If we knew what we were doing

At one point yesterday my wife showed me a wall plaque in
a Signals catalogue with a quote from
Einstein that read, “If we knew what we were doing it wouldn’t be called
research.”  For some reason, it struck a
chord.  And then this morning I was
reading a
review of the new Malcolm
Gladwell book in the Times.   Now I confess that I pretty much loathe this
whole genre of pop science (including other books like The Wisdom of
Crowds and How We Decide) that has taken
over the non-fiction side of the best seller lists all the while presenting itself
as something we need to take really seriously.  And there seems to be no shortage of people in MR doing just that.  So when I read Steven
Pinker’s review of  What the Dog Saw
I literally jumped from my chair with glee. 
He nails not just the Gladwell book but the entire genre when he
describes the reasoning in Outliers as “cherry-picked
anecdotes, post-hoc sophistry and false dichotomies.”  Sure, it’s entertaining stuff.  But it’s also lazy, shallow, and maybe even
dishonest.  And then I thought about all
that is being written and said about “the new MR” and I began to wonder whether
we might be heading down this same road.  I hope not.

Einstein also said, “It’s hard.  That’s why we call it research.”