Jimmy Doyle

Ursula K. Le Guin on Emily Wilson’s Odyssey: “I finished the Wilson Odyssey with some disappointment—too often her ear turns to tin, she uses the flat word or the weak construction. Still I enjoyed it much more than Fitzgerald, infinitely more than Fagles. It moves as swift and certain as a boat on the sea with a good wind in the sails, and I loved the voyage.” (Email to Harold Bloom, 16 January 2018)

Malcolm Gladwell revealed why you shouldn't go to Harvard: 1. America does not have a shortage of students who want science and math degrees. It has a shortage of students who finish them. Half of all high school seniors who intend to study STEM drop out by the end of their second year. The problem is not interest. It is persistence. 2. The obvious assumption is that smarter students persist longer. So Gladwell tested it. At Hartwick College, a small liberal arts school in New York, the top third of math SAT scorers took the majority of STEM degrees. The bottom third dropped out in large numbers. The data seemed to confirm it. Smarter kids stick around longer. 3. Then he looked at Harvard. The bottom third of Harvard's math SAT scores are equal to the top third at Hartwick. By the logic above, everyone at Harvard should graduate with a STEM degree. They are all brilliant. Nobody should be dropping out. 4. Harvard showed the exact same pattern as Hartwick. Top students graduated. Bottom students dropped out like flies. Even though the bottom Harvard students were objectively brilliant by any global standard. Something else entirely was driving the dropout rate. 5. That something is called relative deprivation theory. Human beings do not measure themselves against the world. They measure themselves against the people immediately around them. A Harvard student in the bottom third does not think I am in the top one percent of all students globally. They think that kid next to me keeps getting everything right and I keep getting it wrong. So they quit. 6. The research from UCLA puts a specific number on it. Your odds of graduating with a STEM degree fall by two percentage points for every ten point increase in the average SAT score of your peers. Choose Harvard over the University of Maryland and your chance of finishing a STEM degree drops by thirty percent. Thirty percent. Just to put a brand name on your resume. 7. Relative position matters more than absolute position when it comes to confidence, motivation, and self belief. The eightieth percentile student at Harvard looks up at the people above them and feels like they cannot compete. The number one student at a state school feels like they can conquer the world. That feeling drives everything. 8. The practical hiring implication is radical. Class rank matters more than institution name. Gladwell argues companies should have a don't ask don't tell policy for where someone went to college. Hiring only from top schools means missing the top students from every other school. That is not smart hiring. That is brand worship. 9. When choosing a college, never go to the best school you get into. Go to the school where you are guaranteed to be near the top of your class. Being a big fish in a smaller pond does not just feel better. It statistically produces better outcomes than being a small fish in the most prestigious pond available. 10. So why do we keep choosing Harvard over Maryland? Because we are flattered. Because the acceptance letter feels like validation. Because we make an irrational decision in a moment of enormous flattery and call it ambition. Gladwell's conclusion is simple and brutal. When we have the chance to join an elite institution we do things that are genuinely against our own interest and we feel great about it the whole time.

So what's everyone's favourite conspiracy theory?

When Sam Corner swung that sledghammer to damage weapons, if he saved just ONE child's life, it'd make him a hero. When he swung it again, it was to defend his friend Ellie, who'd been tasered TWICE. Sam was pepper sprayed so couldn't see and his eyes would've been burning, but still he helped his friend. The jury accepted the defence that there was no intent to harm, which is why they were guilty of the LESSER charge of GBH WITHOUT intent!