I haven’t read ‘Outliers’ yet but something else I have just finished reading is Talent is Overrated by Geoff Colvin. This is a very interesting, but for me slightly unnerving, book. It is interesting because it clearly makes the point that ‘success’ in any given field is largely due to what Colvin calls deliberate (i.e. well-designed) practice. In other words talent is not genetic or God-given. This is unnerving because a) I wished I had started various things a lot earlier and b) because I have always thought (and still do) that serious talent (i.e. genius) is just something that’s in the ether (i.e. it’s either a combination of events that cannot be controlled or it’s genetics mixed with opportunity).

More precisely I agree that it is possible to master any pre-existing field or domain with enough practice (about 10,000 hours apparently — a figure that Malcolm Gladwell also uses in his new book ‘Outliers’). However, I really do believe that when it comes to inventing new domains or genres something else is at play. Maybe it’s luck. Maybe it’s imagination. Maybe we’ll never know.

I’ve just finished ‘The Collapse of Globalization and the Reinvention of the World’ by John Ralston Saul. This book was published in 2005 and I’ve had it sitting on a pile next to my bed since 2006. I’m a big fan of Ralston Saul but this book slightly disappoints (The Unconscious Civilization and the Doubter’s Companion seemed much better to me).  Nevertheless there are more than a few good ideas explored in the book.

Ideas

The decline of globalization (remember when this was written!)
The rise of fear
The rise of false populism (connects to the rise of fear obviously)
The growth of patriotism (again linked to fear or ‘them’)
The idea that modern warfare is about learning how to fight the weak
The emergence of protectionism (again, remember he was writing in 2005/6)
The rise of God in politics
Impacts of mass migration

Factoids

Most of the 40 million war deaths since 1945, including the 22 million since 1970 (!) have occurred, not in battle, but in irregular warfare or as a result of it.

From 1968 to 2000 there were 14,000 terrorist attacks worldwide, causing 10,000 dead (rather round numbers don’t you think?). In the US there were 457 terrorist attacks between 1980-1999, mainly by Americans on Americans.

BTW, I’m just finishing off Black Swan: The Impact of The Highly Improbable.