Guest Post by Nassim Taleb
What we have been seeing worldwide, from India to the UK to the US, is the rebellion against the inner circle of no-skin-in-the-game policymaking “clerks” and journalists-insiders, that class of paternalistic semi-intellectual experts with some Ivy league, Oxford-Cambridge, or similar label-driven education who are telling the rest of us 1) what to do, 2) what to eat, 3) how to speak, 4) how to think… and 5) who to vote for.
But the problem is the one-eyed following the blind: these self-described members of the “intelligentsia” can’t find a coconut in Coconut Island, meaning they aren’t intelligent enough to define intelligence hence fall into circularities — but their main skill is capacity to pass exams written by people like them. With psychology papers replicating less than 40%, dietary advice reversing after 30 years of fatphobia, macroeconomic analysis working worse than astrology, the appointment of Bernanke who was less than clueless of the risks, and pharmaceutical trials replicating at best only 1/3 of the time, people are perfectly entitled to rely on their own ancestral instinct and listen to their grandmothers (or Montaigne and such filtered classical knowledge) with a better track record than these policymaking goons.
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Indeed one can see that these academico-bureaucrats who feel entitled to run our lives aren’t even rigorous, whether in medical statistics or policymaking. They can’t tell science from scientism — in fact in their image-oriented minds scientism looks more scientific than real science. (For instance it is trivial to show the following: much of what the Cass-Sunstein-Richard Thaler types — those who want to “nudge” us into some behavior — much of what they would classify as “rational” or “irrational” (or some such categories indicating deviation from a desired or prescribed protocol) comes from their misunderstanding of probability theory and cosmetic use of first-order models.) They are also prone to mistake the ensemble for the linear aggregation of its components as we saw in the chapter extending the minority rule.
The Intellectual Yet Idiot is a production of modernity hence has been accelerating since the mid twentieth century, to reach its local supremum today, along with the broad category of people without skin-in-the-game who have been invading many walks of life. Why? Simply, in most countries, the government’s role is between five and ten times what it was a century ago (expressed in percentage of GDP). The IYI seems ubiquitous in our lives but is still a small minority and is rarely seen outside specialized outlets, think tanks, the media, and universities — most people have proper jobs and there are not many openings for the IYI.
Beware the semi-erudite who thinks he is an erudite. He fails to naturally detect sophistry.
The IYI pathologizes others for doing things he doesn’t understand without ever realizing it is his understanding that may be limited. He thinks people should act according to their best interests and he knows their interests, particularly if they are “red necks” or English non-crisp-vowel class who voted for Brexit. When plebeians do something that makes sense to them, but not to him, the IYI uses the term “uneducated”. What we generally call participation in the political process, he calls by two distinct designations: “democracy” when it fits the IYI, and “populism” when the plebeians dare voting in a way that contradicts his preferences. While rich people believe in one tax dollar one vote, more humanistic ones in one man one vote, Monsanto in one lobbyist one vote, the IYI believes in one Ivy League degree one-vote, with some equivalence for foreign elite schools and PhDs as these are needed in the club.
More socially, the IYI subscribes to The New Yorker. He never curses on twitter. He speaks of “equality of races” and “economic equality” but never went out drinking with a minority cab driver (again, no real skin in the game as the concept is foreign to the IYI). Those in the U.K. have been taken for a ride by Tony Blair. The modern IYI has attended more than one TEDx talks in person or watched more than two TED talks on Youtube. Not only did he vote for Hillary Monsanto-Malmaison because she seems electable and some such circular reasoning, but holds that anyone who doesn’t do so is mentally ill.
The IYI has a copy of the first hardback edition of The Black Swan on his shelves, but mistakes absence of evidence for evidence of absence. He believes that GMOs are “science”, that the “technology” is not different from conventional breeding as a result of his readiness to confuse science with scientism.
Typically, the IYI get the first order logic right, but not second-order (or higher) effects making him totally incompetent in complex domains. In the comfort of his suburban home with 2-car garage, he advocated the “removal” of Gadhafi because he was “a dictator”, not realizing that removals have consequences (recall that he has no skin in the game and doesn’t pay for results).
The IYI has been wrong, historically, on Stalinism, Maoism, GMOs, Iraq, Libya, Syria, lobotomies, urban planning, low carbohydrate diets, gym machines, behaviorism, transfats, freudianism, portfolio theory, linear regression, Gaussianism, Salafism, dynamic stochastic equilibrium modeling, housing projects, selfish gene, election forecasting models, Bernie Madoff (pre-blowup) and p-values. But he is convinced that his current position is right.
The IYI is member of a club to get traveling privileges; if social scientist he uses statistics without knowing how they are derived (like Steven Pinker and psycholophasters in general); when in the UK, he goes to literary festivals; he drinks red wine with steak (never white); he used to believe that fat was harmful and has now completely reversed; he takes statins because his doctor told him to do so; he fails to understand ergodicity and when explained to him, he forgets about it soon later; he doesn’t use Yiddish words even when talking business; he studies grammar before speaking a language; he has a cousin who worked with someone who knows the Queen; he has never read Frederic Dard, Libanius Antiochus, Michael Oakeshot, John Gray, Amianus Marcellinus, Ibn Battuta, Saadiah Gaon, or Joseph De Maistre; he has never gotten drunk with Russians; he never drank to the point when one starts breaking glasses (or, preferably, chairs); he doesn’t even know the difference between Hecate and Hecuba (which in Brooklynese is “can’t tell sh**t from shinola”); he doesn’t know that there is no difference between “pseudointellectual” and “intellectual” in the absence of skin in the game; has mentioned quantum mechanics at least twice in the past five years in conversations that had nothing to do with physics.
He knows at any point in time what his words or actions are doing to his reputation.
But a much easier marker: he doesn’t even deadlift.
Not a IYI
Yep. Our ruling class are a bunch of pseudo-educated pansies who can’t even do moderately complex math.. whose dedication to the current idiotic Narrative has wrecked almost every institution in the West.
Bravo! and I admit I don’t know half of what Nassim was writing but then I guess that makes me a fully qualified IYI! Now can I get a job teaching ‘ethics’ at William and Mary because I don’t think Jim Comey will be available in the fall.
My brother is an insufferable IYI and it has destroyed our brotherhood. He would rather have his poorly supported beliefs than have them challenged by his own brother, so he goes on in life without a brother.
I now know more about what I don’t know.
Gotta love Taleb; I find his contempt delicious and his range of knowledge humbling.
Another thing the IYI don’t understand is the power of demographics. If they did, they wouldn’t get blindsided by demographic changes. Continually! Because demographics doesn’t fit the IYI’s world-view, they keep making the same mistakes over and over. Sort of like insanity.
IYI… mistakes absence of evidence for evidence of absence
I am SO GONNA PLAGIARIZE that onederful peace of punditry.
This is a very erudite way of explaining that many intelligent people exhibit ZERO common sense, and living amongst their peers, they have zero exposure to the ROW. This bubble universe is temporary, as the bubble is wholly dependent on their wealth, and being herd animals, their wealth is all in stocks and bonds and other “wealth retention” vehicles that rely on – you guessed it – stock and bond chicanery.
This is the group that Darwinism should have reduced long ago, but modern civilization has held their numbers up artificially. One notices rather quickly that IYI do not exist in any kind of numbers within shithole countries – only in ‘civilized’ countries.
I have read many comments lately that our own country is progressing down the shithole chute rather glamorously. Darwinism never sleeps – it just takes a nap.
Most other teachers’ classes are just 1 long indoctrination tirade by people the students look at as uncool. Most teachers are intellectuals, yet idiots.
As an educator from the old school, I was taught my job is to present as much info as possible to students and let them make their own damn decisions. Teach them how to think, not what to think!
Not sure what that makes me, but I know I don’t know everything and there’s always someone smarter.
Name Dropper!
He forgot to mention that they never even considered the possibility, much less predict, that Trump would win. Full disclosure, I didn’t predict it, either , although I did tell a friend a few days before the election that I still thought it was a toss-up.
I will take the good old fashioned common sense and wisdom advise over the advice of well indoctrinated individual any time.
Universities are not meant to educate. They are literally brain washing concentration camp institutions. Every terrible policy other than slavery in this country originated in universities.
The University Hustle – Andrea Iravani
American Universities – Of Lab Mice and Mad Men – Andrea Iravani
The IYI cohort have fully infected the national capitol region over the last 30 odd years and that is why they are now screaming in pain at not only the thought of President Trump but the reality that he is winning……..