different types of people with different attitudes towards risk helped clarify some of the dynamics of the guideline committees I have been on. In fact, I liked the book so much I sent a copy to the head of the current committee working on these guidelines.

I also like it when people question dogma, and point out ways in which our previous experience and perspectives influence the way we perceive reality. For example, the possibility that use of seat belts by drivers might shift some injuries from themselves to pedestrians and cyclists had never occurred to me.

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in risk.

Thomas B. Newman, MD, MPH
Professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Pediatrics
University of California, San Francisco