Tetlock and the Taliban An Essay by Richard Hanania richardhanania.substack.com How a humiliating military loss proves that so much of our so-called "expertise" is fake, and the case against specialization and intellectual diversity. The lesson of Tetlock (and the Afghanistan War), is that while you certainly shouldn’t be getting all your information from your uncle’s Facebook Wall, there is no reason to start with a strong prior that people with medical degrees know more than any intelligent person who honestly looks at the available data. What excellence is experienceacademiaexpertise
Pointing at things An Article by Austin Kleon austinkleon.com The story goes that the painter Al Held said, “Conceptual art is just pointing at things,” so John Baldessari decided to take him literally, and commissioned a bunch of amateur painters to paint realistic paintings of hands pointing at things. As I wrote in Steal Like An Artist, “Step 1: Wonder at something. Step 2: Invite others to wonder with you.” Point at things, say, “whoa,” and elaborate. PointingRe: Pointing at thingsLooking Closely is Everything interestcuriosityseeing