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Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

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Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#121

Post by ijk »

triplesec wrote: post #120
crntaylor wrote: post #21

I have heard the genre (which includes Malcolm Gladwell, Jonah Lehrer, the Freakonomics guys and Jared Diamond) described as "insight porn". The idea is to deliver small chunks of insight that is just counter-intuitive enough to be novel, but not so counter-intuitive that we can't take it at face value. It's a market that's developed in response to the fact that nerds are addicted to feeling like they're just a littl…

I believe it's unfair to include Diamond in this genre, as although he's popular, he's also a thinker (and prof) with an academic's consistency and attention to data. The Freakonomics guys are also closer to data, but episodically popularising rather than Diamond's coherent meta-narratives. The biggest argument you could level against Diamond might be one of leaning too heavily on "geographical determinism", which he…

Diamond is a little different, but he is working outside of his original field and produces very mixed responses from anthropologists (e.g. http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2013/01/14/169374400/why-does-... ).

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#122

Post by onebaddude »

georgemcbay wrote: post #62
natural219 wrote: post #14

As a personal data point, I grew up reading lots of "entertaining" books that claimed to have intellectual value, but in hindsight didn't really end up being that intelligent. My early thought heroes were John Stossel, Chuck Palahniuk, Ayn Rand, the Freakonomics guys, and Michael Crichton. While my views have grown more sophisticated over the years, those early adventures into "intellectual" topics eventually led me…

I guess after the magic 10,000 hours of reading you became an expert on reading.

It's funny that people here are mocking Gladwell and Diamond for presenting popularized, simplified interpretations of the science, but those people are doing the same thing by simplifying the works of the authors.

There's nothing "magic" about 10,000 hours. The implication is that hard work, practice and luck play a bigger role in success than most people believe. It's a theory. Sorry if it was too nuanced for you.

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#123

Post by onebaddude »

hingisundhorsa wrote: post #23

Could someone help me out, I've read Pinker's criticisms, Chablis' and others, but I don't feel convinced because they all seem to be generic attacks on accuracy. From their articles, I was not able to identify a specific point that Gladwell has made that is false. Lets take for example, his most recent book, David & Goliath. I was impressed by his unusual look at the David coming down the valley story in a new light…

>but I don't feel convinced because they all seem to be generic attacks on accuracy."

It's the same mentality that drives people to criticize every article here with an I know better, this is wrong attitude.

Malcolm Gladwell is a popular entertainer, he has a new book out which will surely be a best-seller, so he gets attacked. In the same way that people will attack the work of Ben Affleck or Michael Buble. That's unfortunately how our society works.

If policy makers are quoting Gladwell on important issues, that isn't his fault.

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#124

Post by michaelt »

moocowduckquack wrote: post #111
georgemcbay wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess after the magic 10,000 hours of reading you became an expert on reading.

After 20,000 hours you get so good you can read in the bath without getting the pages wet. At that point you are ready to turn pro.

Way ahead of you: https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=bath+book&tbm=isch

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#125

Post by onebaddude »

crntaylor wrote: post #73
paganel wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Guns, Germs and Steel" (the advantages of old-world people over new-world people in the 1500s were due to the influence of geography and climate, not inherent superiorities). I'm too lazy to look for the actual references, but in one form or another climate-related arguments for the "superiority" of Europeans were made in the late 1700s and in the 1800s (and towards the end of the 1800s a more racist undertone emer…

My recollection is that Diamond's argument is slightly different. He argues that the east-west orientation of Eurasia meant that societies were more easily able to expand, because you experience relatively little climate variation moving along parallels than you do moving up and down meridians, which you are forced to do when you expand in a north-south oriented continent like America or Africa. Similarly Eurasia had…

>So it's a little bit more subtle than just "our climate is inherently better for deep philosophical thoughts" or "our climate means that we are more productive workers".

Precisely.

The people here are ripping on the author's simplified theories by presenting even more simplified versions of the arguments.

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#126

Post by ijk »

downandout wrote: post #81
antimagic wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It is a safe assumption that a group of random students at a public Canadian university are not nearly as ambitious as a group of students at an impossibly competitive university such as Princeton." No, it is not a safe assumption. It remains to be proven, and that's assuming you can even come up with a decent objective definition of "ambition". Your post-hoc reasoning is exactly the type of reasoning that is taken…

So you're saying, then, that there are no differences between those that choose to attend a public college and those that attend an elite university? That those two groups of people wouldn't perform differently in studies focused on performance? That is nonsense.

No, antimagic is saying that there isn't enough evidence to conclusively demonstrate that they actually did perform better, rather than it being due to some other factor--such as random noise from the small sample size. Post hoc justification doesn't prove anything.

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#127

Post by shicky »

riffraff wrote: post #12
jetru wrote: post #8

Is this the same story with Freakonomics? I listen to their podcast and they seem pretty intelligent and don't really drawn crazy conclusions and always advice with a pinch of salt.

I'd suppose there is a continuum from "totally made up" and the "100% true fact" and freakonomics leans a bit closer to the latter than gladwell, but e.g. the "names" prediction in the book was totally off (though I can't find the reference for this now).

is this 'Winner' and 'Loser' ?

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#128

Post by d23 »

georgemcbay wrote: post #60
downandout wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a market that's developed in response to the fact that nerds are addicted to feeling like they're just a little bit smarter than everyone else. IMO, this is what appeals to many about HN....the desire to find share-worthy things that will help cement their image as the smart person within their social group. Nothing wrong with it, just an (unscientific) observation.

"IMO, this is what appeals to many about HN....the desire to find share-worthy things that will help cement their image as the smart person within their social group." Don't forget those of us who come to HN primarily to post comments about why the linked article is obviously stupid and wrong, or is right but just saying things that we've been aware of for a while now.

> Don't forget those of us who come to HN primarily to post comments about why the linked article is obviously stupid and wrong, or is right but just saying things that we've been aware of for a while now.

This is why I hate being around a good deal of "smart" people (or atleast, people who have smartness attached to their identity, which seems to be rarely the same group). Every statement, every conversation, every fact is just another opportunity for them to put something down or puff themselves up.

Re: Should we stop believing Malcolm Gladwell?

#130

Post by d23 »

gnaffle wrote: post #88
noonespecial wrote: post #82

Gladwell does the literary equivalent of this: http://images.fanpop.com/images/image_uploads/Barack-Obama-C... The world he presents is a cartoon caricature of the real world. In the drawing linked above, you can clearly recognize the president, but you wouldn't use the drawing to fit him for a hat. His prominent features are overemphasized in interesting and humorous ways for the purpose of sparking delighted recogn…

It's not a very good comparison. First, it's not presented as funny, it's presented as science, complete with links to studies. If you ask most people reading Gladwell, they will believe his theories. Second, it's not that he exaggerates something, but often he's flat-out wrong. The fascination he sparks is the "oh, that's an unlikely fact I wouldn't have believed was true, had it not been for the fact that these sci…

> Second, it's not that he exaggerates something, but often he's flat-out wrong.

Eh, is it though? I confess I haven't read much by him, but it seems like most of his works are truisms anyway (e.g. if something's hard, it'll make you work harder!).

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