Malcolm Gladwell Outliers Essay

According to the website Mathworld, an outlier is “an observation that lies outside the overall pattern of a distribution” and it usually “indicates some sort of problem.” Malcolm Gladwell, author of “Outliers,” defines an outlier as “something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body” or “a statistical observation that is markedly different in value from the others of the sample.” That being said, Gladwell’s definition of an outlier is partially consistent with the statistical definition. However, one of the final statements he makes in the book about outliers would make his definition wrong.
The information given to readers in “Outliers” is what contributed to the success of notable people or what prevented

exceptional people from being successful, therefore making them outliers. Gladwell offered examples, such as the stories of Chris Langan and Robert Oppenheimer, to show how a person’s socio-economic standing can affect their success. Both Langan and Oppenheimer had the same level of intelligence, but due to their upbringing, which were polar opposite, Langan loss opportunites because he wasn’t able to develope skills like practical intelligence due to being raised in a poor household, unlike Oppenheimer. “Practical intelligence includes things like ‘knowing what to say to whom, knowing when to say it, and knowing how to say it for maximum effect.’” (101)
Another contributor to success is when someone is born.

For example, out of the seventy five most wealthy people in history, fourteen are Americans who were born in the mid-nineteenth century. “In the 1860s and 1870s, the American economy went through perhaps the greatest transformations in its history. This was when the railroads were being built and when Wall Street emerged. It was when industrial manufacturing started in earnest. It was when all the rules by which the traditional economy had functioned were broken and remade. What this list says is that it really matters how old you were when that transformation happened.” (62) This is also the case for Jewish lawyers from New York. Time of birth is the reason why Maurice Janklow was not able to be a successful lawyer, despite his qualifications, but his son, Mort Janklow, was able to be. When Mort became a lawyer, there was a demand for his skills and he had the amount of

experience.
The final two contributors to being successful in a field is experience and culture. “...researchers have settled on what they believe is the magic number for true expertise: ten thousand hours.” (40) Gladwell backs this claim up by telling the stories of Bill Joy, a computer genius, and the Beatles. People like them, who have been able to be successful in their field, all have had the opportunity to reach those ten thousand hours needed to become an expert in their field. Meanwhile, culture, as Gladwell proved through his rice paddy anecdote, will affect levels of success. Gladwell also proved this by writing about how a pilot's culture can affect their control of the plane.
The outliers Gladwell discusses in his book all have the previously mentioned things in common, which have made them successful or have prevented others from being successful.

Those who have been successful are what the reader is led to think are the outliers. However, Gladwell makes a statement that contradicts this. “Their success is not exceptional or mysterious. It is grounded in a web of advantages and inheritances, some deserved, some not, some earned, some just plain lucky- but all critical to making them who they are. The outlier, in the end, is not an outlier at all.” (285) That statement would mean that everyone else who has not been able to be extremely successful through their field is the outlier. Also, all the information given in the book about what contributes to creating the outlier would falsify Gladwell’s definition and previously quoted statement. Considering Mathworld’s definition, everyone else in the world who doesn’t meet Gladwell’s outlier criteria would be the outlier. Yet, reaching the levels of success told in the book is difficult and those who do become the minority, not the majority. The advantages and inheritances that contribute to the creation of success are not available to everyone. For that reason, Gladwell’s original definition is consistent with the statistical definition, however, the people he classifies as outlier would make his definition

false.