Outliers: The Story of Success

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Amazon.com

Are successful people born or is that a learned skill? While a lot can be accomplished as a 'self-made-man', there are very strong environmental factors influencing our life path. It is these factors that often create the stereotypical conditions.

The less-known but equally intriguing aspect of this book is the insight about educational systems and the process of learning. On one hand it points out the many failed ways of trying to education the next generation. On the other, it also shows that no matter how much we try to level the playing field, there will always be biases every individual needs to overcome. Far from the assumption of culture or society being the severe handicap; it is the family conditions, upbringing philosophy, and the ways of the immediate environment that shapes us the most into who we really are.

Quotes of interest

Harvard is basically a glorified corporation, operating with a profit incentive. That's what makes it tick. It has an endowment in the billions of dollars. The people running it are not necessarily searching for truth and knowledge. They want to be big shots, and when you accept a paycheck from these people, it is going to come down to what you want to do and what you feel is right versus what the man says you can do to receive another paycheck When you're there, they got a thumb right on you. They are out to make sure you don't step out of line.

If you had met them at five or six years of age, you would have been overwhelmed by their curiosity and mental agility and sparkle. They were true outliers. The plain truth is that in the end almost none of the genius chidren from the lowest social and economic class ended up making a name for themselves. They lacked something that could have been given to them if we'd only known they needed it: a community around them that prepared them properly for the world.

Bill Gates could accept the title of genius, and leave it at that. It takes no small degree of humility for hiim to look back in his life and say, "I was very lucky."