Quote:
Originally Posted by Slava
Anything glaring where he was way off base? I’m just curious because a lot of the topics he covers are things I don’t know much about. I do think some of the lines he draws between things are a little tenuous at times, but it’s really good entertainment.
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I haven't listened to an episode recently, but wouldnt say its a matter of glaring errors, its more of a dunning kruger problem. He's not wrong, but hes also not litterally right, and his accertions should be qualified as just that, accertions not facts.
I think with Gladwell the easy example is taking credit for Andres Ericssons work on deliberate practice being required to excel in a feild, boiling it down to a simple tag line, and then telling people anyone who puts 10,000 hours into something will become an expert at it. While he's not really wrong, its not his work, and its also not really right. The real work says that you need to put in concerted amounts of deliberate practice to excel, and 10,000 hours is a median amount of practice to rank amoung the worlds best at something, its not true for everyone.
In itself its not a bad thing, but if you get too many people credulously listnening to these guys, you end up with psudoscience gurus, so its important to keep that in the back of your mind and take anything these guys say with a grain of salt.
Generally if you like Revisionist history, I would reccomend Freakenomics as a better alternative. When they want to get into specific research, they are allot more likely to go right to the source.