Malcolm Gladwell's Reponse to the Culturalism Post

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/malcolm-gladwells-reponse-to.html

by curtis • 13 years ago

65 68 13 years ago

askakorean.blogspot.com

I'm not a huge Gladwell fan, but it is always a pleasure to read a considered and respectful reply that shows a depth of research, no matter who the reply is coming from or going to. I only wish I was an expert at everything so I could actually judge whether Gladwell is right or wrong.

w1ntermute3• 13 years ago

Since "The Korean" (the author of the linked blog) is not an aviation expert either, but is a well-known cultural apologist (see his (admittedly quite well-written) post rationalizing fan death, a widely held Korean superstition: http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2009/01/fan-death-is-real.htm...), I would give Gladwell the benefit of the doubt for now.

moogleii• 13 years ago

Well, I'm glad "The Korean" didn't resort to a simple "Sorry, you've missed the point" response like he did towards other commenters. But I really like Gladwell's response.

FYI: Here is Gladwell's response to "The Korean"'s response to Gladwell:

http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/my-thoughts-on-gladwe...

I actually find "The Korean's" posts on these matters to be pretty irritating. Culture is a collection of ideas, and like all ideas, they can be bad sometimes, and regardless they are all subject to criticism. While he claims to understand this, he seems hellbent on showing that such negative cultural outliers (if and when they exist), will have "negligible" effect (which he doesn't seem to realize is a totally arbitrary claim; how did he arrive at "negligible" vs, I don't know, any other quantifiable amount). The fact is, the effects can't be measured, but a case showing non-negligible effects can still be made.

jamesaguilar5• 13 years ago

Yeah, defending the belief in fan death is really damaging to his credibility in my eyes.

marshray6• 13 years ago

My scientific instinct is to think this idea of "fan death" is ridiculous. But the US EPA is not helping:

In these conditions, portable electric fans provide a cooling effect by evaporating sweat. The increased circulation of hot air and increased sweat evaporation can, however, speed the onset of heat-attributable conditions (e.g., heat exhaustion). http://www.epa.gov/hiri/about/pdf/EHEguide_final.pdf

EDIT: On further reflection I think his claim that 90F/31C ambient air with a household fan blowing on you (because it makes you feel cooler) is comparable in lethality to 140F/61C is outright absurd.

overgard2• 13 years ago

That Fan Death article really cuts into his credibility. There's a lot of rationalizing going on there. Especially when he rhetorically asks something like:

Does getting the cause for Fan Death wrong mean Koreans live without critical thinking?

Who was making that accusation?! (Answer: basically nobody)

robotcookies2• 13 years ago

I think Gladwell makes some good points and that cultural factors can play a role in these things.

But I can't help but wonder if these same cultural factors can go both ways and maybe we're obsessively focusing on just one effect. For example, it might be that deference to hierarchy and older people leads to children taking responsibility and care of their parents in old age more. It might even be that the elderly in these places live longer and more happier lives as a result and that this outweighs the (still tragic but rare) plane accident.

It reminds me a bit of the terrorism situation in the US. We obsess over these things which are relatively rare and spend great effort to eliminate. But what are we losing in the process?

marshray6• 13 years ago

But no one is talking about whether or not Korean culture is superior or inferior in general, we're talking about whether it's optimal for the very specific situation of airline cockpit communications when the more senior pilot has made an error in judgement.

robotcookies2• 13 years ago

Let's say a country had a higher than average rate of infant mortality. Let's also say that it was speculated the cause was cultural... due to parents in this imaginary country allowing their babies to sleep in their beds. And although very rare, a story gets out in the news about a baby that suffocates in bed. Thousands of articles come out speculating about how this cultural habit is killing innocent babies.

Let's also say that it turns out babies that sleep in bed with their parents turn out to have a higher survival rate that those that don't, after the first year. These babies do better in school, have much lower suicide rates as teens and are happier in their life. Maybe a higher percent actually make to adulthood than the ones who sleep in cribs even accounting for the rare suffocations.

What would you think if the media ONLY discussed the rare infant deaths and not the other effects? Don't you think it would be a bit unfair and biased? You could even argue it might be harmful.

BTW, the example above is made up and I'm not claiming anything about parenting or Korean culture, good or bad. I'm just saying the media and public usually only look at horrific deaths and ignore everything else. This applies to terrorism, plane accidents, roller coasters, etc.

maxidog• 13 years ago

What a pros-and-cons evaluation of a culture misses is that cultures are "self-modifying code", with the weakest attributes constantly being revised. Few cultures are modernising as quickly as Korean. After all, Korean Air decided that Korean Air had a problem.

Where this process of introspection and change falls down is with expats and their children, who have detailed knowledge of and an exaggerated respect for the culture they left behind but are unable to play a role in changing it. Culture becomes a museum exhibit to these people. (I would be surprised if 'The Korean' lives in Korea.) As someone who knows lots of Koreans but few Korean Americans, I can say that after a few bottles of soju and speaking their native language, nobody is more aware of and passionate about resolving the problems in their own culture than a Korean.

Avshalom• 13 years ago

I don't really have a dog in this fight but as a response "Lots of people thought Koreans make terrible pilots" sort of ignores the fact that racism kinda by definition involves a widely held systematic bias.

brg• 13 years ago

Gladwell is very clear that the corporation Korean Air had terrible pilots an terrible piloting procedures, not that Koreans were terrible pilots. He is very clear that Korean Air admitted this, and worked throughout the nineties to change it. He said nothing about the Korean pilots working for Asiana or smaller regional airlines like Air Busan or Jeju.

shadowfox• 13 years ago

Gladwell is very clear that the corporation Korean Air had terrible pilots an terrible piloting procedures, not that Koreans were terrible pilots

I may have misunderstood the 2 posts. But I sort of understood that Gladwell was arguing that Korean cultural aspects, including the nature of the language, play(ed) a vital role in the airplane accidents.

And if that is the case, you could say that he is arguing that Koreans are bad pilots (Of course he is excluding Koreans who don't subscribe to the culture; but is that such a huge number?)

I probably completely misunderstood his original argument.

hannibal5• 13 years ago

Racism is the belief that some people or cultures are inherently inferior.

I think it should be obviously clear that all cultures have their weak and strong points, and sometimes cultures should change and fix these problems. This is true for corporate cultures and cultures of whole nations.

jrarredondo• 13 years ago

That is a simplistic definition. You exclude actions or systemic patterns, just to name a few things to think about. Go to implicit.harvard.edu for a couple of eye opening experiments and tests.

coldtea7• 13 years ago

Racism is the belief that some people or cultures are inherently inferior. I think it should be obviously clear that all cultures have their weak and strong points, and sometimes cultures should change and fix these problems.

How is the second idea different from "racism"? The "fix" part?

If we believe (and it's a legitimate belief) that "all cultures have their weak and strong points", then we can also find that a culture (A) has more weak points than another (B).

If A's weak points are far more, or are in the more important aspects of life, then, can't we say that "A is inherently inferior to B"? In this case, I wouldn't call it racism, but a fair assesment.

I'd rather stick with the old definition of racism: "the belief that some people (members of an ethnic group) are genetically inferior to others".

kmfrk• 13 years ago

I think that's an unfair characterization. I'd rather describe his statement as "Korean airlines have bad pilots, and this might be why".

It's not as broad a generalization as you make it sound, but I still find Gladwell's cultural reasoning highly specious.

marshray6• 13 years ago

South Korea's aviation industry has made some preventable mistakes in the cockpit and they have made changes to their pilot recruitment, training, and procedures in an attempt to address this. The recent crash at SFO naturally raises the question of relevance to previous crashes and whether or not these changes were sufficient.

Gladwell goes out of his way to refute any racist interpretation here. ("Cultural explanations are sometimes wielded with the same blunt force as genetic explanations—and that is a huge mistake.")

npguy• 13 years ago

Gladwell also needs to learn a few things from the Indian parent -

http://statspotting.com/malcolm-gladwell-meet-this-genius-ca...

bjourne• 13 years ago

Eh, I think Gladwell has a point here. "Captain, Guam condition is no good." doesn't count as "speaking up" when a situation is potentially life-threatening. Then you say something like "This approach is very dangerous, I think we should try something else."

SilasX• 13 years ago

The set of practices known as Crew (or Cockpit) Resource management formalize this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crew_resource_management#Commun...

So in this case, the proper action would be:

1) Get attention: "Captain ..."

2) State concern: "I'm concerned that a visual approach is too risky in this weather."

3) State the problem: "Visual approaches only work in low wind (or whatever conditions), and the weather report says we're not within those conditions."

4) State a solution: "I suggest we change plans and prepare for [alternate landing method], starting with [first step]."

5) Get buy-in: "Do you agree with that course of action, Captain?"

(Note that the pilot did just the first two ... or maybe only half of the second or third.)

tokenadult• 13 years ago

The response by Malcolm Gladwell is very thoughtful. The key point is that when the airline company Korean Air (which had already had to change its name after an earlier pilot error disaster) went into problem-solving mode, the airline itself identified changing cockpit communication culture as a step in solving its pilot error crash problem. Whatever else you can say about an airline company owned and based in Korea, you wouldn't expect it to have an inherent prejudice against Korean culture.

It was thoughtful of the blog author to quote Gladwell's reply in full (as it appears he did). Gladwell is easy enough to misunderstand that I have had occasion to mention this on Hacker News before. Gladwell is a professional writer, and he does quite a lot of research on unfamiliar subjects that promise to include interesting story angles. In the subjects that I research for my own writing, I have more often than not discovered that Gladwell does a better than average job of finding and citing good sources. He originates few new scientific hypotheses himself, but he writes interesting and thought-provoking stories about leading scientists in disciplines facing tough problems. Any reader of a Malcolm Gladwell book (as I know, from being a reader of the book Outliers ) can check the sources, and decide from there what other sources to check and what other ideas to play with. Gladwell doesn't purport to write textbooks, but I give him a lot of credit for finding interesting scholarly sources that haven't had enough attention in the popular literature. He is equaled by very few authors as a story-teller who can tie ideas together in a thought-provoking assembly.

Gladwell has said in an interview by a journalist that he writes to try out ideas:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122671211614230261.html

"Q: Do you worry that you extrapolate too much from too little?

"A: No. It's better to err on the side of over-extrapolation. These books are playful in the sense that they regard ideas as things to experiment with. I'm happy if somebody reads my books and reaches a conclusion that is different from mine, as long as the ideas in the book cause them to think. You have to be willing to put pressure on theories, to push the envelope. That's the fun part, the exciting part. If you are writing an intellectual adventure story, why play it safe? I'm not out to convert people. I want to inspire and provoke them."

482924• 13 years ago

http://shameproject.com/profile/malcolm-gladwell-2/

"Malcolm Gladwell began as a college right-wing Reagan supporter, was trained by the tobacco-funded far-right National Journalism Center, and throughout his career has inserted pro-tobacco, pro-banking industry and pro-PHARMA messages into his books and articles. Gladwell can earn $1 million a year as a paid corporate speaker, sometimes from the very same corporations and industry groups he happens to promote and defend in print."

paul_f• 13 years ago

If I am understanding what you are saying, since MG's career and how he makes money is in a way you disapprove, then both his facts and opinions should be dismissed? Discuss.

It is a bit pathetic to attack the person instead of the concepts they espouse.

overgard2• 13 years ago

Ugh, what an awful site. I don't even like most of the people they "profile", but jesus, that reads more like a hate site than a movement to promote transparency.

chetanahuja9• 13 years ago

"Q: Do you worry that you extrapolate too much from too little? "A: No. It's better to err on the side of over-extrapolation ..."

That's all you need to know about his writing. Over-extrapolator of "trends" from some isolated fragments of information about fields he knows nothing about.

Read his book as entertainment... sure. Somewhat like how you'd guffaw at an acerbic observation by a standup comedian without trying to read too much into the scientific validity of said observations. Or how you'd treat the claims of "4 out of 5 dentists recommend our floss" type claims. That's about the right level of credibility for his output.

coldtea7• 13 years ago

The response by Malcolm Gladwell is very thoughtful. The key point is that when the airline company Korean Air (which had already had to change its name after an earlier pilot error disaster) went into problem-solving mode, the airline itself identified changing cockpit communication culture as a step in solving its pilot error crash problem.

That they did so doesn't necessarily mean they found "Korean culture" as the fault with their "cockpit communication". Their reasoning could just as well be that their pilots where not that good trained, and they brought in some experts.

If a French software company is flailing and it brings in, say, Kent Beck and Martin Fowler to do some training, does that mean the company thinks it was their developers French culture that was the problem, or just that it thinks it was their lack of software process savvy?

Whatever else you can say about an airline company owned and based in Korea, you wouldn't expect it to have an inherent prejudice against Korean culture.*

Why not? Lot's of countries have homeland-deprecating officials. Especially when the top dogs have studied abroad (they consider this makes them more worthy than the others, and tend to blame their culture for being backwards irrespective where they are right or wrong. In some sense they are like "adopted" --and brainwashed-- by the culture they studied in).

Don't know if this was the case here, but both of those things happen.

ShabbyDoo2• 13 years ago

Gladwell notes how military culture differs from civilian culture in Korea. Surely, differences of similar magnitudes exist in the US.

I wonder how the US military has changed culturally over the past few decades. As an outsider, I have presumed that the purpose of degrading training programs, continual demonstrations of the power of officers (parade reviews, etc.), and required social proof of the officers' power and authority (stand and salute upon the officer entering a room) all were designed to avoid argument, hesitation, or doubt when an officer tells his soldiers in battle to charge forth toward an enemy firing upon them. To win an infantry battle, such obedience probably is necessary. Imagine if only a small fraction of the soldiers were willing to advance -- they would likely be much worse off than if all the soldiers advanced at once.

However, this nearly blind obedience surely comes at a price. Can a junior guy tell an officer that he is unsure of a drone target's validity? It strikes me that a modern military operation is much more like a large scale construction project or perhaps software development than traditional trench warfare. In these civilian endeavors, the price of hesitation to consider alternative opinions likely is low compared to the cost of being wrong. Has the military changed?

w1ntermute3• 13 years ago

I would guess that there's a much greater difference between the military and civilian cultures for the US than for South Korea, simply because the SK military conscripts all able-bodied males.

ShabbyDoo2• 13 years ago

An interesting lack of selection bias which I had never considered. I presume that those choosing to be career officers opt-in or at least are chosen based on desire/talent/etc.?

marrusl2• 13 years ago

After I read:

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/06/malcolm-gladwell-unma...

I was no longer able to take Malcolm Gladwell seriously on _any_ subject.

swinnipeg• 13 years ago

How does your ad hominem attack add to the discussion of this article?

marrusl2• 13 years ago

I'd say it adds to the discussion by pointing out that widespread respect for anything Mr. Gladwell has to say is misplaced. Though I can't deny it's at best tangential to the specific point at hand. Well spotted. [no really, guilty as charged.]

jplewicke• 13 years ago

I would like to see his response to this article by Phillip Greenspun that argues that the real reason why American airlines have a better track record than Korean ones is that American pilots have roughly 30 times more hours in the air by the time they become a pilot at a major airline: http://philip.greenspun.com/flying/foreign-airline-safety .

It sounds like Malcolm Gladwell's publisher never bothered to fact check the piece with an actual airline pilot before publishing.

conroy• 13 years ago

It sounds like Malcolm Gladwell's publisher never bothered to fact check the piece with an actual airline pilot before publishing.

"Why did I fail to interview a Korean pilot? If you had bothered to ask me before your published your article, I could have answered that question for you. I researched that chapter over the course of many months. I spoke to numerous pilots, Korean and otherwise. I interviewed crash investigators and human factors experts I interviewed the pilots who ran the Korean Air training program. I read internal Korean Air memorandum, the audit by Delta Airlines, as well as every relevant NTSB document related to crashes involving cultural deference. The only thing I did not do was interview current Korean Air management. They repeatedly declined my requests for interviews. "

From: http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2013/07/my-thoughts-on-gladwe...

notahacker• 13 years ago

In Gladwell's example of KAL801 the captain and first officer were in their forties (not to mention there also being flight engineer his late fifties) and had ample hours of commercial experience and military backgrounds; certainly comparable to Greenspun's examples of that required at US majors.

If I was to do fact checking with an actual airline pilot I certainly wouldn't choose Greenspun either, not with statements like "Unless the country is very large, there won't be any regional airlines"

chetanahuja9• 13 years ago

I'm surprised by the supposedly ultra-rational hacker news crowd to be swayed by this feeble defense of a theory, charitably being called "culturalism"... (but which is basically a rehashed version of oriental exoticism made slightly more palatable for the highly educated, western upper middle classes he's pandering to.)

My simple question to Gladwell is this: If Korean culture explains the bad safety record of Korean air, what explains the excellent safety record of the japanese airlines. All Nippon (No fatal accidents in more than 40 years) and JAL (last fatal crash in 1985 and even that due to mechanical failure) ? Does that record prove that Japanese culture is not only completely different from Korean culture (in-as-much as respect for elders and superiors is concerned) but it would also imply that Japanese culture is somehow better for air-safety than that of all the other national airlines of the world who've had a far worse safety record than those two airlines.

I'd be really interested in hearing how Gladwell's cockamamie, quasi-racist theories explain the above. Either directly from Gladwell or anybody else who might care to defend him in this matter.

foobarbazqux8• 13 years ago

I'm not a Gladwell fan, but surely the idea that people in different cultures behave differently is not too surprising, is it? After all, you said yourself that the HN culture is ultra-rational. Or maybe I misunderstood what you are upset about.

chetanahuja9• 13 years ago

The idea that I'm objecting to is that the culturally prescribed behaviour is somehow the root cause of so many plane crashes.

The argument I've presented is that Korean and Japanese (and indeed, most Asian cultures -- and just to be clear, Asia includes India too.) are very similar when it comes to deference towards elders, teachers and other people considered socially superior. And yet there's a large gap between the airline safety record of these two cultures. The japanese airlines I mentioned are not just safer than their Korean counterparts, but actually two of the safest airlines in the world. Any theory pinning Korean airlines' safety record on the Korean (really, Asian) culture must also include an explanation of the exactly contrary observation seen in japanese airlines.

mediascreen• 13 years ago

He is just saying that the larger power distance[1] in some cultures sometimes lowers one of the benefits of having two pilots.

There are, of course, a number of different ways for an airline to handle this. They can for example encourage an organizational, occupational or situational culture where the "normal" cultural "rules" are temporarily relaxed or suspended - making it ok to speak up to your superiors.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_distance

chetanahuja9• 13 years ago

Well you seem to be defending the "cultralism" hypothesis without actually committing to any sort of an explanation of the extreme differential among the Japanese and Korean airline performances. Again, note that the Japanese airlines are among the safest in the world. It's not just a marginal difference.

The vague point you seem to be making is that the Japanese pilots are trained to "suspend" the culture somehow. Soo... it's just training then, isn't it ?

Malcolm Gladwell's Reponse to the Culturalism Post

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