Forget Gladwell
October 22, 2024 9:22 AM Subscribe
"All nonfiction writers can end up writing incorrect or controversial things, but why does every Gladwell book push half-formed and inaccurate theories?" A modest proposal: Forget Gladwell. [W. David Marx in Culture: An Owner's Manual]
Especially valuable for the rundown of critiques of all of Malcolm Gladwell's books. (An early favorite is Isaac Chotiner's takedown of Gladwell's Outliers, Mister Lucky: "And didn't Salieri also have ten thousand hours of composing music under his belt and remain notoriously without greatness?")
Especially valuable for the rundown of critiques of all of Malcolm Gladwell's books. (An early favorite is Isaac Chotiner's takedown of Gladwell's Outliers, Mister Lucky: "And didn't Salieri also have ten thousand hours of composing music under his belt and remain notoriously without greatness?")
Gladwell's bar for whether an idea is worth writing up in a mass market book is literally "I dunno, maybe this is something?"
I'm feeling sympathetic towards Gladwell, maybe because every university essay I ever wrote ( I was studying literature, mind you) was born out of exactly this sentiment. And I was extremely successful. And it was great fun. One can do this in a field where there is no truth. Does sociology count? Parts of it do. The parts where we try to explain human behavior, most definitely.
Anyhow, the level of irritation here made me laugh and I think I'll listen to the Gladwell If Books Could Kill episode again.
posted by kitcat at 9:40 AM on October 22 [10 favorites]
I'm feeling sympathetic towards Gladwell, maybe because every university essay I ever wrote ( I was studying literature, mind you) was born out of exactly this sentiment. And I was extremely successful. And it was great fun. One can do this in a field where there is no truth. Does sociology count? Parts of it do. The parts where we try to explain human behavior, most definitely.
Anyhow, the level of irritation here made me laugh and I think I'll listen to the Gladwell If Books Could Kill episode again.
posted by kitcat at 9:40 AM on October 22 [10 favorites]
Even if I agree with them, I'm never quite sure of the point of these "Successful Author is Actually Bad at Their Job" articles. To protect the general reading public from its own bad taste? ("Violates the basic social contract between author and reader"?) It's not like he's a public school teacher or anything.
posted by gottabefunky at 9:48 AM on October 22 [8 favorites]
posted by gottabefunky at 9:48 AM on October 22 [8 favorites]
(That said, as a fellow nonfiction writer I do understand the urge to just vent sometimes)
posted by gottabefunky at 9:51 AM on October 22
posted by gottabefunky at 9:51 AM on October 22
Gladwell may be attempting some odd humblebrag that he's just some Canadian rando with loosely held ideas
Reckon that's all he is, if I'm being extremely generous to remember even those 3 things about this guy, after this article counter-productively introduced me to him. Some rich goober with bad ideas has too great a reach relative to the value of their output. Don't imagine I was at risk of exposure before, but I can avoid it deliberately now that I'm sure to notice it after W. David Marx's efforts to promote him. :p
posted by GoblinHoney at 9:54 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]
Reckon that's all he is, if I'm being extremely generous to remember even those 3 things about this guy, after this article counter-productively introduced me to him. Some rich goober with bad ideas has too great a reach relative to the value of their output. Don't imagine I was at risk of exposure before, but I can avoid it deliberately now that I'm sure to notice it after W. David Marx's efforts to promote him. :p
posted by GoblinHoney at 9:54 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]
This was a fun bit of venting, though for my own experience, I guess from The Tipping Point onwards, Gladwell has always come across as someone entertaining ideas rather than really positing them as The Truth or whatever. His books are the equivalent of a night out at a cozy bar with an interesting friend who's always jumping from one idea to the next.
Or to put it another way, there's that bit in (IIRC) Mostly Harmless where Trillian meets the astrologer and is appropriately skeptical, and the astrologer explains that astrology is like throwing sand over a bas-relief to get a new perspective on the indentations. Which is to say, there's a place for loosely-held ideas that grant different perspectives on things, and I think that's really Gladwell's stock in trade.
cf: Thomas Friedman, who acts as a useful idiot for whoever allows him into their inner circle and presents terrible metaphors as divine truth. I'll take Gladwell over that any day of the week.
posted by Navelgazer at 10:03 AM on October 22 [18 favorites]
Or to put it another way, there's that bit in (IIRC) Mostly Harmless where Trillian meets the astrologer and is appropriately skeptical, and the astrologer explains that astrology is like throwing sand over a bas-relief to get a new perspective on the indentations. Which is to say, there's a place for loosely-held ideas that grant different perspectives on things, and I think that's really Gladwell's stock in trade.
cf: Thomas Friedman, who acts as a useful idiot for whoever allows him into their inner circle and presents terrible metaphors as divine truth. I'll take Gladwell over that any day of the week.
posted by Navelgazer at 10:03 AM on October 22 [18 favorites]
rich goober
I mean, I think you're just hurting my feelings as a Canadian, but it doesn't sound like he came from money. His family lived in a rural mennonite town in Ontario, and he went to Trinity College in Toronto which is not an expensive school if I can trust Google. He's definitely rich now, though.
posted by kitcat at 10:05 AM on October 22 [4 favorites]
I mean, I think you're just hurting my feelings as a Canadian, but it doesn't sound like he came from money. His family lived in a rural mennonite town in Ontario, and he went to Trinity College in Toronto which is not an expensive school if I can trust Google. He's definitely rich now, though.
posted by kitcat at 10:05 AM on October 22 [4 favorites]
"And didn't Salieri also have ten thousand hours of composing music under his belt and remain notoriously without greatness?"
Salieri was great, though. He composed 13 operas and more than 600 pieces of music, had some of his work turned into studies by other great composers, he just happens through an accident of history to be frequently (and unjustly) compared to arguably the greatest composer of all time.
posted by mhoye at 10:07 AM on October 22 [27 favorites]
Salieri was great, though. He composed 13 operas and more than 600 pieces of music, had some of his work turned into studies by other great composers, he just happens through an accident of history to be frequently (and unjustly) compared to arguably the greatest composer of all time.
posted by mhoye at 10:07 AM on October 22 [27 favorites]
Even if I agree with them, I'm never quite sure of the point of these "Successful Author is Actually Bad at Their Job" articles. To protect the general reading public from its own bad taste? ("Violates the basic social contract between author and reader"?) It's not like he's a public school teacher or anything.
gottabefunky
That seems a bit disingenuous. Gladwell holds himself out as providing insight and analysis of true facts. It's therefore fair to point out where he's wrong. Even more so for him specifically since his whole public image is "the smart guy who sees the hidden truths in the data".
posted by star gentle uterus at 10:15 AM on October 22 [42 favorites]
gottabefunky
That seems a bit disingenuous. Gladwell holds himself out as providing insight and analysis of true facts. It's therefore fair to point out where he's wrong. Even more so for him specifically since his whole public image is "the smart guy who sees the hidden truths in the data".
posted by star gentle uterus at 10:15 AM on October 22 [42 favorites]
"Even if I agree with them, I'm never quite sure of the point of these "Successful Author is Actually Bad at Their Job" articles. To protect the general reading public from its own bad taste? ("Violates the basic social contract between author and reader"?) It's not like he's a public school teacher or anything."
I get it; and but also this is a pretty privileged point of view. When you can read or keep up reasonably well with stuff as it comes out, it's easy to also keep up with what's mostly spitballing crap.
Unfortunately, books like this have an endless half-life. Like Alvin Toffler and whoever else you still see on the shelves at Goodwill, Gladwell's books will get picked up endlessly by people who "heard this was good!" and will believe a lot of stuff they shouldn't, just because of exposure and repetition. That's another thing about being poor and out of the loop.
posted by toodleydoodley at 10:33 AM on October 22 [14 favorites]
I get it; and but also this is a pretty privileged point of view. When you can read or keep up reasonably well with stuff as it comes out, it's easy to also keep up with what's mostly spitballing crap.
Unfortunately, books like this have an endless half-life. Like Alvin Toffler and whoever else you still see on the shelves at Goodwill, Gladwell's books will get picked up endlessly by people who "heard this was good!" and will believe a lot of stuff they shouldn't, just because of exposure and repetition. That's another thing about being poor and out of the loop.
posted by toodleydoodley at 10:33 AM on October 22 [14 favorites]
Even if I agree with them, I'm never quite sure of the point of these "Successful Author is Actually Bad at Their Job" articles. To protect the general reading public from its own bad taste?
From the article:
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:37 AM on October 22 [46 favorites]
From the article:
Picking on Gladwell, however, is a bit of a cliché, and I am often advised to keep quiet for a wide range of professional reasons. But he's unstoppable and incorrigible, and I don't believe he's harmless. As The New York Times notes, “Business mavens, political leaders and ordinary strivers in both those fields treated [The Tipping Point] like a Bible, mining it for insights on how to make their own products and pitches spread.”Gladwell pushing bullshit isn't harmless, and it is right to call him out for it.
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:37 AM on October 22 [46 favorites]
I've spent 10,000 hours complaining about things on the internet, and I'm still not an expert.
posted by box at 10:38 AM on October 22 [36 favorites]
posted by box at 10:38 AM on October 22 [36 favorites]
Balderdash. That was an expert-level complaint on the internet about not being an expert about complaining about things on the internet.
posted by fimbulvetr at 10:40 AM on October 22 [13 favorites]
posted by fimbulvetr at 10:40 AM on October 22 [13 favorites]
I guess I just always assumed Gladwell's material wasn't supposed to be treated as gospel truth as much as "makes you think, doesn't it?" Like a less well constructed version of James Burke's material.
posted by drewbage1847 at 10:42 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by drewbage1847 at 10:42 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]
Quoting from Wikipedia:
Gladwell's theories of crime were heavily influenced by the "broken windows theory" of policing, and Gladwell is credited for packaging and popularizing the theory in a way that was implementable in New York City. Gladwell's theoretical implementation bears a striking resemblance to the "stop-and-frisk" policies of the NYPD. However, in the decade and a half since its publication, The Tipping Point and Gladwell have both come under fire for the tenuous link between "broken windows" and New York City's drop in violent crime. During a 2013 interview with BBC journalist Jon Ronson for The Culture Show, Gladwell admitted that he was "too in love with the broken-windows notion". He went on to say that he was "so enamored by the metaphorical simplicity of that idea that I overstated its importance".
posted by gimonca at 10:51 AM on October 22 [37 favorites]
Gladwell's theories of crime were heavily influenced by the "broken windows theory" of policing, and Gladwell is credited for packaging and popularizing the theory in a way that was implementable in New York City. Gladwell's theoretical implementation bears a striking resemblance to the "stop-and-frisk" policies of the NYPD. However, in the decade and a half since its publication, The Tipping Point and Gladwell have both come under fire for the tenuous link between "broken windows" and New York City's drop in violent crime. During a 2013 interview with BBC journalist Jon Ronson for The Culture Show, Gladwell admitted that he was "too in love with the broken-windows notion". He went on to say that he was "so enamored by the metaphorical simplicity of that idea that I overstated its importance".
posted by gimonca at 10:51 AM on October 22 [37 favorites]
I kind of decided he was a dumbass when he couldn't be arsed to look up how to correctly spell the subject of an essay he wrote (eigenvalues).
posted by kyrademon at 10:54 AM on October 22 [11 favorites]
posted by kyrademon at 10:54 AM on October 22 [11 favorites]
Wait how did he spell it? Eygenvalue? Igenvalue? Eigenvalyoo?
posted by axiom at 10:56 AM on October 22
posted by axiom at 10:56 AM on October 22
@axiom "igon value"
posted by Lanark at 10:59 AM on October 22 [13 favorites]
posted by Lanark at 10:59 AM on October 22 [13 favorites]
and maybe I'm being defensive, but I read a bunch of Gladwell books early on, because they were engaging and accessible and sticky (deliberately using his own vocabulary) and highly recommended, and now I know a bunch of stuff that's perniciously *wrong*, but because it was so sticky, all those little "facts" are mixed up together with some legitimate knowledge.
So, I can't always remember what's been rigorously documented and what's just good-sounding horseshit (10,000 hours: real or fake?) and that really bugs me.
I'm too old to still be carrying bullshit around and getting fooled over and over like that, and I don't have the spare time to rigorously root all of it out.
posted by toodleydoodley at 11:07 AM on October 22 [24 favorites]
So, I can't always remember what's been rigorously documented and what's just good-sounding horseshit (10,000 hours: real or fake?) and that really bugs me.
I'm too old to still be carrying bullshit around and getting fooled over and over like that, and I don't have the spare time to rigorously root all of it out.
posted by toodleydoodley at 11:07 AM on October 22 [24 favorites]
Gladwell's a grifter, like Nate Silver and the Freakonomics guys. He's not interested in the truth, he's interested in selling profound thoughts about the world to cleverish people who want someone to give them soundbite-sized answers about existence that have cute stories attached. Those answers must seem to pull away the unnerving complexity of the world to reveal a reassuring simplicity underneath, they should confirm the pre-existing beliefs of the educated readers who consume them, and they should be plausible-ish. Understanding why they're badly wrong must require the kind of complex reading and thinking that said readers are trying to avoid.
Truth would interfere with that approach.
posted by Galvanic at 11:08 AM on October 22 [33 favorites]
Truth would interfere with that approach.
posted by Galvanic at 11:08 AM on October 22 [33 favorites]
"igon value"
Called out by Steven Pinker. We must go deeper.
posted by away for regrooving at 11:11 AM on October 22 [6 favorites]
Called out by Steven Pinker. We must go deeper.
posted by away for regrooving at 11:11 AM on October 22 [6 favorites]
I'm never quite sure of the point of these "Successful Author is Actually Bad at Their Job" articles.
It's because we need people who can point out that the emperor wears no clothes.
Naked emperors are responsible for cryptocurrencies, alternative medicine, AI hype, guru cults, fad diets, pyramid scams and MLMs, megachurches, and the promise that we can make America great again.
Given that we have lying billionaire tech bros, influential social media grifters, useful idiot NYT columnists, and are 14 days away from potentially electing a fascist President, I think we need MORE of these articles, not fewer.
posted by AlSweigart at 11:39 AM on October 22 [38 favorites]
It's because we need people who can point out that the emperor wears no clothes.
Naked emperors are responsible for cryptocurrencies, alternative medicine, AI hype, guru cults, fad diets, pyramid scams and MLMs, megachurches, and the promise that we can make America great again.
Given that we have lying billionaire tech bros, influential social media grifters, useful idiot NYT columnists, and are 14 days away from potentially electing a fascist President, I think we need MORE of these articles, not fewer.
posted by AlSweigart at 11:39 AM on October 22 [38 favorites]
W David Marx is one of my favorite writers BTW
Not sure he’s involved with NeoJapanisme still but that was generally good reading…
posted by torokunai at 11:48 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]
Not sure he’s involved with NeoJapanisme still but that was generally good reading…
posted by torokunai at 11:48 AM on October 22 [1 favorite]
@axiom "igon value"
I had a good chuckle at this, because I thought you were taking the piss. So I looked it up and realized you were right and I can't decide if that is even funnier, or if it's kind of horrifing.
posted by Dr. Twist at 12:05 PM on October 22 [7 favorites]
I had a good chuckle at this, because I thought you were taking the piss. So I looked it up and realized you were right and I can't decide if that is even funnier, or if it's kind of horrifing.
posted by Dr. Twist at 12:05 PM on October 22 [7 favorites]
frakanomics
posted by AlbertCalavicci at 12:09 PM on October 22
posted by AlbertCalavicci at 12:09 PM on October 22
I just want to say that I once saw Malcolm Gladwell in a NYC subway station. It was probably 2010 or so: perhaps the Peak Gladwell Big-Hair Moment.
His 'do was truly a thing to behold.
posted by Dr. Wu at 12:11 PM on October 22 [3 favorites]
His 'do was truly a thing to behold.
posted by Dr. Wu at 12:11 PM on October 22 [3 favorites]
The podcast (Revisionist History) had some good moments, but there were some terrible one as well, like the one where he insisted that country music was actually sad because it was specific in the lyrics (as if music itself doesn't serve a role in evoking an emotional response) and capping it by reciting a line from "Wild Horses" in a duhh voice to prove his point, or even worse when he examined Elvis Presley and proved that his version of some song was derivative - appropriate - from another artist by playing a performance by that artist done years after Elvis had a massive hit. I mean, Dylan played Watchtower like Hendrix after Hendrix remade the song in the popular imagination, how can the artist help but be influenced by that? It proves nothing.
posted by stevil at 12:24 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by stevil at 12:24 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
The problem with Gladwell isn't "oh, the public has bad taste", the problem is that, locally, I'm trying to communicate some ideas about how we think about "accidents", and traffic safety, and alternative transportation and lifestyle. And how those things interact with housing costs, municipal finance, and climate change.
There are tons of papers out there on the topic, and then the popularizers who are distilling those into pieces to things that I might want to forward along reference Gladwell, and... record scratch, 'cause I know there's gonna be hogwash in there somewhere.
Malcolm Gladwell and LLMs output the same product, to the same audience. And the same people are impressed by them. And those of us who have aspirations towards truth, whatever that means, have to spend more time digging through dreck because of them.
(And the number of those popularizers who also reference people like Haidt, and suddenly I'm wondering if I am on the right side...)
posted by straw at 12:24 PM on October 22 [25 favorites]
There are tons of papers out there on the topic, and then the popularizers who are distilling those into pieces to things that I might want to forward along reference Gladwell, and... record scratch, 'cause I know there's gonna be hogwash in there somewhere.
Malcolm Gladwell and LLMs output the same product, to the same audience. And the same people are impressed by them. And those of us who have aspirations towards truth, whatever that means, have to spend more time digging through dreck because of them.
(And the number of those popularizers who also reference people like Haidt, and suddenly I'm wondering if I am on the right side...)
posted by straw at 12:24 PM on October 22 [25 favorites]
Okay now I will always think of Gladwell as a human LLM!
posted by TwoWordReview at 12:28 PM on October 22 [17 favorites]
posted by TwoWordReview at 12:28 PM on October 22 [17 favorites]
So I looked it up and realized you were right and I can't decide if that is even funnier, or if it's kind of horrifing.
If someone gets a pronunciation wrong because they have only ever seen the word in print, I can forgive that - at least it shows they read. This is the exact opposite of that, it shows he is writing about something he has heard but never bothered to look up in any kind of print format.
posted by Lanark at 12:33 PM on October 22 [20 favorites]
If someone gets a pronunciation wrong because they have only ever seen the word in print, I can forgive that - at least it shows they read. This is the exact opposite of that, it shows he is writing about something he has heard but never bothered to look up in any kind of print format.
posted by Lanark at 12:33 PM on October 22 [20 favorites]
Radiolab did a piece on universal language-free communication, and they had a piece where two shapes are each facing some abstract task, but one is clearly at an advantage based on circumstance. They describe how the animations show first one shape and then the other falling to some sort of kinetic calamity, and how this is used to get a sort of universal survey.
It turns out there's some small percentage of humanity (less than 15% if I recall: possibly only 5% or 1%?) who have the greatest sympathy for the privileged shape that suffers a fall from grace, and show little empathy for the eternally-struggling shape whose life is made worse.
And then they cut to Malcolm Gladwell, who seemed to be the only person among their contacts of writers and researchers who had a hard time accepting that his position was a minority one. There's clips out there of him acting astonished that humanity as a whole wouldn't be terrified of seeing a king fall to the same fates that commoners endure.
It was that tiny interaction that made me understand why people have such a strong reaction against his writing: he only has feeling for the elite, and he thinks we're the same as him.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 12:46 PM on October 22 [22 favorites]
It turns out there's some small percentage of humanity (less than 15% if I recall: possibly only 5% or 1%?) who have the greatest sympathy for the privileged shape that suffers a fall from grace, and show little empathy for the eternally-struggling shape whose life is made worse.
And then they cut to Malcolm Gladwell, who seemed to be the only person among their contacts of writers and researchers who had a hard time accepting that his position was a minority one. There's clips out there of him acting astonished that humanity as a whole wouldn't be terrified of seeing a king fall to the same fates that commoners endure.
It was that tiny interaction that made me understand why people have such a strong reaction against his writing: he only has feeling for the elite, and he thinks we're the same as him.
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 12:46 PM on October 22 [22 favorites]
Malcolm Gladwell on Radiolab is what they would play to torture me in hell.
posted by zoinks at 12:49 PM on October 22 [11 favorites]
posted by zoinks at 12:49 PM on October 22 [11 favorites]
Called out by Steven Pinker. We must go deeper.
I found this.
posted by TedW at 12:52 PM on October 22
I found this.
posted by TedW at 12:52 PM on October 22
igon value
lmao, that's Theranos-level "P for Potassium"
posted by ryanrs at 1:13 PM on October 22 [7 favorites]
lmao, that's Theranos-level "P for Potassium"
posted by ryanrs at 1:13 PM on October 22 [7 favorites]
There's a certain type of pop-science nonfiction that is finally having its moment of reckoning. Like Jared Diamond's libel about the Eastern Islanders destroying their environment being shown to be demonstrably bullshit.
Other examples of these just-so books include the Freakonomics guys' laughable take on climate change, and Noah Yuval Harari's status as an expert on everything. Ironically, I think Pinker is as guilty of thinking he's an "everything expert" as Gladwell. Takes one to know one I guess.
Some writers of the genre have more lasting power. Carl Sagan, Rachel Carson, Oliver Sacks, Steven J. Gould, Ed Yong, Phil Plait, Naomi Oreskes come to mind. I think the secret is to know their lane, stick to their expertise (or at least make clear when they're talking as a qualified expert vs. educated layman), and show humility about the certainty of their conclusions. Acting like actual scientists!
posted by dantheclamman at 1:17 PM on October 22 [12 favorites]
Other examples of these just-so books include the Freakonomics guys' laughable take on climate change, and Noah Yuval Harari's status as an expert on everything. Ironically, I think Pinker is as guilty of thinking he's an "everything expert" as Gladwell. Takes one to know one I guess.
Some writers of the genre have more lasting power. Carl Sagan, Rachel Carson, Oliver Sacks, Steven J. Gould, Ed Yong, Phil Plait, Naomi Oreskes come to mind. I think the secret is to know their lane, stick to their expertise (or at least make clear when they're talking as a qualified expert vs. educated layman), and show humility about the certainty of their conclusions. Acting like actual scientists!
posted by dantheclamman at 1:17 PM on October 22 [12 favorites]
It always seemed like there was something off about him but I just assumed it was my inherent distrust of pop science writers. The 10,000-hour thing, though, that was when he became a hack as far as I was concerned.
posted by tommasz at 1:29 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by tommasz at 1:29 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
dantheclamman, I was intrigued by your mention of Naomi Oreskes - not a name I was familiar with. But I look her up and find she is a badass scientist/historian of science and co-authored Merchants of Doubt! I verymuch enjoyed the documentary, and am delighted to have someone new to dig into for principled science writing. Thanks!
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 1:35 PM on October 22 [4 favorites]
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 1:35 PM on October 22 [4 favorites]
Things were not awesome at Gladwell's podcast company, Pushkin, either.
posted by mykescipark at 1:42 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by mykescipark at 1:42 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
I blogged about Gladwell 5 years ago. Mainly because of a 2019 replication of the original, kid-violinist, 10,000 hrs study which came to a rather less black&white conclusion.
"My take on Gladwell: his books should have been magazine articles and his magazine articles should have been tweets." source
posted by BobTheScientist at 2:00 PM on October 22 [11 favorites]
"My take on Gladwell: his books should have been magazine articles and his magazine articles should have been tweets." source
posted by BobTheScientist at 2:00 PM on October 22 [11 favorites]
Oooh, if this becomes dunking on Pinker, too, I am so in. A little over two decades ago, I was in Hong Kong for business, and trying to learn enough written Chinese to not end up with too much intestine or chicken feet when I went out to eat. This, naturally, led to all sorts of discussion about learning Chinese with people who saw the white guy practicing writing glyphs. Which led to discussions (with people who wanted to practice their English with someone from the US) about the difficulties of learning Cantonese, and regional dialects, and... there was a particular, I don't remember the details now, object-subject-verb structure that two or three people mentioned showing up in Cantonese, that was nothing like English.
On the flight back from one such trip I was reading The Blank Slate, and while the dude was inadvertently making the opposite case of what he was trying to make re the heritability of intelligence, and at some point after the umpteenth strawman or flawed example, I came across a passage in which he called out exactly that language structure as "unthinkable".
In the intervening decades there have been numerous other takedowns of Pinker, so if anything I feel slightly smug about having twigged to him fairly early, in his alleged subject domain, before he branched out. As I wrote on my blog back then, it's not worth going back and subjecting myself to more of his dreck to be really specific, just realize that he's part of a style of writing and communication that I sure as hell don't need more of in my life, and move on.
As long as nobody else takes him seriously. Sigh.
posted by straw at 2:09 PM on October 22 [8 favorites]
On the flight back from one such trip I was reading The Blank Slate, and while the dude was inadvertently making the opposite case of what he was trying to make re the heritability of intelligence, and at some point after the umpteenth strawman or flawed example, I came across a passage in which he called out exactly that language structure as "unthinkable".
In the intervening decades there have been numerous other takedowns of Pinker, so if anything I feel slightly smug about having twigged to him fairly early, in his alleged subject domain, before he branched out. As I wrote on my blog back then, it's not worth going back and subjecting myself to more of his dreck to be really specific, just realize that he's part of a style of writing and communication that I sure as hell don't need more of in my life, and move on.
As long as nobody else takes him seriously. Sigh.
posted by straw at 2:09 PM on October 22 [8 favorites]
Voting in favor of Pinker and Diamond as additions to the grifter list.
posted by Galvanic at 2:11 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
posted by Galvanic at 2:11 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
The thing that Gladwell and all these neoliberal TED Talk-style "airport books" by "thought leaders" have in common is a conservative perspective that insists that systemic change is never the answer because the free market is an efficient, level playing field and America is a meritocracy.
The excellent podcast If Books Could Kill calls this their "one book theory". All this self-help, contrarian, "dangerous ideas" slop is basically the same when you read a bunch of them together.
posted by AlSweigart at 2:12 PM on October 22 [12 favorites]
The excellent podcast If Books Could Kill calls this their "one book theory". All this self-help, contrarian, "dangerous ideas" slop is basically the same when you read a bunch of them together.
posted by AlSweigart at 2:12 PM on October 22 [12 favorites]
No, Al, actually it’s not all about capitalism vs. socialism.
posted by Galvanic at 2:15 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by Galvanic at 2:15 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
There's a certain type of pop-science nonfiction that is finally having its moment of reckoning.
Michael Hobbes can take credit for at least a substantial chunk of that, at least in the podcast world; first at You're Wrong About, and now at Maintenance Phase and If Books Could Kill. (Here's the IBCK episode on Outliers and Gladwell in general.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:15 PM on October 22 [6 favorites]
Michael Hobbes can take credit for at least a substantial chunk of that, at least in the podcast world; first at You're Wrong About, and now at Maintenance Phase and If Books Could Kill. (Here's the IBCK episode on Outliers and Gladwell in general.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:15 PM on October 22 [6 favorites]
jinx!
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:15 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:15 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
No, Al, actually it’s not all about capitalism vs. socialism.
From the article:
As The New York Times notes, “Business mavens, political leaders and ordinary strivers in both those fields treated [The Tipping Point] like a Bible, mining it for insights on how to make their own products and pitches spread.”
posted by AlSweigart at 2:17 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
From the article:
As The New York Times notes, “Business mavens, political leaders and ordinary strivers in both those fields treated [The Tipping Point] like a Bible, mining it for insights on how to make their own products and pitches spread.”
posted by AlSweigart at 2:17 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
I mean, I'm looking over the If Books Could Kill episode list and here's the ones that promote conservative politics, unregulated capitalism, and/or individualism:
Who Moved My Cheese?, Hillbilly Elegy, Going Infinite, Lean In, The Art of the Deal, The Identity Trap, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, The 48 Laws of Power, San Fransicko, The 4-Hour Work Week, God and Man At Yale, Liberal Fascism, The Rules, Atomic Habits, The World is Flat, Nudge, Rich Dad Poor Dad, The Coddling of the American Mind, The Clash of Civilizations, The End of History, Men are from Mars Women are from Venus, The Secret, The Game, Bobos in Paradise, Outliers, Freakonomics
Another thing that most of them share in common: they claim to be politically neutral.
posted by AlSweigart at 2:39 PM on October 22 [22 favorites]
Who Moved My Cheese?, Hillbilly Elegy, Going Infinite, Lean In, The Art of the Deal, The Identity Trap, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, The 48 Laws of Power, San Fransicko, The 4-Hour Work Week, God and Man At Yale, Liberal Fascism, The Rules, Atomic Habits, The World is Flat, Nudge, Rich Dad Poor Dad, The Coddling of the American Mind, The Clash of Civilizations, The End of History, Men are from Mars Women are from Venus, The Secret, The Game, Bobos in Paradise, Outliers, Freakonomics
Another thing that most of them share in common: they claim to be politically neutral.
posted by AlSweigart at 2:39 PM on October 22 [22 favorites]
As part of my MBA studies we got the execrable Michael Porter - checks bookshelf, "Competitive Strategy" and "Competitive Advantage" - case studies etc. I have NOT read the entire books or even a major portion, but I can probably find necessary quotes to support any argument I choose to make.
And so I discovered these "thought leaders" and have had a much happier life for avoiding them and definitely not spending any time reading them.
If I am asked to mentor someone, I suggest that they spend time with "The Elements of Style" by Strunk and White, as clear communication is a better skill to bring to a business.
posted by Barbara Spitzer at 2:40 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
And so I discovered these "thought leaders" and have had a much happier life for avoiding them and definitely not spending any time reading them.
If I am asked to mentor someone, I suggest that they spend time with "The Elements of Style" by Strunk and White, as clear communication is a better skill to bring to a business.
posted by Barbara Spitzer at 2:40 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
> gottabefunky: "Even if I agree with them, I'm never quite sure of the point of these "Successful Author is Actually Bad at Their Job" articles. To protect the general reading public from its own bad taste? ("Violates the basic social contract between author and reader"?) It's not like he's a public school teacher or anything."
There's an old saying: you might not care about politics, but your boss's boss probably does. Same deal here. You might not read Gladwell (or Pinker or Diamond or whoever), but odds are if you work in a corporate environment, someone in your management chain, maybe someone pretty high up in that chain, reads Gladwell. And worse, maybe takes him seriously. Maybe placed a bulk order and passed out copies to all the execs.
posted by mhum at 3:12 PM on October 22 [7 favorites]
There's an old saying: you might not care about politics, but your boss's boss probably does. Same deal here. You might not read Gladwell (or Pinker or Diamond or whoever), but odds are if you work in a corporate environment, someone in your management chain, maybe someone pretty high up in that chain, reads Gladwell. And worse, maybe takes him seriously. Maybe placed a bulk order and passed out copies to all the execs.
posted by mhum at 3:12 PM on October 22 [7 favorites]
> He writes like someone who does not care about being correct.
This nearly made me jump out of my chair, because I've been saying this about Gladwell ever since I was first exposed to him, in an episode of This American Life. He was telling stories about his time as a journalist, and it was painfully and immediately obvious that he was a person who did not care about delivering the truth. He was talking about this with real delight in his voice: It was clear that he liked getting one over on his readers. I never understood how people could take his work seriously when he has admitted so plainly what he is about.
posted by zenhob at 3:30 PM on October 22 [2 favorites]
This nearly made me jump out of my chair, because I've been saying this about Gladwell ever since I was first exposed to him, in an episode of This American Life. He was telling stories about his time as a journalist, and it was painfully and immediately obvious that he was a person who did not care about delivering the truth. He was talking about this with real delight in his voice: It was clear that he liked getting one over on his readers. I never understood how people could take his work seriously when he has admitted so plainly what he is about.
posted by zenhob at 3:30 PM on October 22 [2 favorites]
If am asked to mentor someone, I suggest that they spend time with "The Elements of Style" by Strunk and White, as clear communication is a better skill to bring to a business.
This is a book in my area of expertise, and I’m sorry to say it’s yet another example of a not very good book that has had a lot more influence than it should have.
posted by Well I never at 4:09 PM on October 22 [13 favorites]
This is a book in my area of expertise, and I’m sorry to say it’s yet another example of a not very good book that has had a lot more influence than it should have.
posted by Well I never at 4:09 PM on October 22 [13 favorites]
This is a book in my area of expertise, and I’m sorry to say it’s yet another example of a not very good book that has had a lot more influence than it should have.
please say more!
posted by kensington314 at 4:18 PM on October 22 [2 favorites]
If you've been reading Gladwell, sorry, but you're an idiot. And I've been judging you and thinking you really like Ted Talks, Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson. Develop a better taste of what the truth is. That's all I can do for you.
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 4:19 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 4:19 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
and maybe I'm being defensive, but I read a bunch of Gladwell books early on, because they were engaging and accessible and sticky (deliberately using his own vocabulary) and highly recommended, and now I know a bunch of stuff that's perniciously *wrong*, but because it was so sticky, all those little "facts" are mixed up together with some legitimate knowledge.
So, I can't always remember what's been rigorously documented and what's just good-sounding horseshit (10,000 hours: real or fake?) and that really bugs me.
This was me, back in high school, and my arc with Malcolm Gladwell roughly parallels yours.
Gladwell is a very big reason why I basically stopped reading and don't trust the vast majority of nonfiction books anymore, and certainly not anything that seems to tell too convenient and beautiful a story. It feels like I've been thoroughly and utterly tricked, and how on earth am I supposed to avoid falling into that trap again besides reading every critique of a book and assessing their quality and authority (lest they too turn out to be elaborately constructed scams) before I read the book itself?
posted by chrominance at 4:30 PM on October 22 [2 favorites]
So, I can't always remember what's been rigorously documented and what's just good-sounding horseshit (10,000 hours: real or fake?) and that really bugs me.
This was me, back in high school, and my arc with Malcolm Gladwell roughly parallels yours.
Gladwell is a very big reason why I basically stopped reading and don't trust the vast majority of nonfiction books anymore, and certainly not anything that seems to tell too convenient and beautiful a story. It feels like I've been thoroughly and utterly tricked, and how on earth am I supposed to avoid falling into that trap again besides reading every critique of a book and assessing their quality and authority (lest they too turn out to be elaborately constructed scams) before I read the book itself?
posted by chrominance at 4:30 PM on October 22 [2 favorites]
If you've been reading Gladwell, sorry, but you're an idiot. And I've been judging you and thinking you really like Ted Talks, Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson. Develop a better taste of what the truth is. That's all I can do for you.
uhhh, thanks?
posted by kensington314 at 4:46 PM on October 22 [10 favorites]
uhhh, thanks?
posted by kensington314 at 4:46 PM on October 22 [10 favorites]
Develop a better taste of what the truth is. That's all I can do for you.
Harsh but fair? But also not constructive? Relatedly, I don't like the "it's not our job to educate you" line because there's a ton of Nazis online who counter with, "hey, we'll give you all the education you want!" But also it's really hard to believe that, say, Trump supporters don't realize why Trump is terrible and that they are, in fact, voting for him because of his racism and hateful personality, not in spite of it.
I don't know how to make horses drink. Especially when the horse is hopping from outrage to grievance to conspiracy to yelling to accusation and back again. But I'm going to guess that the road is long with many false starts and no shortcuts.
posted by AlSweigart at 5:10 PM on October 22 [3 favorites]
Harsh but fair? But also not constructive? Relatedly, I don't like the "it's not our job to educate you" line because there's a ton of Nazis online who counter with, "hey, we'll give you all the education you want!" But also it's really hard to believe that, say, Trump supporters don't realize why Trump is terrible and that they are, in fact, voting for him because of his racism and hateful personality, not in spite of it.
I don't know how to make horses drink. Especially when the horse is hopping from outrage to grievance to conspiracy to yelling to accusation and back again. But I'm going to guess that the road is long with many false starts and no shortcuts.
posted by AlSweigart at 5:10 PM on October 22 [3 favorites]
He's got an early article about criminal profiling that's so very good at integrating ideas on why profiling isn't really reliable, in a way that lines up with the research. And I kind of hate that, because I end up not wanting to use it in my class because it's him. Just ugh.
posted by bizzyb at 5:14 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
posted by bizzyb at 5:14 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
A very good academic friend of mine was talking about Gladwell once and how in Blink he doesn't mention Silvan Tomkins, the psychologist who developed Affect Theory, which was heavily influential on Paul Ekman's work, which Blink goes into detail about.
Tomkins was also a teacher of Ekman's.
This just seemed incredibly sloppy of Gladwell to me, and conversely that's what I always think of when I hear his name.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 5:51 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
Tomkins was also a teacher of Ekman's.
This just seemed incredibly sloppy of Gladwell to me, and conversely that's what I always think of when I hear his name.
posted by Phlegmco(tm) at 5:51 PM on October 22 [1 favorite]
If you've been reading Gladwell, sorry, but you're an idiot.
I read all sorts of things but I don’t necessarily agree with them. How else are you going to critique them?
posted by TedW at 5:57 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
I read all sorts of things but I don’t necessarily agree with them. How else are you going to critique them?
posted by TedW at 5:57 PM on October 22 [5 favorites]
Ok, how about develop a more discerning eye for the hucksters among us? Then go the opposite direction. If someone is selling you a philosophy or approach to life, go the other way. That's for free, too.
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 5:58 PM on October 22
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 5:58 PM on October 22
You don't have to READ them to have read them, man. I read enough to know he was a charlatan.
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 6:00 PM on October 22
posted by DeepSeaHaggis at 6:00 PM on October 22
I was so infuriated when the editors of The New Yorker printed Gladwell's moronic article about how anyone who smoked cannabis turned into a homicidal manic, it was just so stupid.
posted by ovvl at 6:41 PM on October 22
posted by ovvl at 6:41 PM on October 22
I stand by my assessment years ago that Gladwell is the greatest Composition II student of all time.
posted by Caxton1476 at 7:02 PM on October 22 [10 favorites]
posted by Caxton1476 at 7:02 PM on October 22 [10 favorites]
If the person with the naturally superior intellect could stop calling people idiots I’m sure we’d all appreciate that very much. So graceful.
posted by toodleydoodley at 7:18 PM on October 22 [9 favorites]
posted by toodleydoodley at 7:18 PM on October 22 [9 favorites]
Chotiner sure has gotten better since 2009. His review of Outliers linked in the post is smarmy and cheap. I haven't read Outliers and have no idea whether it's a good book, but even if it's bad, the review is bad too.
posted by escabeche at 8:47 PM on October 22
posted by escabeche at 8:47 PM on October 22
If your stuff is good, peer review...
If not, well...get out otfway
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 9:16 PM on October 22
If not, well...get out otfway
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 9:16 PM on October 22
Utterly preening - never read this author.
I do use the 10k something something as a joke, as in I have 7,837 more three-turns to practice until I really have it down.
posted by sammyo at 11:40 PM on October 22
I do use the 10k something something as a joke, as in I have 7,837 more three-turns to practice until I really have it down.
posted by sammyo at 11:40 PM on October 22
DeepSeaHaggis: Ok, how about develop a more discerning eye for the hucksters among us?
That sounds healthy, do you have any further suggestions? I'm a temporarily-inconvenienced great man of history (I'm sure) and I've made my whole personality this GenX "I'm slumming it because they're all hucksters, all the art is grift, all the text is selling something or compelling me, authoritarian-like."
posted by k3ninho at 12:20 AM on October 23 [3 favorites]
That sounds healthy, do you have any further suggestions? I'm a temporarily-inconvenienced great man of history (I'm sure) and I've made my whole personality this GenX "I'm slumming it because they're all hucksters, all the art is grift, all the text is selling something or compelling me, authoritarian-like."
posted by k3ninho at 12:20 AM on October 23 [3 favorites]
...but odds are if you work in a corporate environment, someone in your management chain, maybe someone pretty high up in that chain, reads Gladwell. And worse, maybe takes him seriously. Maybe placed a bulk order and passed out copies to all the execs.
The commercial success of Who Moved My Cheese? is due to managers bulk buying them for their soon-to-be-laid-off employees to tell them that "change" is good, actually, and don't spend any time thinking about it (or addressing the systemic causes through unionizing or legislation). Just accept it and move on to find new cheese.
If Books Could Kill calls it "demonic" and, yeah, that's the word I'd choose to describe how cynical and insidious (and bizarrely written) of a book it is.
posted by AlSweigart at 5:30 AM on October 23 [7 favorites]
The commercial success of Who Moved My Cheese? is due to managers bulk buying them for their soon-to-be-laid-off employees to tell them that "change" is good, actually, and don't spend any time thinking about it (or addressing the systemic causes through unionizing or legislation). Just accept it and move on to find new cheese.
If Books Could Kill calls it "demonic" and, yeah, that's the word I'd choose to describe how cynical and insidious (and bizarrely written) of a book it is.
posted by AlSweigart at 5:30 AM on October 23 [7 favorites]
how on earth am I supposed to avoid falling into that trap again besides reading every critique of a book and assessing their quality and authority (lest they too turn out to be elaborately constructed scams) before I read the book itself?
I worry about this too, but I've found it's generally less of a problem than I feared. Firstly, be suspicious of "grand narrative" books, as fun as they are; anything that's more focused is much more likely to be largely correct, and, as a bonus, often they end up being little microcosms of human experience anyway. Secondly, be suspicious of cross-disciplinary books written for a lay audience; generally they're relying on no-one having the exact experience required to double-check their facts.
Thirdly, if you've probably heard about the book, you can probably find people willing to disagree with it publicly. This was easier before Google made search worse, but you can punch in the name of the book and "criticisms" and find people who disagree with the book. Wikipedia often has summaries of counter-arguments, and sometimes it's on something like RationalWiki which is generally fairly reliable. You probably don't have the expertise to be able to assess other arguments, but you can generally get a sense of the motivations of who's doing it and what they object to - are they a crank, do they seem to have an ideological bias they can't keep a lid on, is it a technical argument.
posted by Merus at 5:33 AM on October 23 [2 favorites]
I worry about this too, but I've found it's generally less of a problem than I feared. Firstly, be suspicious of "grand narrative" books, as fun as they are; anything that's more focused is much more likely to be largely correct, and, as a bonus, often they end up being little microcosms of human experience anyway. Secondly, be suspicious of cross-disciplinary books written for a lay audience; generally they're relying on no-one having the exact experience required to double-check their facts.
Thirdly, if you've probably heard about the book, you can probably find people willing to disagree with it publicly. This was easier before Google made search worse, but you can punch in the name of the book and "criticisms" and find people who disagree with the book. Wikipedia often has summaries of counter-arguments, and sometimes it's on something like RationalWiki which is generally fairly reliable. You probably don't have the expertise to be able to assess other arguments, but you can generally get a sense of the motivations of who's doing it and what they object to - are they a crank, do they seem to have an ideological bias they can't keep a lid on, is it a technical argument.
posted by Merus at 5:33 AM on October 23 [2 favorites]
It's not like he's a public school teacher or anything.
A bookstore I've worked at used to order in all the required and recommended books for local high schools. All these kinds of books-- Gladwell and a lot of the others mentioned in this thread-- were always on those tables.
I don't think it's necessarily bad for teachers to assign bullshitty books as long as they are teaching students to keep an eye out for bullshit and encouraging them to have fun arguing and engaging with the text. I'm afraid though that most of them are just kind of indoctrinating their students with bootstrappy bullshit.
posted by BibiRose at 7:03 AM on October 23 [5 favorites]
A bookstore I've worked at used to order in all the required and recommended books for local high schools. All these kinds of books-- Gladwell and a lot of the others mentioned in this thread-- were always on those tables.
I don't think it's necessarily bad for teachers to assign bullshitty books as long as they are teaching students to keep an eye out for bullshit and encouraging them to have fun arguing and engaging with the text. I'm afraid though that most of them are just kind of indoctrinating their students with bootstrappy bullshit.
posted by BibiRose at 7:03 AM on October 23 [5 favorites]
It's not like he's a public school teacher or anything.
And also, he is a defacto public school teacher when he influences public school decision makers with his bad ideas. School admin types tend to love Gladwell. School teachers during the height of his popularity were taught his ideas as legitimate lessons in college. We can't act like an "influencer" isn't also affecting work on the ground level.
posted by phlyingpenguin at 7:07 AM on October 23 [5 favorites]
And also, he is a defacto public school teacher when he influences public school decision makers with his bad ideas. School admin types tend to love Gladwell. School teachers during the height of his popularity were taught his ideas as legitimate lessons in college. We can't act like an "influencer" isn't also affecting work on the ground level.
posted by phlyingpenguin at 7:07 AM on October 23 [5 favorites]
If someone is selling you a philosophy or approach to life, go the other way.
DeepSeaHaggis
But this sounds like a philosophy or approach to life so now I don't know what to do.
posted by star gentle uterus at 10:13 AM on October 23 [8 favorites]
DeepSeaHaggis
But this sounds like a philosophy or approach to life so now I don't know what to do.
posted by star gentle uterus at 10:13 AM on October 23 [8 favorites]
Nobody can literally magically, out of thin air, suss out the Truth. I read James Gleick's The Elegance Universe on string theory in high school, and thought it was the greatest thing. But 10 years ago I discovered Prof. Woit's blog who highly criticized the book for pandering to a lay audience and misrepresenting the actual state of scientific research in physics. Both are experts in their respective fields. If I didn't come across this dispute I wouldn't have known any better. Oftentimes you actually need different information, which comes from outside yourself. Being well-rounded in your readings can help.
posted by polymodus at 11:11 AM on October 23 [4 favorites]
posted by polymodus at 11:11 AM on October 23 [4 favorites]
My take on Gladwell and his ilk is that they appeal to someone whose literacy topped at the low end of PIAAC literacy proficiency level 3. This includes most people with a college degree in the US. Their life was spent learning from texts as final things, not treating texts as collections of evidence to be worked from. Watching my 6th grade son struggling into level 3 right now brings home just how weird and hard 4 and 5 are.
posted by madhadron at 12:38 PM on October 23
posted by madhadron at 12:38 PM on October 23
The commercial success of Who Moved My Cheese? is due to managers bulk buying them for their soon-to-be-laid-off employees to tell them that "change" is good
Can confirm
posted by St. Peepsburg at 2:21 PM on October 23 [2 favorites]
Can confirm
posted by St. Peepsburg at 2:21 PM on October 23 [2 favorites]
I used to attend a non fiction book club (met some amazingly interesting people there) but after 6 months it was clear these books all followed a trend of idea the author liked + hand picked anecdata + mild recommendations for humanity; this was late 2000s so peak Ted Talk time. And then we read one book about traffic and traffic patterns and I watched an interview with the author who was so clearly some Ivy League shit who wrote a book about some topic he didn’t care less about for the New York Times Bestseller List lulz and I just couldn’t anymore. Also gladwell has a sideshow bob punchable face.
posted by St. Peepsburg at 3:28 PM on October 23 [2 favorites]
posted by St. Peepsburg at 3:28 PM on October 23 [2 favorites]
If someone is selling you a philosophy or approach to life, go the other way.
DeepSeaHaggis
But this sounds like a philosophy or approach to life so now I don't know what to do.
Reminds me of someone I read complaining about those "Question Authority" bumper stickers.
'Like I'm supposed to blindly follow that advice??'
I enjoy Gladwell's stories- he's a great storyteller. I especially like his voice when reading his own stuff.
I've known for a while that (like Freidman) it's all Monday morning quarterbacking- there's no predictive value. It's only recently that I understood it's not necessarily accurate.
But I'm fine with a good story if I know it's fiction.
posted by MtDewd at 6:12 PM on October 23 [2 favorites]
DeepSeaHaggis
But this sounds like a philosophy or approach to life so now I don't know what to do.
Reminds me of someone I read complaining about those "Question Authority" bumper stickers.
'Like I'm supposed to blindly follow that advice??'
I enjoy Gladwell's stories- he's a great storyteller. I especially like his voice when reading his own stuff.
I've known for a while that (like Freidman) it's all Monday morning quarterbacking- there's no predictive value. It's only recently that I understood it's not necessarily accurate.
But I'm fine with a good story if I know it's fiction.
posted by MtDewd at 6:12 PM on October 23 [2 favorites]
I think I did read one of Malcolm Gladwell's early books and didn't twig to him being unreliable at the time. I'd stopped reading him for other reasons (his defence of Joe Paterno was gross) but for learning which authors to watch out for this here website is a good resource.
posted by mscibing at 8:58 AM on October 24
posted by mscibing at 8:58 AM on October 24
MtDewd: a friend of mine wore a "Question Authority" badge to school in the 90s, and confused his whole class.
Like, nobody could parse it. They kept challenging him:
Like, nobody could parse it. They kept challenging him:
"Who made you the Question Authority??"posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 2:11 AM on October 25 [2 favorites]
I mean, your friend could have been a big fan of the DC Comics character The Question, so.
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:36 AM on October 25
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:36 AM on October 25
He's defended Joe Paterno and napalm. He had a podcast (that never acknowledged any sponsorship) about the efficacy of a specific type of dish detergent, at a time when the manufacturer had launched a campaign to encourage people to run their dishwasher before it was entirely full, because it didn't matter. I'm reminded of the author of The Shangri La Diet who made a useful discovery once and then tried to strike oil over and over to the detriment of science. I even linked to one of his pieces 23 years ago. But I just can't read him any more.
posted by mecran01 at 9:05 AM on October 25 [1 favorite]
posted by mecran01 at 9:05 AM on October 25 [1 favorite]
« Older Queensland-first solar panel recycling plant | Let's get unlost Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by agatha_magatha at 9:32 AM on October 22 [4 favorites]