The Trouble with Malcolm Gladwell?

Here's a contrarian take on Gladwell from John Gray at the New Republic: "Malcolm Gladwell Is America's Best-Paid Fairy-Tale Writer:The heavily-footnoted uplift of 'David and Goliath'"--

What is striking about Gladwell’s work is not its distance from academic theorizing but the uncritical reverence that he displays toward the academic mind. He describes himself as a storyteller, but for him the story is never enough; it must be supported, and thereby legitimated, by prestigious academic studies and copious references. He is a high priest in the cult of “studies.” He feels on safe ground only when he is able to render his story into the supposed exactitude of quantitative social science. “How often do you think the bigger side wins?” he asks rhetorically. The reader does not have to wait long for an answer: “When the political scientist Ivan Arreguín-Toft did the calculation a few years ago, what he came up with was 71.5 percent. Just under a third of the time, the weaker country wins.“

I've only read Gladwell's first book, The Tipping Point, though not due to any objection to his "uncritical reverence" for the "academic mind." I've always enjoyed his magazine pieces in the New Yorker. Gladwell is rarely boring. I'll probably read his other books in time.

Comments

[Saurabh Chandra]

Regading the theory propogated by Malcom Gladwell in his Book " The Blink" , I wish to bring a few points in your kind notice :
According to Evan gladwell, when questions of analysis and personal choice start to get complicated - when we have to juggle many different variable (in the process of decision making) - then our unconcious thought process (intuitive repulsion or the Blink) may be superior. He further states that , decisions should be made on the basis of "this blink" as they are exact and correct. This principle has been reflected here in there in various religious/spiritual texts with no scientific evidences, records and approval. Even I found the author confused and failed to advocate his principal. Mearly quoting incidents, examples and experiments (some of which are not even relevant to intuitive repulsion) and concluding this principle has made it not acceptable . When the author presented this theory before the scholars of Haward Law school, he faced complete rejection.Intuitive repulsion is not universal and it occurs not very often. The world is entirely trained and habitual of making decisions based on calculations made by conscious brain, which selects an available option from the available options. Focus is on making these decisions more scientific.
Even if we keep this principle in the center of our hypothesis, It would be very difficult (not impossible but risky) to prove this hypothesis with traditional or existing scientific research mathodologies. It is risky to prove that a snap judgement can be far more effective than cautious decision, on the basis of statistical data, may be it can not be proved. just like the concept of God can not be proved scientifically. It can be proved theoratically but that would move beyond the lines of science and enter into the domain of ethics , most probably philosophy. Research methodology can be created. This research can also enter into the domain of religion, which can be quantitatively avaioded but can not qualitatively ignored. It would be interesting to prove it in India which is the mother of spirituality.
Some shades of existing decision making theories might touch this attribute of human mind, for which understanding and analysis of the theories would be required.