The little things do matter as the Butterfly Effect attests. Take DMRT3, a gene associated with movements in animal limbs as an example. Evidence reported online by Ben Panko* suggests that hybridization of horses by Vikings about a millennium ago led to more comfortable horseback rides through the gene's mutation. Relatively rapidly, the little mutation spread across the world.
Little ideas spread in even less time than hybrid horses because they give people “comfortable” mental rides. What little ideas and what comfortable mental rides? Well, of course, we can count cultural biases, political notions, and stereotypes. But among the most inhibiting little ideas that have shaped modern culture is the one based on “expertise.”
The roots of expertise grow in the dirt of early educational systems, the universities. The keepers of knowledge became increasingly more specialized. There is, of course, justification for specialization. No one can “know it all,” and with the spiraling increase in detail, people “concentrate” in “fields” of knowledge. So, a naturalist who knew something of geology in the eighteenth century gives way to someone who specializes in geomorphology. And the geomorphologists, for example, take on further specializations, such as coastal geomorphology. The same can be said for other intellectual endeavors, all those various areas of concentrated studies college students pursue on their way to a career. From undergraduate to graduate to post graduate work, specialization progressively dominates.
So, why do I say that “expertise” is limiting? Am I not aware of the significant work done by particle physicists at CERN or virus researchers at the CDC? Allay your doubts. I am aware, and I know that specialists contribute in very practical ways. But the danger of the little idea of “expertise” is that only specialists can contribute and that all others, the LAITY, have little to say on matters that increase our understanding.
Specialists rely on a scientific method for advancing knowledge. That’s the good news. So, Christopher Chabris and Joshua Hart “scientifically” refute the work of “outsiders.” The two Union College professors studied the “Triple Package” of success proposed by Yale professors Amy Chua and Jed Rubenfeld. Briefly, that “Triple Package” postulates success on: 1) A belief that a person’s group is innately superior to other groups; 2) A successful person is insecure; and 3) A successful person has great impulse control. “In this case, our [Chabris and Hart] studies affirmed that a person’s intelligence and socioeconomic background were the most powerful factors in explaining his or her success, and that the triple package was not — even when we carefully measured every element of it and considered all of the factors simultaneously.”
Back to the little idea. Even though they do refute the “Triple Package,” Chabris and Hart make an important point about the work of “outsiders” and “non-specialists.” In any specialization a culture of “only us” permeates members’ ranks. Yet, anecdotally, we can report numerous instances of “amateur” discoveries and propositions the “specialists” failed to consider and that appear to be valid even after scientific testing. As Chabris and Hart note:
Outsiders can make creative and even revolutionary contributions to a discipline, as the psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman did for economics. And professors do not further the advancement of knowledge by remaining aloof from debates where they can apply their expertise. Researchers should engage the public, dispel popular myths and even affirm “common sense” when the evidence warrants.**
Why should I have made you wade through this? You don’t have to be a specialist to have a valid idea or novel approach to any aspect of life. “Specialists” can fall into the same pit that all of us stumble into, the pit of “acceptable” knowledge. Once a specialist enters that pit, he or she might find it difficult to see some stranger standing outside the pit of habitual thinking, an amateur offering an extracting hand or at least a periscope that provides a new perspective to consider. One thousand years ago Vikings who were not geneticists or veterinary scientists with advanced degrees changed horseback riding forever. You, too, might provide some comfortable ride through a field of knowledge for which you have no “expertise.”
* http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/08/mutation-made-it-easier-ride-horses-evolved-more-1000-years-ago
**http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/10/opinion/sunday/how-not-to-explain-success.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FSociology&action=click&contentCollection=science®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=5&pgtype=collection&_r=0
Little ideas spread in even less time than hybrid horses because they give people “comfortable” mental rides. What little ideas and what comfortable mental rides? Well, of course, we can count cultural biases, political notions, and stereotypes. But among the most inhibiting little ideas that have shaped modern culture is the one based on “expertise.”
The roots of expertise grow in the dirt of early educational systems, the universities. The keepers of knowledge became increasingly more specialized. There is, of course, justification for specialization. No one can “know it all,” and with the spiraling increase in detail, people “concentrate” in “fields” of knowledge. So, a naturalist who knew something of geology in the eighteenth century gives way to someone who specializes in geomorphology. And the geomorphologists, for example, take on further specializations, such as coastal geomorphology. The same can be said for other intellectual endeavors, all those various areas of concentrated studies college students pursue on their way to a career. From undergraduate to graduate to post graduate work, specialization progressively dominates.
So, why do I say that “expertise” is limiting? Am I not aware of the significant work done by particle physicists at CERN or virus researchers at the CDC? Allay your doubts. I am aware, and I know that specialists contribute in very practical ways. But the danger of the little idea of “expertise” is that only specialists can contribute and that all others, the LAITY, have little to say on matters that increase our understanding.
Specialists rely on a scientific method for advancing knowledge. That’s the good news. So, Christopher Chabris and Joshua Hart “scientifically” refute the work of “outsiders.” The two Union College professors studied the “Triple Package” of success proposed by Yale professors Amy Chua and Jed Rubenfeld. Briefly, that “Triple Package” postulates success on: 1) A belief that a person’s group is innately superior to other groups; 2) A successful person is insecure; and 3) A successful person has great impulse control. “In this case, our [Chabris and Hart] studies affirmed that a person’s intelligence and socioeconomic background were the most powerful factors in explaining his or her success, and that the triple package was not — even when we carefully measured every element of it and considered all of the factors simultaneously.”
Back to the little idea. Even though they do refute the “Triple Package,” Chabris and Hart make an important point about the work of “outsiders” and “non-specialists.” In any specialization a culture of “only us” permeates members’ ranks. Yet, anecdotally, we can report numerous instances of “amateur” discoveries and propositions the “specialists” failed to consider and that appear to be valid even after scientific testing. As Chabris and Hart note:
Outsiders can make creative and even revolutionary contributions to a discipline, as the psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman did for economics. And professors do not further the advancement of knowledge by remaining aloof from debates where they can apply their expertise. Researchers should engage the public, dispel popular myths and even affirm “common sense” when the evidence warrants.**
Why should I have made you wade through this? You don’t have to be a specialist to have a valid idea or novel approach to any aspect of life. “Specialists” can fall into the same pit that all of us stumble into, the pit of “acceptable” knowledge. Once a specialist enters that pit, he or she might find it difficult to see some stranger standing outside the pit of habitual thinking, an amateur offering an extracting hand or at least a periscope that provides a new perspective to consider. One thousand years ago Vikings who were not geneticists or veterinary scientists with advanced degrees changed horseback riding forever. You, too, might provide some comfortable ride through a field of knowledge for which you have no “expertise.”
* http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/08/mutation-made-it-easier-ride-horses-evolved-more-1000-years-ago
**http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/10/opinion/sunday/how-not-to-explain-success.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FSociology&action=click&contentCollection=science®ion=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=5&pgtype=collection&_r=0
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