Generalists & Specialists

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Index Entry

Q. "You say you are holistic and opposed to specialists. But cannot generalists be employed to coordinate the work of the specialists?"

RBF: "Yes. The specialists were all generalists anyway until they got to the graduate level. So they lose authority. An effective generalist just learns all of the generalized principles; the specialist just seeks the special cases-- with ever less and less chance of finding a new generalization.

"The specialists don't see the applications of their knowledge; they are encouraged not to. It's like the blacksmiths vs. the Nobel prize-winners, the system tries to make them smaller than they really are."