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While this stance sounds nice, it doesn't actually make much sense in reality. It appeals to our cultural want for 'justice'/'fairness'/'equality', but it doesn
by oblique63 13y ago
While this stance sounds nice, it doesn't actually make much sense in reality. It appeals to our cultural want for 'justice'/'fairness'/'equality', but it doesn't quite pan out once you look at the general picture of skill acquisition.
If a person learned to become exceptionally 'talented' in one area, then he/she's more likely to replicate that same level success in a completely new area, than someone who hasn't gained that level of skill anywhere. This is because skill acquisition itself is a skill. So once you've learned what it takes to master a certain skill (i.e. you learned how to learn effectively), you can then apply it with much more ease than someone who hasn't really learned how to learn as much. This causes a sort of 'snowball-effect' outcome, where ease of skill acquisition follows a logarithmic curve of sorts rather than a linear/exponential one like most people seem to view it.
The only limiting factor on skill acquisition is choice/taste. If a particular area doesn't interest you, then why bother expending energy learning to master it, right? Doesn't mean you're not capable of it, all it means is that you didn't have to strive for greatness in that area to make it work for you. And since Jobs met Woz pretty early on, there was really no reason for him to become a master engineer thereafter. Meanwhile, Woz probably just didn't care about business/marketing, so he chose to not master it.
There are other factors that influence skill acquisition (e.g. IQ), but they don't necessarily limit it. And in order for the 'fair' view of skill acquisition to hold, there would need to be some sort of non-trainable limiting mechanism for building skills. But as of now, I'm not familiar of anything that would cause that.
The only way the "Jack of all trades; master of none" mantra holds, is if the 'Jack' never deeply learnt/'mastered' any of the subjects he's familiar with. But of course, the label "Jack of all trades" doesn't actually specify whether-or-not that's actually the case. Same for "well-rounded"; implying it indicates anything other than breadth of knowledge is inaccurate.
- stiff 13y agoWithout references your comment is worthless.
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- oblique63 13y agoNo, worth can be drawn simply by applying the model I outlined above. References may add more worth if you're looking for verification (which I don't blame), but it's also a daunting task to compile such lists. Your comment on the other hand, could've just asked me for sources and that would've been productive, but instead you chose to just dismiss the entire argument cynically with a single statement; that literally doesn't add any value for anybody. I wish downvotes would be justified more deeply than this. However, since it is useful, here are some resources to begin learning about what intelligence and cognitive research have to say about the matter: http://www.amazon.com/The-Talent-Code-Greatness-Grown/dp/055380684X/ http://www.amazon.com/The-Talent-Code-Greatness-Grown/dp/055... http://www.amazon.com/The-Genius-All-Us-Insights/dp/0307387305 http://www.amazon.com/The-Genius-All-Us-Insights/dp/03073873... http://healthland.time.com/2012/12/26/motivation-not-iq-matters-most-for-learning-new-math-skills/ http://healthland.time.com/2012/12/26/motivation-not-iq-matt... http://www.cogmed.com/impact-working-memory-training-young-people-social-emotional-behavioral-difficulties http://www.cogmed.com/impact-working-memory-training-young-p... http://www.cogmed.com/working-memory-but-not-iq-predicts-subsequent-learning-in-children-with-learning-difficulties http://www.cogmed.com/working-memory-but-not-iq-predicts-sub... http://www.cogmed.com/working-memory-training-generalize-improve-offtask-behavior-children-attentiondeficithyperactivity-disorder http://www.cogmed.com/working-memory-training-generalize-imp... http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~antonvillado/courses/09a_psyc630001/Ackerman%20(1987)%20PB.pdf http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~antonvillado/courses/09a_psyc630... http://reports-archive.adm.cs.cmu.edu/anon/ml2009/CMU-ML-09-102.pdf http://reports-archive.adm.cs.cmu.edu/anon/ml2009/CMU-ML-09-... http://jabba.edb.utexas.edu/it/enhancingCognitiveSkill.pdf http://jabba.edb.utexas.edu/it/enhancingCognitiveSkill.pdf There are plenty more resources out there, and I'm sure there are much better ones too. But the implication of all this is that learning is a skill, and that you can learn how to learn better. We may not yet thoroughly understand how generalized learning takes place in the brain, but it does seem to be a function of working memory and motivation, which can be improved. Generalized learning is segmented more finely than how I described it originally, but it still functions the same way (e.g. learning to juggle may not help you learn a new language better, but learning to play a musical instrument may help you to learn the other two more easily, since it incorporates language skills through music, and motor skills through playing). Making an argument against this model would place the burden of proof on that side, because as I mentioned before, there is no known mechanism that would lead to the outcome outlined by the 'fair'/balanced model, and it would have to explain away phenomena like neuroplasticity that seem to directly oppose it.
- stiff 13y agoWow. So you HN guys just accept statements like those on faith?
- chiph 13y agoPeople here at HN don't just know how use a search engine ... they write search engines.