The Power of Positive Thinking in 1955. Meyer writes that "The Power of Positive Thinking" provides partial awareness to the limitations of the readers but does not supply the necessary self-confidence to overcome those limitations. He proceeds to compare Peale to a con man saying that the problem with Peale lies in the “paltriness of the confidence he preached. He did not really try to fool you into thinking you could do much, or be much, or live much. He did not make you aware of greater heights any more than of greater abysses.” Psychologist Martin Seligman, former APA president and founder of positive psychology,
Magical thinking thinking: "Magical thinking is no less characteristic of our own mundane intellectual activity than it is of Zande curing practices." Bronisław Malinowski's "Magic, Science and Religion" (1954) discusses another type of magical thinking, in which words and sounds are thought to have the ability to directly affect the world. This type of wish fulfillment thinking can result in the avoidance of talking about certain subjects ("speak of the devil and he'll appear"), the use of euphemisms instead of certain words, or the belief that to know the "true name" of something gives one power over it, or that certain chants,