Charlatans and Experts

Commentary

We’ve lived through tough times. Social media companies promised to give us voice and then censored us. News media that claimed to be objective parroted scripts from industry. Pharmaceutical companies claimed to have the cure that ended up harming us. Presidents and politicians we elected to represent us were just mannequins and marionettes. Above all else, the experts trotted out to instruct us are revealed to be performers working for interest groups.

It’s the last point that disturbs us most because so much of modern life depends on expertise. This is what is possessed by people with the best training from the best centers of learning who are then put in charge of systems on which we all depend for living the good life.

Their fall from grace has been hard to parse, sometimes delightful in its particulars but disturbing overall. Because there were not only one or two but a multitude of them who we are now discovering were charlatans.

It should cause us to reflect on fundamental issues. We need to use our own critical intelligence to cultivate a sense of discernment over whom or what to trust. Clearly, we can no longer take for granted that those who have ascended up to the commanding heights of society actually merit the plaudits and emoluments that come their way. For all we know, the people who are pushed at us as the “leading experts” in whatever are the least likely to tell us what we need to know.

We need some rules of thumb to separate the wheat from the chaff. Here are mine.

1. Truly intelligent people are quick to admit when they do not know or understand something.
2. Truly competent people are always ready to say what they cannot do and quick to admit error.
3. People who come by their successes honestly are always happy to credit others with whom they work.
4. Great managers of systems seek out people who are smarter than they are and crave a good critique.
5. A genuine expert is always happy to admit that what he does not know is vastly more than what he knows.

We should all commit those principles to memory. And we should test our own experiences in life against them, trusting those who pass the test and eschewing the counsel of those who fail.

Let’s take them one by one.

I once knew a gentleman from an exceedingly humble background who rose up the ranks quickly because he demonstrated remarkable performance in every intellectual task he confronted. His marks in math were over the top. He was a chess champion. He excelled in languages. Pretty much he dazzled everyone, passing every test pushed his way.

He had natural gifts, no doubt, but he also had an unquenchable passion to succeed. He would forgo every social invitation to hit the books instead. Any task thrown his way he would study and master until he saw victory.

He was likely this way in part because the expectations for him were low. He constantly saw the need to prove himself. And he did: soaring SATs, Ivy League admissions, quick achievement in every class, a PhD at a young age, best-selling books.

But one thing I noticed about him is that he developed an insatiable curiosity. He was a great listener. He would ask questions and more questions. He often seemed to me to be far more interested in what he could learn from others than what he could teach. If anyone praised him as a genius, he would mostly ignore the comment and explain that he knows not much at all.

This, I submit, is the mark of a truly intelligent person. Sadly, life took a different turn for him, and he settled into the role of an expert. He became preachy and condescending, exactly the opposite of what led to his rise. His role as leader went to his head because he was not well-prepared for it and insufficiently guarded in believing what his fans said about him.

I’ve similarly known tremendously talented people, the best of the best. I briefly had contact, even in a performance on stage, with a man named Bill Watrous, who was the greatest trombone player in the history of humanity. I seriously doubt that anyone will ever be better. Indeed, he was so good that it seems almost pointless to try to be his match, much less improve on his tone, technique, and creativity. A master of the ages.

After he died, I had the opportunity to talk to his widow. To my amazement, she told me that he was more critical of himself than anyone else ever was. He would wake early and practice with all the basic scales over and over and then move on to the harder stuff and play it over and over, always to perfection. He would put on improvisation albums with just a backup band, the same ones I used when I was playing, and obsess over creating the perfect solo. He was never satisfied and never wanted to listen to recordings because he could only hear mistakes.

I was actually astonished to hear this. I had no idea. There has never been a player less deserving of any criticism and more deserving of undying adulation. But he would have none of it. His standard for himself was flawless, and he only heard and experienced the flaws.

That’s remarkable, isn’t it? It makes me think that perhaps true competence in any field is marked by knowing what is possible but forever feeling that one’s own mastery falls short.

As for crediting others, this is something upon which all of us can improve. None of us achieves anything alone in real life. We all depend on colleagues, spouses, writers of books, teachers, coworkers, mentors, and influencers from the past and present. No man is an island, as they say. In this case, how to accept a compliment? It is something of an art. Don’t refuse it. Accept it, embrace it, appreciate it, but always on behalf of those who got you where you are.

True success is a combination of individual achievement and the community surrounding the person who succeeded. A person worthy of your success, and worthy of his own success, will be quick to celebrate all those who helped along the way. Not in a gratuitous way but in a sincere way.

Now let’s address the point about managers. I’ve worked with both types on the extreme poles. A job at a fish restaurant involved being a busboy and dishwasher. The manager was a serious doer, there before anyone and leaving later than anyone else. He once noted that the sinks were too dirty and threw on gloves and scrubbed to show me how it was done. That inspired me. He only wanted hard workers all around him. When he found them, he promoted them and paid them more.

That’s the retail sector, where every penny counts and there is a daily test of a job well done. The nonprofit sector, government, and academia are different. They breed a class of people who are threatened by competence. Managers in these sectors are more inclined to demote and avoid anyone who threatens to show them up. They gather sycophants around them for fear of being found out as not deserving of their titles and salaries.

Such people invariably preside over decline. There are really only two directions any business or institution can go: up and down. Managers who repel talent or otherwise feel threatened by new ideas or smarter thoughts are driving institutions into the ditch while aggrandizing their own personal reputation. On the other hand, managers who seek out talent and desperately want to surround themselves with intelligence and genuine expertise take institutions to the next level.

In any job you have, ask yourself which of the two types is in charge of you. If it is the former and not the latter, make plans to find another place of work. If not, intelligent, competent, and hardworking people might find themselves punished for their virtues. If you are put in charge, be the kind of leader who seeks out talent and intelligence and welcomes a challenge to your assumptions and judgment.

Finally, the principle to use in discerning a genuine expert is that he is always happy to admit that what he does not know is vastly more than what he knows. I’ve known such people too. They are unfailingly curious about new evidence, new books, new insights, and new knowledge no matter how eccentric, and they are always ready to correct and learn. They are not braggarts but just the opposite. They are humble in the face of the vast universe of unknowns of which they are profoundly aware.

For review, you can spot an expert when you see:

• Quick admission of ignorance
• Willingness to say what one cannot do and to correct mistakes
• Crediting others
• Actively seeking smarter people and real critique
• Open recognition that one’s knowledge is a small island in a large ocean of unknowns

Thus ends my tutorial on how to tell the difference between a charlatan and a person deserving of genuine respect. We all need to sharpen our skills and power of discernment, because this is the era of expert failure, most assuredly. Still we need actual experts. The key is to evaluate the difference as best we can, based on the evidence we are given.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.