TWO RULES UNDERPINNING THE INTELLECTUAL PURSUIT
TWO RULES UNDERPINNING THE INTELLECTUAL PURSUIT
Noteworthy – November 2008
Hardly a day passes that I am not in a conversation with an economist or intellectual of some sort and discussing how to go about the task of figuring out what is reality and then describing – to a global audience – this reality. There is a good amount of envy and indeed jealousy oozing from these conversations, though I admit that most of the time they are friendly in nature and tone. There is no bitterness or animosity. But there is recognition that a problem does exist, and that this problem manifests itself in a most embarrassing way. The intellectual cannot do the job the proper way; or to put it more bluntly and openly, the intellectual fails to understand the problem, and also fails to predict future events. The intellectual is exposed as having a weak understanding of the matter at hand. The “expertise” of the intellectual is called into question. The intellectual looks like a fool or even charlatan.
I will confess that I was a teenager when I first realized that I would have to respect two basic rules if I was to be successful in the intellectual pursuit, any intellectual pursuit. I just did not believe anyone when they told me that they had expertise. This typically drew laughter from me. I recall laying out two very fundamental rules underpinning the intellectual pursuit, which I was to follow quite religiously all my life.
GET INTIMATELY ACQUAINTED WITH ALL DOCTRINE, THEORY, IDEOLOGY AND DOGMA, BUT REFUSE TO ALLOW THESE IDEAS TO GOVERN AND SHAPE YOUR THINKING.
GET INTIMATELY ACQUAINTED WITH ALL MATTERS OR PLACES WHICH COMMAND YOUR ATTENTION, BUT REFUSE TO COMMENT UNLESS YOU HAVE PERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH THESE MATTERS OR PLACES.
It is amazing that these two rules are so ignored. I am not sure they are even recognized as such. There is this astonishing belief (or delusion) that we need only get a PhD, and after going about pursuing the standard professional path, we will possibly (or likely) achieve some modest successes. This is shockingly stupid. It is just wishful thinking. It is nonsense. Nothing guarantees success in the intellectual pursuits. The two rules I list above merely serve as a beginning, as a very flimsy foundation for a career in the intellectual pursuits. We want to change the world with our ideas? Well, we had better pledge a religious adherence to these two rules. Then we had best get to work, and follow our “instincts.” Failure should be expected. Success is a very rare event, very rare indeed.
December 17th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Two comments:
“…foundation for a career in the intellectual pursuits.” There’s no direct link between career and intellectual pursuit. Being an intellectual might eventually help your career — whatever it is, but do not make it the end goal. You can have one or the other, both or none and still life goes on.
“…pledge a religious adherence to these two rules.” Rhetorical, I know, but how to convince non-religious people to adhere? You see how proposed bold sentence weakens with a simple question? Be prepared to question every opinion, specially your own. Be more analytical, the world is already full of rhetorics.
December 18th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
“GET INTIMATELY ACQUAINTED WITH ALL MATTERS OR PLACES WHICH COMMAND YOUR ATTENTION, BUT REFUSE TO COMMENT UNLESS YOU HAVE PERSONAL EXPERIENCE WITH THESE MATTERS OR PLACES.”
Dude, you’d empty out a third of the interwebs if people followed this.
December 18th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
this is nothing more than a variant of Schrödinger’s cat….
December 18th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
How about:
Find out what works
Do it
December 18th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
How about:
If someone can’t explain to you what they do clearly, in a sentence or two, using words of one syllable…
They are full of it. Intellectual or otherwise.
Anyone who wants to explain or teach something to another needs to understand it deeply first.
December 18th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
@leftback: I grew up in the UK. All teachers at a minimum needed a degree in the subject they were teaching and most had worked in their industry for many years. Teaching was kind of a semi-retirement for many, and the anecdotes they shared were often more valuable than whatever the curriculum said.
It amazed me when I moved to the USA to learn that not only were so many teachers “academics” with no real-world experience, but they even had university students tutoring other students. I guess the fact that you passed last year’s exam means you’re qualified enough to lead the freshmen through passing last year’s exam.
December 18th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
Barry, you’re a rare breed. I think most of us as teenagers (myself included) fell in love with one ideology or another because it gave us a (false) sense of identity that filled a hole. Seems like it took me an awfully long time to start to discern the shit from shinola in my own thinking, let alone others’…
I hope you’ve read the Richard Feynman books. He was all about questioning received opinions and is a personal hero. Anyone who hasn’t read his essay on “Cargo Cult Science” needs to do so asap.
December 18th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
I’ll be honest. I don’t really know what you mean by ‘intellectual.’ An academic? Pundit? News commentator? Political appointee? Fortune 500 CEO? Thomas Jefferson?
Because I don’t understand what an ‘intellectual’ is in your essay, I feel as if you are speaking in code to a handful of the boys *wink wink* who know what you really mean.
December 18th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
…except hollywood actors, because they are so good at pretending.
December 18th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Regarding WAM
While I found the recommendation about avoiding ideological straight jackets valuable, I would note that further down on the WAM website there is a book review of something written by a G. Celente (odd) and if you scroll further down, the author’s anti-semitism becomes apparent. This stuff is just a little goofy. Sounds like a bad translation of President Ah’m a Dinner Jacket’s Super Secret Diary.
Excerpt [my reproductionn of the excerpt is not an endorsement of the WAM site's content, quite the contrary]:
“THE REALITIES OF EIOK AND EROI
The total destruction of Israel will be an awesome sight, and it would appear that many Jews will lose their lives – if they do not flee. War is coming, violence is coming, and of course this is because this is what the human animal is all about – predation. This is history, the force and power of history. We either respect others, or suffer their wrath when we have fallen from grace. The Jews respect only themselves, and so they will be destroyed, their delusions of grandeur destroyed. “
December 18th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
“….as a very flimsy foundation for a career in the intellectual pursuits…”
I respectfully disagree; keeping an open mind is a strong foundation for intellectual pursuit.
The author almost sound Zen / gnostic :c)
December 18th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
“If1 someone2 can’t2 explain2 to1 you1 what1 they1 do1 clearly2, in1 a1 sentence2 or1 two1, using2 words1 of1 one1 syllable3…
They1 are1 full1 of1 it1. Intellectual5 or1 otherwise3.”
he1 he1, just1 being2 factious3 : )1
December 18th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
and, differently: “There aren’t some serious Questions that need Answering, There are some serious Answers that need Questioning.”
~~
MRegan,
while I’m not, in any way, supportive of that clip, if we never hewed the Dross, we’d have no Gold..
December 18th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
Yeah, because we know that true “intellectuals” always USE THE CAPLOCK TO EXPLAIN ARBITRARY RULES, FOLLOWED RELIGIOUSLY, WHICH THEREBY QUALIFY ONE’S THOUGHT AS INTELLECTUALISM.
Also, Feynman might well have been referring to economists in the “Cargo Cult” piece. Like Krugman, for example.
Wouldn’t this World Affairs Monthly outfit be a good merger fit for Deep Capture?
~~~
BR: No, WAM is mostly rational
December 18th, 2008 at 10:24 pm
Sorry, could have sworn the by-line said Barry Ritholtz earlier and not “Guest Author”…
Damn, Barry, this Pochari chap is a little facile in his political theories, no? Provocative, yes, but maybe a little on the Lyndon LaRouche side?
December 19th, 2008 at 10:50 am
What was our original face before we were born? We spend a lifetime accumulating habits and one ideology or another. None of it provides any insight as to what was our original face.
December 19th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
I think therefor I am
a simple organism in the sea – that feeds off the basic elements of the sea
therefor I will not perish until the sea ceases to exist
so save the seas
NOT … quite
I am a complex organism – on a complex planet
operated by other complex organisms
that many care less about saving the seas
so save the seas
The Beatles – Octopus’s Garden
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqd6yF4SrmI
December 19th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
I am an academic in one of the insecure social science disciplines. Myimpression is that often people get the farthest who are irrationally or ignorantly devoted to some proposition or set of ideas. I think most well-known ideas in my field are true part of the time, but never most or all of the time, and unfortunately it is very hard to predict when they will be or won’t be the right ones. The actual situation is so complex and unmanageable that it is mostly those who have oversimplified the problem, and pressed ahead with unjustified confidence who both succeed, and who produce interesting work.
I have not seen a way around this problem.