Walter Isaacson Goes Inside the Mind of Leonardo Da Vinci(thedailybeast.com)
thedailybeast.com
Walter Isaacson Goes Inside the Mind of Leonardo Da Vinci
https://www.thedailybeast.com/walter-isaacson-goes-inside-the-most-creative-mind-in-history-leonardo-da-vinci?curator=MediaREDEF
24 comments
After Issacson's botched Steve Job's biography, I have a difficult time trusting him for any historical figure. Issacson had unprecedented access to Steve Jobs, yet the biography really didn't provide any new insight into what made him who he was.
That's a commendable lack of susceptibility to the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. [1] It would be easy to take this biography of someone we don't and can't know, and take it as fact, when he failed to do a good job on the biography of someone we did know.
> Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.
> In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know. That is the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect.
[1] http://larvatus.com/michael-crichton-why-speculate/
> Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.
> In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know. That is the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect.
[1] http://larvatus.com/michael-crichton-why-speculate/
It's also possibly partly due to Steve Jobs and his RDF (reality distortion field). I actually found that biography pretty good. I think he did the best that he could with it. By presenting all points of view, its really up to you to decide. I don't think he ever said he is a liar (as someone commented) -- not sure how he could have done that. If you're reading that biography as if it's the freaking bible of Steve Jobs, then no. But it showed a lot of the sides of Steve that I did not know before and did not like. I knew he was an a-hole, but didn't know how low he had gone. I especially found the part about his first wife and daughter Lisa so very, very sad -- and he made Woz cry. What a guy.
It's not that he was a liar, it's that he was granted a unique opportunity to write a book unlike anything anyone else could write and delivered that...turd.
Sure, deadlines, pressure, but honestly, it was 80% junk that had already been written in other books or articles, 10% "why are you asking these dumb questions" and only 10% actual insight.
It was a surprising weak effort is all. People expected something of more substance.
It's a shame someone like Michael Lewis wasn't at bat for that book. He seems more able to dig through the layers and find out the actual story. The New New Thing gets into fantastic detail about Jim Clark even though he's just one of the people in that book.
Sure, deadlines, pressure, but honestly, it was 80% junk that had already been written in other books or articles, 10% "why are you asking these dumb questions" and only 10% actual insight.
It was a surprising weak effort is all. People expected something of more substance.
It's a shame someone like Michael Lewis wasn't at bat for that book. He seems more able to dig through the layers and find out the actual story. The New New Thing gets into fantastic detail about Jim Clark even though he's just one of the people in that book.
I've always liked Steven Levy's book about Apple, Insanely Great. (He released an updated version not too long ago.)
I also thought he did a great job with the profiles of historic computing pioneers in Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution. (One of the few books that users the word "hackers" properly...)
I also thought he did a great job with the profiles of historic computing pioneers in Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution. (One of the few books that users the word "hackers" properly...)
Ah yes, a book for the plebs. Not for the hardcore stalker who has studied every shred of information to ever have been published about Jobs.
If you'd simply had a subscription to Byte Magazine and casually read every third article you'd know at least 50% of what he put in that book.
We're talking about someone who over decades had an outsized impact on Silicon Valley and computing in general, not some obscure figure that nobody ever wrote about and you'd have to go out of your way to learn more. If this was about Gordon Moore or Andy Grove you'd have a point, but it's Steve fucking Jobs. There's maybe ten people from his era that are more instantly recognizable, and those are people like Oprah Winfrey or Bill Clinton.
Isaacson's book is the Reader's Digest version of a biography. It's the WikiHow version of what should have been written.
Imagine writing a biography of Elon Musk and introducing, breathlessly, that he made his first fortune from PayPal as if people didn't know. This is that book.
We're talking about someone who over decades had an outsized impact on Silicon Valley and computing in general, not some obscure figure that nobody ever wrote about and you'd have to go out of your way to learn more. If this was about Gordon Moore or Andy Grove you'd have a point, but it's Steve fucking Jobs. There's maybe ten people from his era that are more instantly recognizable, and those are people like Oprah Winfrey or Bill Clinton.
Isaacson's book is the Reader's Digest version of a biography. It's the WikiHow version of what should have been written.
Imagine writing a biography of Elon Musk and introducing, breathlessly, that he made his first fortune from PayPal as if people didn't know. This is that book.
Many people don’t know. That’s the entire point.
Not everyone is a stalker fanboi who absorbs all trivia over years and needs a pure diet of only previously untold anecdotes.
Not everyone is a stalker fanboi who absorbs all trivia over years and needs a pure diet of only previously untold anecdotes.
It's not that I'm a "stalker fanboi" so much as you've apparently been living under a rock for the last thirty years if you haven't heard this shit before. Did you know Bill Gates founded Microsoft? No way! Did you know Steve Wozniak built the original Apple? Get out! This is not mind-blowing news.
It's also irrelevant. This ended up being some bullshit compendium when, given the unprecedented access, you'd expect better. They could've written this book based on anecdotes and old press. That's the problem.
It's also irrelevant. This ended up being some bullshit compendium when, given the unprecedented access, you'd expect better. They could've written this book based on anecdotes and old press. That's the problem.
If you made a point of getting to know people outside your sphere, you would be surprised at how little some people know about these things. That you take this for granted says more about you than Isaacson’s book on Jobs.
For instance: I don’t follow football. Which means that you can pick any football celebrity in the world ever and at most — at the very most, I may be able to connect a name to the face. But I wouldn’t know what they’ve done or who they’ve played for. In the unlikely event that I would read their biography, it would be helpful to provide ample context.
Now the thing is that do the comments here help me determine if the book he wrote on da Vinci is accurate? No. Not really. Not any more than random newspaper reviewer opining on the quality of the writing.
For instance: I don’t follow football. Which means that you can pick any football celebrity in the world ever and at most — at the very most, I may be able to connect a name to the face. But I wouldn’t know what they’ve done or who they’ve played for. In the unlikely event that I would read their biography, it would be helpful to provide ample context.
Now the thing is that do the comments here help me determine if the book he wrote on da Vinci is accurate? No. Not really. Not any more than random newspaper reviewer opining on the quality of the writing.
He did certainly not. LDV has been asleep for years. He is dead. His remains are but dust.
Isaacson has more likely been using his great imagination to write an exciting read. He has performed wonderfully at this in the past with other long-dead individuals. But in the cases where the person was only recently deceased and still present in first-hand memories of living individuals, Isaacson has been found to do a dismal job.
Isaacson has more likely been using his great imagination to write an exciting read. He has performed wonderfully at this in the past with other long-dead individuals. But in the cases where the person was only recently deceased and still present in first-hand memories of living individuals, Isaacson has been found to do a dismal job.
What was wrong with Isaacson's biography of Jobs? I think unless it was exceptional it was going to make people unhappy, but I don't recall it being "dismal".
Becoming Steve Jobs is better, though.
Becoming Steve Jobs is better, though.
It got basic facts wrong. Lots of them. Things you could easily google or ask anyone who knew a bit about computers. Gruber wrote some about it on DF:
https://daringfireball.net/2012/02/walter_isaacson_steve_job...
I believe there is an entire episode of Connected or ATP about errors in the book from when it came out.
Sloppy research, unasked questions, not talking to other primary sources. Just a GIANT missed opportunity/mistake.
https://daringfireball.net/2012/02/walter_isaacson_steve_job...
I believe there is an entire episode of Connected or ATP about errors in the book from when it came out.
Sloppy research, unasked questions, not talking to other primary sources. Just a GIANT missed opportunity/mistake.
To be very specific episode 42 and 43 of John Siracusa’s Hypercritical are about the book and Siracusas opinion of it.
Albeit there is a lot of nit picking — especially in the latter episode — his overall point is that Isaacson’s book did not use the opportunity of having access to Jobs and the people around him. Specifically he didn’t know the industry and — apparently from the book — bother to learn about it.
But relating to a bio on da Vinci? He doesn’t have exclusive access so the argument doesn’t transfer.
Hypercritical: 42: The Wrong Guy https://overcast.fm/+IplN7GcE/18:32
Albeit there is a lot of nit picking — especially in the latter episode — his overall point is that Isaacson’s book did not use the opportunity of having access to Jobs and the people around him. Specifically he didn’t know the industry and — apparently from the book — bother to learn about it.
But relating to a bio on da Vinci? He doesn’t have exclusive access so the argument doesn’t transfer.
Hypercritical: 42: The Wrong Guy https://overcast.fm/+IplN7GcE/18:32
I loved Hypercritical. It didn’t occur to me that would be the podcast. Thanks.
The asking the right questions thing doesn’t apply but the quality of research that he showed in his biography of Jobs makes me doubt the level of work/research in other biographies he writes.
The asking the right questions thing doesn’t apply but the quality of research that he showed in his biography of Jobs makes me doubt the level of work/research in other biographies he writes.
My biggest problem was that 1) he really seemed obsessed about Jobs 'crying', and 2) he skipped over what struck me as one of the most important periods of his life: the 'wilderness' of his ex-Apple days before his return.
Especially 2 is a part I had not read too much about, and I was really disappointed that he just kind of skipped the NeXT days.
Especially 2 is a part I had not read too much about, and I was really disappointed that he just kind of skipped the NeXT days.
> He did certainly not. LDV has been asleep for years. He is dead....
I came to say this (or read a similar thing). Modern readers tend to think that biographies are accurate historical works. They are often not. So many events are by definition, unknown and unknowable due to the passage of time and many other factors, that most biographies belong in the class of "faction"
I came to say this (or read a similar thing). Modern readers tend to think that biographies are accurate historical works. They are often not. So many events are by definition, unknown and unknowable due to the passage of time and many other factors, that most biographies belong in the class of "faction"
What troubled me about the article is that it implies Leonardo was a peaceful man yet these are points 4, 5 and 6 in in his resume:
"... 4. Again, I have kinds of mortars; most convenient and easy to carry; and with these I can fling small stones almost resembling a storm; and with the smoke of these cause great terror to the enemy, to his great detriment and confusion.
5. And if the fight should be at sea I have kinds of many machines most efficient for offense and defense; and vessels which will resist the attack of the largest guns and powder and fumes.
6. I have means by secret and tortuous mines and ways, made without noise, to reach a designated spot, even if it were needed to pass under a trench or a river. ..."
http://www.openculture.com/2014/01/leonardo-da-vincis-handwr...
"... 4. Again, I have kinds of mortars; most convenient and easy to carry; and with these I can fling small stones almost resembling a storm; and with the smoke of these cause great terror to the enemy, to his great detriment and confusion.
5. And if the fight should be at sea I have kinds of many machines most efficient for offense and defense; and vessels which will resist the attack of the largest guns and powder and fumes.
6. I have means by secret and tortuous mines and ways, made without noise, to reach a designated spot, even if it were needed to pass under a trench or a river. ..."
http://www.openculture.com/2014/01/leonardo-da-vincis-handwr...
It is likely he needed money for his projects. War sells.
I remember a fun discussion Isaacson once had about Benjamin Franklin. After finishing a 608-page biography about Franklin's life, Isaacson was asked "Would Ben Franklin be a blogger if he were alive today?"
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/12/11/what-if-ben-were-one-...
Isaacson, who'd written a 608-page biography of Franklin, insisted that the answer was no — "not a blogger." The distinction was that Franklin "polished every word." But the question was too provocative to leave without more discussion. Ben Franklin would have a web site, Isaacson speculated. "It would be carefully crafted. It would be more like Andrew Sullivan than your normal blogger in pajamas."
http://www.10zenmonkeys.com/2007/12/11/what-if-ben-were-one-...
Isaacson, who'd written a 608-page biography of Franklin, insisted that the answer was no — "not a blogger." The distinction was that Franklin "polished every word." But the question was too provocative to leave without more discussion. Ben Franklin would have a web site, Isaacson speculated. "It would be carefully crafted. It would be more like Andrew Sullivan than your normal blogger in pajamas."
The Observer (Sunday Guardian) gave this a glowing review yesterday. Very interested in this book.
So half of what he says will be completely wrong, possibly intentionally so?
What I found really infuriating about his novel about Jobs was he would quote Jobs saying something true, something that anyone who knows the history or Apple or technology of the time knows is true, and then refer to unnamed other sources who claimed that this was a lie, and then assert that it's an example of Jobs lying.
What a hatchet job.
Worst mistake Jobs ever made was trusting that guy.
What a hatchet job.
Worst mistake Jobs ever made was trusting that guy.
Isaacson recently gave a promotional talk on the KERA Think podcast: http://think.kera.org/2017/10/18/the-strange-and-wonderful-m...