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Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World Kindle Edition
'A goldmine of surprising insights. Makes you smarter with every page' – James Clear, author of Atomic Habits
The Instant Sunday Times Bestseller. As featured on Diary of a CEO.
The essential guide to improving your performance, and a powerful playbook for success in any field: develop range while everyone around you is rushing to specialize.
You may have been taught that success in any field requires early specialization, and 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. If you only dabble or delay, you'll never catch up with those who got a head start. This is completely wrong.
In this landmark book, David Epstein shows you that the way to succeed is by sampling widely, gaining a breadth of experiences, taking detours, experimenting relentlessly and juggling many interests.
Studying the world's most successful athletes, artists, musicians, inventors and scientists, Epstein demonstrates how generalists often find their path relatively late, and they juggle many interests rather than focusing on one.
Range has challenged the status quo, reshaped career paths, inspired parents and changed lives. Read it to learn how to be more creative, more agile, and more capable of making the connections that your more specialized peers cannot see.
‘If you're a generalist who has ever felt overshadowed by your specialist colleagues, this book is for you' – Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft
Shortlisted for the Financial Times/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award
'I loved Range' – Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherMacmillan
- Publication dateJune 27, 2019
- Reading age18 years and up
- File size1591 KB
- Our greatest strength is the exact opposite of narrow specialization. It is the ability to integrate broadly.Highlighted by 11,904 Kindle readers
- In wicked domains, the rules of the game are often unclear or incomplete, there may or may not be repetitive patterns and they may not be obvious, and feedback is often delayed, inaccurate, or both.Highlighted by 10,321 Kindle readers
- Moravec’s paradox: machines and humans frequently have opposite strengths and weaknesses.Highlighted by 7,802 Kindle readers
- Whether or not experience inevitably led to expertise, they agreed, depended entirely on the domain in question. Narrow experience made for better chess and poker players and firefighters, but not for better predictors of financial or political trends, or of how employees or patients would perform.Highlighted by 7,734 Kindle readers
- “AI systems are like savants.” They need stable structures and narrow worlds.Highlighted by 7,650 Kindle readers
Editorial Reviews
Review
“I love this idea [Range], because I think of myself as a jack of all trades.” — Fareed Zakaria, CNN
“The storytelling is so dramatic, the wielding of data so deft and the lessons so strikingly framed that it’s never less than a pleasure to read. . . . a wealth of thought-provoking material.” —New York Times Book Review
“Range is a convincing, engaging survey of research and anecdotes that confirm a thoughtful, collaborative world is also a better and more innovative one.” —NPR
“For reasons I cannot explain, David Epstein manages to make me thoroughly enjoy the experience of being told that everything I thought about something was wrong. I loved Range.” —Malcolm Gladwell, author of Outliers and The Tipping Point
“It’s a joy to spend hours in the company of a writer as gifted as David Epstein. And the joy is all the greater when that writer shares so much crucial and revelatory information about performance, success, and education.” — Susan Cain, author of Quiet
“For too long, we’ve believed in a single path to excellence. Start early, specialize soon, narrow your focus, aim for efficiency. But in this groundbreaking book, David Epstein shows that in most domains, the way to excel is something altogether different. Sample widely, gain a breadth of experiences, take detours, and experiment relentlessly. Epstein is a deft writer, equally nimble at telling a great story and unpacking complicated science. And Range is an urgent and important book, an essential read for bosses, parents, coaches, and anyone who cares about improving performance.” —Daniel H. Pink, author of When, Drive, and A Whole New Mind
“In a world that’s increasingly obsessed with specialization, star science writer David Epstein is here to convince you that the future may belong to generalists. It’s a captivating read that will leave you questioning the next steps in your career—and the way you raise your children.” —Adam Grant, author of Give and Take and Originals
“Range is a blueprint for a more thoughtful, collaborative world – and it’s also really fun to read.” —NPR, Best Books of 2019
“I want to give Range to any kid who is being forced to take violin lessons—but really wants to learn the drums; to any programmer who secretly dreams of becoming a psychologist; to everyone who wants humans to thrive in an age of robots. Range is full of surprises and hope, a 21st century survival guide.” —Amanda Ripley, author of The Smartest Kids in the World.
“An assiduously researched and accessible argument for being a jack of all trades.” —O Magazine, Best Nonfiction Books Coming in 2019
“Range elevates Epstein to one of the very best science writers at work today. The scope of the book—and the implications—are breathtaking. I find myself applying what I've learned to almost every aspect of my life.” —Sebastian Junger, author of Tribe, War, and The Perfect Storm
“A goldmine of surprising insights. Makes you smarter with every page.” —James Clear, New York Times best-selling author of Atomic Habits
“Range will force you to rethink the nature of learning, thinking, and being, and reconsider what you thought you knew about optimal education and career paths—and how and why the most successful people in the world do what they do. It's one of the most thought-provoking and enlightening books I've read.” —Maria Konnikova, author of Mastermind and The Confidence Game, professional poker player
“A fresh, brisk look at creativity, learning, and the meaning of achievement.” —Kirkus Reviews
“Brilliant, timely, and utterly impossible to put down. If you care about improving skill, innovation, and performance, you need to read this book. ” —Daniel Coyle, author of The Culture Code and The Talent Code
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter 1
The Cult of the Head Start
One year and four days after World War II in Europe ended in unconditional surrender, Laszlo Polgar was born in a small town in Hungary-the seed of a new family. He had no grandmothers, no grandfathers, and no cousins; all had been wiped out in the Holocaust, along with his father's first wife and five children. Laszlo grew up determined to have a family, and a special one.
He prepped for fatherhood in college by poring over biographies of legendary thinkers, from Socrates to Einstein. He decided that traditional education was broken, and that he could make his own children into geniuses, if he just gave them the right head start. By doing so, he would prove something far greater: that any child can be molded for eminence in any discipline. He just needed a wife who would go along with the plan.
Laszlo's mother had a friend, and the friend had a daughter, Klara. In 1965, Klara traveled to Budapest, where she met Laszlo in person. Laszlo didn't play hard to get; he spent the first visit telling Klara that he planned to have six children and that he would nurture them to brilliance. Klara returned home to her parents with a lukewarm review: she had "met a very interesting person," but could not imagine marrying him.
They continued to exchange letters. They were both teachers and agreed that the school system was frustratingly one-size-fits-all, made for producing "the gray average mass," as Laszlo put it. A year and a half of letters later, Klara realized she had a very special pen pal. Laszlo finally wrote a love letter, and proposed at the end. They married, moved to Budapest, and got to work. Susan was born in early 1969, and the experiment was on.
For his first genius, Laszlo picked chess. In 1972, the year before Susan started training, American Bobby Fischer defeated Russian Boris Spassky in the "Match of the Century." It was considered a Cold War proxy in both hemispheres, and chess was suddenly pop culture. Plus, according to Klara, the game had a distinct benefit: "Chess is very objective and easy to measure." Win, lose, or draw, and a point system measures skill against the rest of the chess world. His daughter, Laszlo decided, would become a chess champion.
Laszlo was patient, and meticulous. He started Susan with "pawn wars." Pawns only, and the first person to advance to the back row wins. Soon, Susan was studying endgames and opening traps. She enjoyed the game and caught on quickly. After eight months of study, Laszlo took her to a smoky chess club in Budapest and challenged grown men to play his four-year-old daughter, whose legs dangled from her chair. Susan won her first game, and the man she beat stormed off. She entered the Budapest girls' championship and won the under-eleven title. At age four she had not lost a game.
By six, Susan could read and write and was years ahead of her grade peers in math. Laszlo and Klara decided they would educate her at home and keep the day open for chess. The Hungarian police threatened to throw him in jail if he did not send his daughter to the compulsory school system. It took him months of lobbying the Ministry of Education to gain permission. Susan's new little sister, Sofia, would be homeschooled too, as would Judit, who was coming soon, and whom Laszlo and Klara almost named Zseni, Hungarian for "genius." All three became part of the grand experiment.
On a normal day, the girls were at the gym by 7 a.m. playing table tennis with trainers, and then back home at 10:00 for breakfast, before a long day of chess. When Laszlo reached the limit of his expertise, he hired coaches for his three geniuses in training. He spent his extra time cutting two hundred thousand records of game sequences from chess journals-many offering a preview of potential opponents-and filing them in a custom card catalog, the "cartotech." Before computer chess programs, it gave the Polgars the largest chess database in the world to study outside of-maybe-the Soviet Union's secret archives.
When she was seventeen, Susan became the first woman to qualify for the men's world championship, although the world chess federation did not allow her to participate. (A rule that would soon be changed, thanks to her accomplishments.) Two years later, in 1988, when Sofia was fourteen and Judit twelve, the girls comprised three of the four Hungarian team members for the women's Chess Olympiad. They won, and beat the Soviet Union, which had won eleven of the twelve Olympiads since the event began. The Polgar sisters became "national treasures," as Susan put it. The following year, communism fell, and the girls could compete all over the world. In January 1991, at the age of twenty-one, Susan became the first woman to achieve grandmaster status through tournament play against men. In December, Judit, at fifteen years and five months, became the youngest grandmaster ever, male or female. When Susan was asked on television if she wanted to win the world championship in the men's or women's category, she cleverly responded that she wanted to win the "absolute category."
None of the sisters ultimately reached Laszlo's highest goal of becoming the overall world champion, but all were outstanding. In 1996, Susan participated in the women's world championship, and won. Sofia peaked at the rank of international master, a level down from grandmaster. Judit went furthest, climbing up to eighth in the overall world ranking in 2004.
Laszlo's experiment had worked. It worked so well that in the early 1990s he suggested that if his early specialization approach were applied to a thousand children, humanity could tackle problems like cancer and AIDS. After all, chess was just an arbitrary medium for his universal point. Like the Tiger Woods story, the Polgar story entered an endless pop culture loop in articles, books, TV shows, and talks as an example of the life-hacking power of an early start. An online course called "Bring Up Genius!" advertises lessons in the Polgar method to "build up your own Genius Life Plan." The bestseller Talent Is Overrated used the Polgar sisters and Tiger Woods as proof that a head start in deliberate practice is the key to success in "virtually any activity that matters to you."
The powerful lesson is that anything in the world can be conquered in the same way. It relies on one very important, and very unspoken, assumption: that chess and golf are representative examples of all the activities that matter to you.
Just how much of the world, and how many of the things humans want to learn and do, are really like chess and golf?
Product details
- ASIN : B07M6QPRRG
- Publisher : Macmillan (June 27, 2019)
- Publication date : June 27, 2019
- Language : English
- File size : 1591 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Print length : 370 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #161,632 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
David Epstein is the author of the #1 New York Times best seller Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World , and of the New York Times best seller The Sports Gene, which has been translated in 18 languages. (To his surprise, it was purchased not only by his sister but also by President Barack Obama and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.)
He was previously a science and investigative reporter at ProPublica, and prior to that a senior writer at Sports Illustrated, where he co-authored the story that revealed Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez had used steroids. His writing has been honored by an array of organizations, from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, to the Society of Professional Journalists and the National Center on Disability and Journalism, and has been included in the Best American Science and Nature Writing anthology. His story “Following the Trail of Broken Hearts,” on sudden cardiac death in athletes, was chosen as one of the top 100 stories of the last 100 years by Columbia Journalism alumni.
David has given talks about performance science and the uses (and misuses) of data on five continents; his TED Talk has been viewed 8.5 million times, and was shared by Bill Gates. Three of his stories have been optioned for films: a Sports Illustrated story on the only living Olympian to have survived a concentration camp; an Atlantic/ProPublica piece detailing the DEA’s fraught pursuit of Chapo Guzman’s rivals; and a 2016 “This American Life” episode he wrote and narrated about a woman with two rare diseases who shares a mutant gene with an Olympic medalist.
David has master’s degrees in environmental science and journalism, and is reasonably sure he’s the only person to have co-authored a paper in the journal of Arctic, Antarctic, and Alpine Research while a writer at Sports Illustrated. (Like many of the characters in Range, he has benefitted from a winding career.) He has worked as an ecology researcher in the Arctic, studied geology and astronomy while residing in the Sonoran Desert, and blithely signed up to work on the D-deck of a seismic research vessel shortly after it had been attacked by pirates.
David enjoys volunteering with the Pat Tillman Foundation and Classroom Champions. An avid runner, he was a Columbia University record holder and twice NCAA All-East as an 800-meter runner.
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Learn more how customers reviews work on AmazonCustomers say
Customers find the book informative and interesting, with interesting examples. They describe it as an amazing and worthwhile read. Readers praise the writing quality as well-written and compelling. However, some find the anecdotes too specific or lacking a connective narrative.
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Customers find the book informative and interesting. It offers examples, definitions, and terms that spark thought. Readers appreciate the transformative effect it has on their thinking. The book is well-researched and peppered with fun facts and surprising history of famous people. Overall, readers find it inspiring and motivating.
"...However, while studying the topic, he noticed that accumulated experience in different domains and late specialization are worth it in the long run...." Read more
"...Pros: - Tons of interesting examples, definitions and terms throughout the book that were insightful. -..." Read more
"...2. Creative Performance comes from early exploration and interdisciplinary learning: Given the domain-specific view of expertise we tend to assume..." Read more
"...This book convincingly makes the case that there is merit to both views and that they are most valuable when understood as mutually inclusive...." Read more
Customers find the book interesting and worth reading. They say it's well-written and provides solid takeaways. Readers mention it's the best non-fiction book they've read in recent memory.
"...Since the reading has sincerely resonated with me, I decided to share a review before you make any commitment...." Read more
"Overall this was definitely worth a read, regardless of whether you agree with the author or not...." Read more
"...Range" is a wonderfully intelligent read!" Read more
"...It was written in a way that made it more interesting to read, though at times I found the audiobook helpful to get through it...." Read more
Customers find the book well-written and engaging. They appreciate the author's thorough research and clear organization. The book is easy to read with good content and illustrations. It makes for light reading for those predisposed to it.
"...Basic structure: across 12 chapters that author points to tons of examples across history and industries to argue that people who took time to..." Read more
"This is a beautifully written and well justified discussion of the various specific things that are not taken into account by the widespread..." Read more
"...It was written in a way that made it more interesting to read, though at times I found the audiobook helpful to get through it...." Read more
"Epstein's writing is compelling and fluid. He provides the reader with a lot to think about and that certainly makes this a worthwhile read...." Read more
Customers find the anecdotes in the book overly specific and boring. They feel there are too many examples and not all of them are convincing. The book uses cherry-picked sources and anecdote from sports or artist. It tends to simplify complex stories and jump to conclusions.
"...are full of pseudo science and therefore uses cherry-picked sources and anecdotes, mostly from sports or artist/writer types...." Read more
"...There is also a loooooot of data and case studies...." Read more
"...The book is peppered with fun facts and surprising history of famous people we all know...." Read more
"but too many deep dives on examples that just really don’t add up to much. I think it should be a bit more focused on the anecdotes" Read more
Reviews with images
A Compelling Case for the Power of Generalists
Top reviews from the United States
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- Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2019Once I started reading the book, I had a hard time putting it down. Since the reading has sincerely resonated with me, I decided to share a review before you make any commitment. First, I hope to put together a brief summary from each chapter including key excerpts highlighted while taking notes. Then, I will share some personal thoughts and recommendations.
SUMMARY
[Introduction] Right in the beginning David says we are often taught that the more competitive and complicated the world gets, the more specialized we must become, and the earlier we must start to navigate it. However, while studying the topic, he noticed that accumulated experience in different domains and late specialization are worth it in the long run. The stories of Tiger Woods and Roger Federer are presented to illustrate that, although both reached the top of their domains, the approach they took growing up was completely different.
[Chapter 1] Through the premise of early specialization, Laszlo Polgar pushed his daughters to their limits through rigorous chess practices from an early age. Even though they achieved outstanding results, we learn that a head start in hyperspecialized practices from day one, such as chess and golf, are exceptions. In most domains, however, “the rules of the game are often unclear or incomplete, there may or may not be repetitive patterns and they may not be obvious, and feedback is often delayed, inaccurate, or both.” In order to thrive in these domains, Christopher Connolly says that successful adapters are excellent at taking knowledge from one pursuit and applying it creatively to another, and at avoiding cognitive entrenchment.
[Chapter 2] Now we take a close look at how modern societies have drawn to a more holistic context of abstract thinking. David explains that “exposure to the modern world has made us better adapted for complexity, and that has manifested as flexibility, with profound implications for the breadth of our intellectual world.” Like chess and golf masters, premodern villagers relied on things being the same tomorrow as they were yesterday. They were extremely well prepared for what they had experienced before but failed at learning without experience. David adds that “their very thinking was highly specialized in a manner that the modern world has been telling us is increasingly obsolete.”
[Chapter 3] Based on examples dated back to the 1710s and recent research studies regarding the development of musicians, David shows that a “sampling period, often lightly structured with some lessons and a breadth of instruments and activities, followed only later by narrowing of focus, increased structure, and an explosion of practice volume” is the most common path to excellence. Breadth in training is key to create abstract models so that we can better apply the knowledge to situations we have never seen before.
[Chapter 4] David shifts gears toward effective strategies to learn science. Although some of them seem to impair performance in the short term, they have shown to be essential for better performance later. Among the strategies, we learn the benefits of [1] spacing practices between sessions for the same material; [2] promoting students to make connections with broader concepts; [3] testing progress over time; and [4] learning under varied conditions.
[Chapter 5] This chapter is about the importance of cultivating an outside perspective to look for structurally similar analogies. Using astronomer Johannes Kepler’s approach—who thought entirely outside of his domain—as an example, David explains that “deep analogical thinking is the practice of recognizing conceptual similarities in multiple domains or scenarios that may seem to have little in common on the surface.” After all, in a confused and inaccurate world, relying upon experiences from a single domain isn’t only limiting, it can be disastrous.
[Chapter 6] Here we explore the virtues of late start. The unusual paths taken by Van Gogh throughout his early life paid off later, becoming one of the most well-known painters in history. As David puts, Van Gogh “tested options with maniacal intensity and got the maximum information signal about his fit as quickly as possible, and then moved to something else and repeated, until he had zigzagged his way to a place no one else had ever been, and where he alone excelled.” Allowing students to delay specialization while sampling and finding out who they are and where they fit improves match quality throughout later career decisions.
[Chapter 7] Our work and life preferences don’t stay the same across time and context. David argues that “because personality changes more than we expect with time, experience, and different contexts, we are ill-equipped to make ironclad long-term goals when our past consists of little time, few experiences, and a narrow range of contexts.” Professor Ibarra’s studies are interesting. She says that, instead of a grand plan, we should focus on finding experiments that can be undertaken quickly—something she calls “test-and-learn.” She concludes by affirming “we discover the possibilities by doing, by trying new activities, building new networks, finding new roles models.”
[Chapter 8] Using interesting examples, David shows how framing problems with distant analogies from random experiences outside the field can be remarkably effective to find solutions. In fact, some organizations have actually facilitated entities in any field to post their challenges and reward for outside solvers. “The larger and more easily accessible the library of human knowledge, the more chances for inquisitive patrons to make connections at the cutting edge.”
[Chapter 9] To reiterate the importance of having accumulated a range of experiences, David shows that even in hyperspecialized fields breadth becomes increasingly important. Andy Ouderkirk and other researchers at 3M set out to study the commercial impact inventors made through patents. They concluded that both specialist and generalists made contributions. Whereas “specialists were adept at working for a long time on difficult technical problems, and for anticipating development obstacles, the generalists tended to get bored working in one area for too long.” Instead, generalists “added value by integrating domains, taking technology from one area and applying it in others.” More important, though, is to know that specialists and generalists thrive when working together.
[Chapter 10] Here we learn how to distinguish successful from unsuccessful forecasters. In essence, the best forecasters “are high in active open-mindedness.” Moreover, David says, “they are also extremely curious, and don’t merely consider contrary ideas, they proactively cross disciplines looking for them.” They aren’t only the best forecasters as individuals, but they also have qualities that make them particularly effective collaborators. The unsuccessful ones, however, tend to know one big thing—their expertise is deep but narrow. Some have spent their careers studying a single problem, “reaching for formulaic solutions to ill-defined problems.”
[Chapter 11] In a hyperspecialized world, psychologist Karl Weick says that dropping familiar tools is particularly difficult for experienced professionals who rely on overlearned behavior. Based on a handful of tragic examples, we learn that experienced groups became rigid under pressure—“it’s the very unwillingness of people to drop their tools is what turns some dramas into tragedies.” To counterbalance that, studies have shown that an effective problem-solving culture is one that balances standard practices with forces that push in the opposite direction. The trick, David says, “is expanding the organization's range by identifying the dominant culture and then diversifying it by pushing in the opposite direction.”
[Chapter 12] The final chapter focuses on scientific progress through the results of free intellects working on interdisciplinary subjects. The cult of the head start, professor Arturo Casadevall argues, “is that young scientists are rushed to specialize before they learn how to think; they end up unable to produce good work themselves and unequipped to spot bad work by their colleagues.” He is indeed a big proponent of exploring innovation ecosystems that intentionally preserve range and inefficiency.”
PERSONAL THOUGHTS
Well, I ended preordering the book because I felt deeply compelled by the topic. Although I have taken a specialized route throughout education and the initial years of my career, I have noticed that it wasn’t a natural fit. To be more precise, I am drawn toward the diverse possibilities the world offers us to explore. The value of hyperspecialized domains is hardly questionable, despite the fact that a transdisciplinary approach toward education and research seems to be advantageous to move the needle forward for the rest of humanity.
The book brings a wealth of knowledge through examples, stories, and practical applications. Moreover, David covers a vast array of topics, ranging from sports all the way to hyperspecialized scientific research. Because of that, throughout the reading, we are likely to find pieces that speak directly to us—to further reflect on the issues, and hopefully put them into practice.
Take care,
Haical
- Reviewed in the United States on October 4, 2021Overall this was definitely worth a read, regardless of whether you agree with the author or not. Basic structure: across 12 chapters that author points to tons of examples across history and industries to argue that people who took time to explore different career paths actually ended up excelling versus specialized peers. Its especially interesting to think about given social media has ignited this rat race and hypercompetitive dynamic in which people are so eager to be climb the ladder in their respective field faster than others.
Pros:
- Tons of interesting examples, definitions and terms throughout the book that were insightful.
- Kudos to the author for going out on a limb and publishing this book; it takes guts to go against conventional thinking
Cons:
- The book could be condensed materially and still get its point across. By the last couple of chapters I already knew where the author was going with the points he made, and its a bit overkill.
- The author argues that generalists can think laterally better and can provide more creative solutions, but he doesn't really talk about the case where specialists can try to adapt a more generalist mindset and be more flexible in thought.
- The author mostly includes examples that are related to science, literature, the arts, or something in a creative domain. I thought this was ironic because this was a type of book where it would've been helpful to get a more diverse set of industries than hyperfocus on a select few (so the author could've shown more "Range" if you may).
- Reviewed in the United States on July 20, 2019This is a beautifully written and well justified discussion of the various specific things that are not taken into account by the widespread cultural emphasis on early specialization for success and our popular model of performance in terms of domain-specific expertise.
This takes the form of a single conclusion which I would paraphrase as: "we need to be able to play and explore widely and to color outside the lines for a while in order to become very good at solving the difficult problems we later encounter. But our cultural obsession with specialization pushes counter to that."
There is a constant tension of the author's confidence in his conclusion that generalists are uniquely valuable and desperately needed and his recognition that he is fighting an almost Quixotic uphill battle against powerful cultural trends and incentives for specialization.
What he means by specialization and the factors closely tied to it:
1. Head Start: Encouraging children from an early age to narrowly pursue things they seem talented at or have an interest in.
2. Domain-Specificity: Training with heavy emphasis on the specific narrow range skills we know we will need in the target environment and assuming far transfer of skills from other activities will be limited or non-existent.
3. Disciplinary Focus: Viewing learning as consisting of accumulating facts and theories specific to a particular field or subfield of study in order to become highly skilled at working in that narrow field.
4. Persistence: The idea that we should identify a passion early and stick with it no matter what because it’s what we’re good at and enjoy and so can become successful at it if we manage to persist.
5. Fast and Efficient Short-Term Learning: The assumption that we are learning better when we feel familiar with the material quickly and that we are then learning more efficiently.
Against those powerful and popular specialization factors, Epstein presents several compelling lines of evidence:
1. Domain-Specificity varies with Kind vs. Wicked Learning: The argument for early specialization and domain-specificity is based on the observation that we need a long period of deliberate practice to accumulate the patterns and skills specific to performing in that specific activity and that practicing or exploring other activities is unlikely to do anything helpful for our performance in our specialty. Epstein counters that on closer inspection we find a crucial distinction between different kinds of domains and learning environments, where in some of them deliberate practice reliably makes us better but in others deliberate practice either helps much less or can even make us perform more poorly under some conditions. So not all domains or learning environments are equally specific and the head start is not equally helpful in all activities.
2. Creative Performance comes from early exploration and interdisciplinary learning: Given the domain-specific view of expertise we tend to assume that in order for someone to perform at a high level in any activity, since they need expertise, they need to specialize in that activity. Epstein counters that when we focus specifically on creative performance, we find that deep expertise can be invaluable but is not enough. In order to come up with truly novel solutions to problems we need to make use of analogies that cross different domains while sharing deep structural similarities. That means being familiar with a wider range of ideas and ways of thinking than just those in our specialty, and so Epstein says creative performance is found more in people with broader backgrounds. Epstein argues that outstanding creative performance also tends to be associated with early exploration of different activities more than with early specialization.
3. The Efficiency We Perceive from Narrow Immersion is Very Often Illusory: We tend to assume that when we feel more familiar with the activity or material that we are learning it. That’s part of the strong intuitive appeal for immersion in an activity comes from, it feels like we are learning more when we are more immersed. Epstein argues that the evidence from learning research show quite often exactly the opposite, that the learning we think we are doing under conditions of immersion is either much less or much shorter lived than we assume. Robert Bjork’s concept of “desirable difficulty” in learning and the evidence base behind it plays a central role in this argument. This, Epstein argues, tells us that “slow learning” which helps us make new connections between a wider range of experiences is much more conducive to learning in the long run than fast, efficient learning from immersion in a narrow subject matter.
4. Match Quality is Not Necessarily the Same as Early Passion: Part of the argument for early specialization is based on the assumption that people have certain interests and talents from early on and if they can find something that matches them well and start early, they can align their passion with a successful career in that activity. Epstein argues that what we know about lifespan development tells us that people’s passions are not so fixed or narrow and finds a number of cases of exceptionally successful people who spent their lives exploring and trying different things before finding a match that was truly satisfying and successful for them.
Range is an appeal to encourage exploration in our lives from early on and for experimenting and experiencing broadly in our learning, even though it may seem to be inefficient or slow. Epstein does not deny the immense value of long deliberate specialized practice in “kind” domains or the value of having deep specialized experience in some areas, but he has also made a passionate and well-argued case for making better use of a completely different dimension of performance. A dimension rooted in longer term developmental outcomes, more exploratory or playful learning, and an ongoing search for ever better matches between our interests and abilities and our activities.
Top reviews from other countries
- J.TannerReviewed in Canada on May 5, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars 10 Stars
You know, for years I kept questioning myself, why am I not satisfied and keep jumping from one role/career/domain to another? I thought it’s a matter of getting bored easily. And I thought it was a weakness. At the end, who would hire a domain/career/interest hopper?
Thank you David for shedding light on such an important yet so forgotten art of being yourself and living YOUR life rather than that of others.
Yes I get board easily, yes I jump from one thing to the other, but guess what, a dish that lacks flavour turns out bland, so make sure your life is flavourful.
Enjoy the read!
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Cliente de KindleReviewed in Mexico on January 9, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars buenos puntos a considerar
Este libro aborda muchos personajes que demuestran el camino recorrido para llegar a ser expertos en su área iniciando muchas veces con un concepto inicial diametralmente opuesto.
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MorgothReviewed in Germany on October 13, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars Super
Eines der besten Bücher, die ich je gelesen habe. Es ist sehr gut geschrieben und gibt denjenigen Positivität, die in einer Phase feststecken, in der sie sich unterbewertet fühlen.
- SivaramReviewed in India on August 30, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars Must read
The book is about counter intuitive thinking of learning breadthwise could be useful in solving important problems. Must read for everyone who wants continuous learning.
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IeroReviewed in France on June 15, 2024
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent
Aucune surprise, je m'attendais à un livre génial, et c'est ce que j'ai eu.
Les premiers chapitres m'ont paru un peu long. Beaucoup d'exemples historiques et d'études scientifiques racontés en détail, je ne savais pas où l'auteur voulait en venir.
Par la suite c'est bien mieux, j'imagine qu'il voulait poser des bases solides, pour faciliter la compréhension de son point de vue. Les chapitres suivants sont davantage concrets et explicites.
Si vous êtes vraiment intéressé par ce concept et souhaitez l'appliquer dans votre vie, Polymath de Peter Hollins est un bon complément : il y présente un plan d'action pour arriver à devenir un Polymath soi-même, là où Range est plus axé sur les preuves scientifiques, la comparaison Spécialiste VS Généraliste.
Bonne lecture !