Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World

Laszlo Polgar was a Hungarian man with a theory that people could be made into geniuses if they were given consistent and focused training in a subject starting from an early age. He devoted himself to creating geniuses out of his own three daughters, Zsuzsa, Zsofia, and Judit, deciding to have them all focus on chess. The children spent huge amounts of time from an early age playing and studying chess. Polgar’s efforts seemed to pay off, given that Judit became a chess grandmaster at only age 15, and Zsuzsa and Zsofia also went on to have spectacular careers in chess. The story of the Polgars’ success spread around the world and led to a swath of books and experts claiming to have similar methods of creating geniuses in a variety of fields.

Epstein argues that the undeniable success of the Polgars obscures the problem with the generalized theory that hyperspecialization is the method for fostering excellence in all situations and fields. Chess champions, he points out, rely primarily on using and recognizing patterns that they have memorized and that work within the defined context of the game. This approach is limited and does not function well in unfamiliar situations and those with do not have the option of such clear and immediate results. Chess champions and other similarly trained elites (such as highly trained classical musicians) have expertise that relies more on these limited parameters rather than on experience.

Psychologists Gary Klein and Daniel Kahneman had opposing viewpoints on the topic of expertise versus experience but ultimately found common ground by distinguishing between “kind” and “wicked” environments. Kind environments are those that work with a limited, defined set of parameters and in which outcomes are similarly defined and limited. Domains such as sports and classical music are examples of kind environments: For instance, it is easy to see when and why points are scored or when a note played is correct or incorrect. Wicked environments involve parameters, causes, or variables that are not necessarily defined and in which outcomes may not be clearly visible or understood. Health is an example of a wicked environment: Experts may not know what causes a certain disease, and thus their success (or lack of success) in treating it cannot rely on factors that are fully known and understood.

Epstein shows how chess grandmasters tend to rely on photographic memory of patterns rather than real-time strategy. For this reason, computer chess programs can beat humans because the computers have superior abilities in working with patterns. Yet freestyle chess—where a human player leverages a computer’s pattern-thinking abilities and focuses on strategy—is even more effective than computer chess programs alone. This shows how humans benefit most when they utilize their cognitive flexibility instead of rote learning. Drawing on the concepts of kind and wicked environments, Epstein argues that the tactics that lead to success in areas like chess and sports do not really work in domains where answers and patterns are not well or fully understood and in which feedback is not immediate and clear. 

Political scientist James Flynn studied a puzzling topic: While IQ tests have been adjusted over time so that average scores remain so, in actuality questions on the tests have become more complicated, indicating that individuals’ ability to think in abstract terms has increased steadily over the 20th and 21st centuries. “The increase in correct IQ test answers with each new generation in the 20th century” has become known as the Flynn effect (38). Epstein gathers research to show that individuals’ ability to make high-level comparisons has increased as has their fluency in “imperceptible concepts.” In addition, scientific concepts and terminology—once limited to expert discussions—have trickled down into the vocabulary of everyday people. As a result, individuals in many parts of the world have become better at solving problems that require them to think abstractly and in novel ways rather than to rely on the use of patterns they have already been taught and become familiar with.

However, Epstein points out, these gains have not occurred evenly across the world but have been more concentrated in developed areas. He refers to a natural experiment that resulted when the Soviet government initiated forced modernization reforms in remote areas of the USSR. Older generations in these areas relied on tradition and repeated patterns of accepted knowledge that were a “concrete part of their daily lives” (42). The younger generations who were more influenced by the educational, cultural, and economic reforms the Soviets imposed were also more equipped to think abstractly, which befits modernity. On the other hand, younger generations are less perceptive about fine differences and holistic context. As Epstein writes, “[t]o use a common metaphor, premodern people miss the forest for the trees; modern people miss the trees for the forest” (44). Despite the intellectual gains that have come along with modernity, Flynn and others like him regret how they have led to specialization rather than encouraging thinking in terms of transferable concepts. Epstein recommends leveraging the cognitive flexibility modernity is primed for by encouraging skills in estimation, big-picture thinking, and the application of knowledge to new contexts.