Learning From Literature

Range by David Epstein

Cover of Range by David Epstein

Range: Why Generalists Triumph In A Specialized World by David Epstein is a self-help book published in 2019.

We are often told the earlier we start and the more we specialize, the more we will stand out. A commonly cited example is Tiger Woods, who was winning his first golf tournament at 2 years old, and by 4, he was beating grown men and raking in money on bets from disbelievers. On the other hand, Roger Federer represents a different approach. Throughout childhood, he played squash, wrestling, swimming, skateboarding, basketball, handball, tennis, table tennis, badminton, soccer, and skiing, not emphasizing any particular one.

Early prodigies turning into superstars like Tiger Woods make great stories but are ultimately far less common (as shown by research). In Range, Epstein breaks down why the ability to draw upon a wide range of outside experiences, not early specialization, is becoming increasingly valuable for our modern society.

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Enjoy!

Table of Contents

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In The Time Of The Revolution by Alan Axelrod

Introduction: Roger vs. Tiger
  • Elites typically devote less time to deliberate practice early on
    • “Sampling Period” → variety of experiences in unstructured environment, gain a range of proficiencies + learn about their own abilities
    • Only later do they ramp up in one area
  • Parallel Trenches Analogy
    • Specialization = digging deeper into your own trench without looking in the next trench over, even though your solution probably resides there
    • Best problem solvers increase impact by drawing upon experiences in different domains (like connecting the trenches)
The Cult of the Head Start
  • Whether experience leads to expertise depends on the domain
  • Kind Environments
    • Repetitive patterns + accurate, rapid feedback
    • Chess → pieces moved according to rules within defined boundaries
    • Extensive, repetitive practice → instinctive pattern recognition → expertise
  • Wicked Environments
    • Unclear rules, delayed / inaccurate feedback, may not have patterns
    • Financial / political trends, human interactions, etc
    • Experience does NOT lead to skill
  • Since most environments are wicked, we need range, not specialization
    • Range — ability to draw on outside experiences + integrate broadly
    • Have “one foot outside your world”
  • Examples
    • Steve Jobs → calligraphy class in college → Mac’s multiple typefaces + proportionally-spaced fonts 
    • Claude Shannon → philosophy class teaching 1 = true statements, 0 = false statements, and logic problems can be solved like math → created system to encode and transmit information electronically (fundamental of computers)
    • Nobel laureates → 22x+ more likely than other scientists to have been an amateur actor, dancer, magician, musician, sculptor, painter, printmaker, woodworker, mechanic, electronics tinkerer, glass-blower, poet, or writer
Kind vs Wicket Environments Chart
How the Wicked World Was Made
  • Modernity → more complexity in life → more powerful abstract thinking → less reliance needed on direct experiences to understand
  • Learn how to think before what to think about
    • Understand the why → better recall, flexible across domains
    • American education pushes specialization, not conceptual + transferable learning
    • College Seniors → no correlation between GPA & broad conceptual thinking skills
  • Thinking broadly is increasingly necessary
    • A kind world based on repeating patterns is fine when you stay in the same village your whole life, but our world is changing faster & faster — a wicked environment
    • The more specific / repetitive a challenge, the more likely it will be automated
When Less of the Same Is More
  • Sampling is an integral part of deep learning
    • Allows you to build out conceptual schemes / maps of how the activity works
    • Breadth of training predicts breadth of transfer (creativity / problem solving)
  • Music School Research
    • Top players play on average 3+ instruments
    • Too many lessons at young age is not helpful
    • Previous practice time was not indicator of exceptionality
    • Top players more likely to come from less musically active families, played less, and started later
Learning, Fast and Slow
  • 2 Types Of Questions
    • Procedural → practice something just learned (practice problems)
    • Connection → to grasp a broader concept (why solution works)
  • The most effective learning strategies are challenging, slow, and frustrating
    • Shortcuts that boost immediate performance (hints, cramming, etc) undermine long-term progress
  • Current Performance ≠ Learning
    • The feeling of learning is just before-your-eyes progress
  • View your topic as a system, not a set of procedures to memorize
    • Useful Knowledge → flexible, mental schemes matchable to new problems
    • Far Transfer → When a knowledge structure is so flexible it can be applied effectively even in new domains / situations
  • Tools That Enhance Learning
    • Testing → quiz yourself (even if wrong / don’t know it yet)
    • Spacing → leave time between practice sessions (moves to long-term memory)
    • Interleaving → mix topics, don’t “block” / sequentially study each topic
Thinking Outside Experience
  • Analogical Thinking → recognizing conceptual similarities in multiple domains
    • Use the familiar to reason through the unseen / unfamiliar
    • Successful problem solvers determine the deep structure of a problem before matching a strategy to it
  • Outside View > Inside View
    • Outside View → probes deep structural similarities, ignores unique surface features, looks outside for structurally similar analogies
    • Inside View → make judgments based narrowly on the details of a particular problem
  • Ex → Kepler was facing a problem not just new to himself, but to all humanity. There was no experience database to draw on. He stated that the Earth revolves around the Sun, not the other way around… in a time where people were burned at the stake for saying such things
The Trouble with Too Much Grit
  • “Match Quality” — the degree of fit between the work someone does & who they are
  • Exploration is a benefit, not a luxury
    • Late Specializers → entered job market with less domain-specific skills but higher idea of “match quality” → quickly caught up in earnings
    • Learning stuff is less important than learning about yourself
  • Knowing when to quit is a strategic advantage
    • Explore / switch more → faster understanding of yourself / higher match quality
    • Top experts switch careers more than average
  • Finding high match quality is more difficult than working hard
    • International survey of 200,000+ workers → 85% are “not engaged” / “actively disengaged” at work
    • In that case, quitting takes a lot more guts than continuing
Flirting with Your Possible Selves
  • People who are fulfilled pursue long-term goals AFTER a period of self-discovery
    • Can’t plan before you know where you’re starting from
    • Can’t make inflexible long-term goals if we don’t know what truly fits us
  • “Standardization Covenant” — cultural notion to trade self-exploration for head start on a rigid goal because it ensures stability
    • Even a PhD or law degree isn’t stability, you are making a commitment before you know it fits you — We change, and so do our work / life preferences 
  • “Test-And-Learn”
    • We learn who we are by living
    • Maximize match quality through sampling activities & reflection
    • Accumulate diverse experiences → “undefinable process of digestion” → form of training
The Outsider Advantage
  • “Big innovation most often happens when an outsider who may be far away from the surface of the problem reframes the problem in a way that unlocks the solution”
    • “Thinking outside the box”
    • The box = narrow view taken by specialists
    • Thinking outside = drawing upon outside experiences & multiple domains 
  • The further the problem was from the solver’s expertise, the more likely they were to solve it
  • Example
    • Problem = getting peanut-butter-consistency oil out of the barges that cleaned it from the ocean
    • Solution = guy drew a version of the concrete rod-vibrator that keeps concrete from solidifying (solution ended up just being 3 pages, including diagrams)
Lateral Thinking with Withered Technology
  • Lateral Thinking — reimagining information in new contexts, giving old ideas new use
    • Using familiar information, you are unencumbered by new learning and can focus on development / ideas / creativity
  • We need broad AND deep thinking
    • Specialists → adept at difficult technical problems + anticipating obstacles
    • Generalists → integrating domains, take ideas from one area & apply it in others
Fooled by Expertise
  • More complexity → More breadth needed
  • “If you are too much of an insider, it’s hard to get good perspective”
    • Specialists tend to see events as governed by deterministic rules framed by their area of expertise
    • Specialists cherry-pick details to fit their specific knowledge
    • However, in our wicked world there are not deterministic rules
    • Cannot use single-domain intuition in a wicked world
  • The best teams use “active open-mindedness”
    • View their own ideas as hypotheses in need of testing
    • Encourage trying to falsify their own ideas
  • Draw from outside experiences & accept contradiction
    • Constantly collect perspectives to add to your intellectual range (more tools in your toolshed)
    • “Genuinely curious about everything”
Learning to Drop Your Familiar Tools
  • Beware reaching conclusions from incomplete data
    • Richard Feynman — “when you don’t have any data, you have to use reason”
  • Under pressure / unfamiliar situations, experienced pros regress to what they know best
    • 1990s – 23 elite wildland firefighters refused to drop their tools when running & were caught by the fire
    • Navy seamen who ignored orders to remove steel-toed shoes when abandoning a ship & drowned
    • Fighter pilots in disabled planes refusing orders to eject
  • Since wicked environments have no rules, your normal processes might not work → adapt
  • Effective problem solving culture balances conformity & independent thought
    • Identifying the dominant culture & push in the opposite direction for diversification
Deliberate Amateurs
  • Principle Of Limited Sloppiness → be careful not to be too careful or you’ll limit your exploration
  • Play
    • In play, you aren’t concerned with constraints & your mind roams freely
    • Question things people never bother to ask
    • Essentialism describes the research-backed benefits of PLAY
  • “When you push the boundaries, a lot of it is just probing. It has to be inefficient”
    • Pushing boundaries is the only way to create a breakthrough
    • Pushing boundaries comes with a lot of failed attempts
  • Ex → Einstein wondered if time passes differently in high vs low gravity
    • Now essential to a lot of technology – like your cell phones whose satellites are gravitationally adjusted to keep clocks in sync
Conclusion: Expanding Your Range
  • Don’t feel behind, go and experiment
    • Compare yourself to yourself yesterday, not to others
    • Original creators strike out a lot but hit the grand slams
    • “Breakthrough and fallacy look a lot alike initially”
    • Julius Caesar broke down in tears when he saw a statue of Alexander the Great — he felt so far behind because Alexander had already conquered many nations at that age
  • Be willing to learn and adjust as you go
    • Abandon a goal + change directions entirely if the need arises

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