Fyodor Dostoevsky wrote his major novels 150 years ago without access to modern psychology. Neuroscientists and psychoanalysts now use his work as case studies. Here is why his understanding of the human mind was decades ahead of science.
Humans are not rational actors who occasionally err. We are systematically, predictably irrational in ways that researchers have mapped in detail. Understanding these patterns is the beginning of making better decisions.
