Balancing Expertise & Arrogance

Is it possible to be an expert without becoming insufferably arrogant? Is it possible to be a master of your subject and retain some semblance of humility? I wanted to find out. So I asked a bunch of people. I first wrote to the Dalai Lama, Abhinav Bindra and Jagdish Bhagwati and never heard back. So I had to resort to others. I chose my targets carefully.

College professors, for instance, have to be experts at what they teach. If they are good, students look up to them; pepper them with questions. It would be very easy for them to feel smug and superior...

Rajeev Gowda is a professor at IIM Bangalore. He is also a genial self-effacing sort of bloke. So I asked him, “Rajeev, how do you retain some humility while maintaining this God-like aura of the all-knowing guru?”

In the social sciences, there are no absolutes, said Gowda. There are explanations that work some of the time and in some contexts. “Understanding this is fundamentally humbling.” He then went on to talk about being open-minded and listening to all points of view, which is easy to say but hard to do. The problem, Gowda said in closing, was that most of us look at the world through the lens of our own world view and convictions “and accept or reject evidence to suit our positions. That is what makes various experts insufferably arrogant and intolerant”. Bingo! I do this all the time: filter information through the prism of my own prejudices. Maybe that’s why I was so “misunderstood”.

- Shoba Narayan, How do you balance expertise and arrogance?

Comments

Unknown said…
hey sir,

this article really interested me. sir what i believe is a sports person can dare not get arrogant in his life. coz he knows that he can never be infallible. no matter how expert he may be in the game, he knows that there always exists a better player who can defeat him. the same applies to all facets of life but people seldom realise it. its not as evident in other spheres of life as much as it is in sports. thats where we coined in the term 'sporting spirit.' its also true that faculties/teachers are found to have more of intellectual arrogance coz this is perhaps the only field where hundreds of other people(students) listen to you. a hundred people listening to you everyday can do more than enough to make one an intellectual snob. i dont think one can ever afford to be very arrogant in any other industry except the teaching industry. it wont be long before the person is left far behind in the league. this is no rebuke to any teacher, but just a personal observation. gud day !
Unknown said…
hey sir,

this article really interested me. sir what i believe is a sports person can dare not get arrogant in his life. coz he knows that he can never be infallible. no matter how expert he may be in the game, he knows that there always exists a better player who can defeat him. the same applies to all facets of life but people seldom realise it. its not as evident in other spheres of life as much as it is in sports. thats where we coined in the term 'sporting spirit.' its also true that faculties/teachers are found to have more of intellectual arrogance coz this is perhaps the only field where hundreds of other people(students) listen to you. a hundred people listening to you everyday can do more than enough to make one an intellectual snob. i dont think one can ever afford to be very arrogant in any other industry except the teaching industry. it wont be long before the person is left far behind in the league. this is no rebuke to any teacher, but just a personal observation. gud day !
Ray Titus said…
Meghal,

Point taken. Its indeed difficult to remain grounded especially when you dabble in intellectual sorta stuff everyday.

Sure, teachers may be more susceptible to the lure of arogance. But remember, there are exceptions, the ones that truly inspire by combining a brilliant mind with deep rooted humility.

Cheers :)

Popular Posts