Paolo Stolfo

Die Illusion des Verstehens

What happens to your thinking when a machine explains everything to you

Read the sample

The exercise

Ask a language model how a quantum computer works. Read the answer. Close the tab.

Now explain it. Out loud, in your own words, without the terms from the answer.

Where you stall, the feeling was faster than the understanding. You read words, and it felt like understanding.

Cognitive psychologists have known the effect since 2002: the illusion of explanatory depth. We systematically overestimate how well we understand mechanisms – until we have to explain them. What’s new is that the explanation now comes included: free of charge, in any quantity, in a tone that invites no follow-up question.

Forget for a moment whether it’s true. Do you understand it?

A word for a state without a name

Sham understanding is the feeling of having understood something without actually having understood it: the inner “ah, I see” after a fluent explanation, the conviction of being informed when all you have done is consume words.

From the inside, it is hard to tell whether you have understood or only think you have. Your brain has no built-in alarm.

A false claim provokes contradiction. A good feeling of understanding provokes nothing. That is the difference this book is about.

What this book is about

It doesn’t explain how AI works. It describes what AI explanations do to your thinking.

It shows why fluent answers switch off your checking and what happens to your memory when everything can be looked up at any time. And it follows sham understanding to the places where it has consequences: in a loan decision, at the doctor’s, in the boardroom.

You can read the chapter on your memory in advance: Sample with the introduction and chapter 6 (PDF, in German)

I help build what this book warns against. And yet I sat in a meeting and nodded, without noticing that these very mechanisms were working on me.

The book makes them visible. You can read the introduction and chapter 6 in advance: Sample (PDF, in German)

Purchase and delivery

Release date – The German edition is published on 12 November 2026 and is available from that day. You receive download access immediately after purchase, on the confirmation page and by email.

Formats – EPUB for Apple Books, Kobo, Tolino and Kindle (via Send to Kindle), PDF for all devices. The files are not tied to any account. The book is in German.

Payment and receipt – Payment is handled by Link, Stripe’s sales service. Stripe issues the receipt and remits the VAT. Your bank statement shows «STOLFO» together with Link or Stripe.

Help with download and content – Write to books@paolostolfo.com. If no email has arrived, check your spam folder first. If it isn’t there, get in touch and I’ll send you access manually.

Help with payment, receipt and refunds – Link’s support team can help: link.com. The contact address is also on your receipt.