On Obama's Thinking

Jonah Lehrer, 27, on Obama's brain:-

How would you describe the Obama brain?
I think Obama’s real talent is metacognition, which is the ability to think about thinking. I imagine that if you took a scan of his brain, you would see lots of activity in the prefrontal cortex, which doesn’t mean that he doesn’t experience the primal emotions that come from the amygdala.


For all his rationality, he seems drawn to people with overactive amygdalas, like Rahm Emanuel.
I think he is aware that the brain has a tendency to suppress dissonant ideas and fall into the certainty trap, and he wants to surround himself with people with strong opinions and set up an atmosphere that actively discourages groupthink.