Best Reading of the Day
What comes to mind when someone mentions 'Steve Jobs'??
Greatness? Arrogance?
The myth of the great man, moving history rather than being moved by history, has been written about for nearly 200 years in Western culture. The concept is largely disproven but does seem to continue in technology today as this article calls out.
http://www.technologyreview.com/review/539861/techs-enduring-great-man-myth/
Here is a snippet from the piece:
The idea of “great men” as engines of change grew popular in the 19th century. In 1840, the Scottish philosopher Thomas Carlyle wrote that “the history of what man has accomplished in this world is at bottom the history of the Great Men who have worked here.” It wasn’t long, however, before critics questioned this one–dimensional view, arguing that historical change is driven by a complex mix of trends and not by any one person’s achievements. “All of those changes of which he is the proximate initiator have their chief causes in the generations he descended from,” Herbert Spencer wrote in 1873. And today, most historians of science and technology do not believe that major innovation is driven by “a lone inventor who relies only on his own imagination, drive, and intellect,” says Daniel Kevles, a historian at Yale. Scholars are “eager to identify and give due credit to significant people but also recognize that they are operating in a context which enables the work.” In other words, great leaders rely on the resources and opportunities available to them, which means they do not shape history as much as they are molded by the moments in which they live.
Why does the great man myth continue in technology and in business in general? How else does one sell all of those books and take in fees at speaking engagements?
Happy Reading,
J.W. Gant
No comments:
Post a Comment