Patterns, Thinking, and Cognition: A Theory of Judgment

by Howard Margolis

What happens when we think? How do people make judgments? While different theories abound—and are heatedly debated—most are based on an algorithmic model of how the brain works. Howard Margolis builds a fascinating case for a theory that thinking is based on recognizing patterns and that this process is intrinsically a-logical. Margolis gives a Darwinian account of how pattern recognition evolved to reach human cognitive abilities.

Illusions of judgment—standard anomalies where people consistently misjudge or misperceive what is logically implied or really present—are often used in cognitive science to explore the workings of the cognitive process. The explanations given for these anomalous results have generally explained only the anomaly under study and nothing more. Margolis provides a provocative and systematic analysis of these illusions, which explains why such anomalies exist and recur.

Offering empirical applications of his theory, Margolis turns to historical cases to show how an individual's cognitive repertoire—the available cognitive patterns and their relation to cues—changes or resists changes over time. Here he focuses on the change in worldview occasioned by the Copernican not only how an individual might come to see things in a radically new way, but how it is possible for that new view to spread and become the dominant one. A reanalysis of the trial of Galileo focuses on social cognition and its interactions with politics.

In challenging the prevailing paradigm for understanding how the human mind works, Patterns, Thinking, and Cognition is certain to stimulate fruitful debate.

Genres: Psychology, Nonfiction, Philosophy, Politics, Science

339 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1987

Reviews

[Muhammad Ahmad · Rating 3 out of 5]

Many important insights about dual process cognition but lacking the clarity of Kahneman or Sperber et al’s writing. The book can easily lose a hundred pages and would’ve been vastly improved by good editing.

[Ed · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extraordinary book on our automatic pattern recognition systems that do most of our thinking for us, leaving our rational step by step brain to justify the self righteous conclusion we have jumped to. Not an easy read that could have done with a good challenging editor, but so rich that it is worth the trouble. Will exceed some attention spans.

[Neil Pasricha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thinking about thinking really has become a huge trend. The original popularity of “life hacking” or “lifestyle design” blogs. The rise in psychedelics and consciousness exploration. The somewhat originally-meta-but-now-commonplace-podcast-trope of asking people how they’re thinking about everything they’re thinking about. WE SURE ARE DOING A LOT OF THINKING THESE DAYS. But, uh, how do we actually think? Like ... what even is thinking? How do our brains, you know, work? I recommend this dense, academic University of Chicago publication which offers an extremely articulate and well-argued answer: patterns. That’s it! Now you know. We think in patterns. We don’t think like computers. Even though that’s what most people believe. Inputs, outputs, dusty hard drives, all out of RAM when we’re looking for the remote. No! The first chapter shows a number of mental models that seem simple on the surface but stump our pattern-based brains. From there the book gets perhaps a bit too heavy – okay, definitely too heavy – but it hammers home this wonderful point that helps you see things like ‘the stories you tell yourself’ or ‘the tribes you’re part of’ or ‘the cultures you believe in’ or ‘the habits that mould your identity’ as much, much more malleable than they appear on the surface.

[Mike Cheng · Rating 2 out of 5]

The basic premise here by Professor Howard Margolis is that all thought can be explained as pattern-recognition that ranges from simple feedback all the way up to reasoning and calculation. Recognition of any pattern is prompted by cues in the context - that pattern itself then becomes part of the environment which cues the next pattern. Imo this reads more like an advanced textbook, and someone without at least a background in undergraduate cognitive psychology might find this to be difficult, if not bone-dry.

[Slater Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some of the science is dated and it often reads a little bit like a technical manual but I do believe this is a really good book. Led me to Elizabeth Loftus's literature, Haidt's Righteous Mind, Dennett's Consciousness Explained, Searle's work, etc. This is a great introductory for anyone interested in consciousness.

[Elia Mantovani · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read it because I needed a cognitive perspective over Kuhnian philosophy. Good in some analyses, not at all clear in many others. An excessively huge number of historical case-studies.

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Margolis' use of "alogic"--or pattern recognition more specifically--to synthesize cognitive science that emphasizes human rationality with cognitive science that emphasizes human irrationality is brilliantly simple and straight-forward. The use of examples from the history of science to make his point in the last third of the book was the cherry on top.

[Bill Mech · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating treatise on how intuitive people process information and make decisions. Hint: pattern recognition and mulling.