Thanks for the post—I can see what you’re getting at, but this doesn’t feel like two clearly distinct categories to me. The first person I thought to try and apply this to had strong traits from both columns, for example. As a similar but more available example, where would you fit Bryan Caplan here? He’s disagreeable without being angry, and is trying hard not to be wrong while happily telling others why they are.
I’m not sure whether my intuition here is that these can both be strong/weak in the same person, that there’s more of a spectrum, or that they’re a set of characteristics that may or may not cluster the way you’ve described. I’m not really sure what shape you meant for this to take, or how well it applies in these intermediate cases.
I’d note that I expect these clusters (and I suspect they’re clusters) to be a minority of intellectuals. They stand out a fair bit to me, but they’re unusual.
I agree Bryan Caplan leans disagreeable, but is less intense than others. I found The Case Against Education and some of his other work purposefully edgy, which is disagreeable-type-stuff, but at the same time, I found his interviews to often be more reasonable.
I would definitely see the “disagreeable” and “assessor” archetypes as a spectrum, and also think one person can have the perks of both.
Thanks for the post—I can see what you’re getting at, but this doesn’t feel like two clearly distinct categories to me. The first person I thought to try and apply this to had strong traits from both columns, for example. As a similar but more available example, where would you fit Bryan Caplan here? He’s disagreeable without being angry, and is trying hard not to be wrong while happily telling others why they are.
I’m not sure whether my intuition here is that these can both be strong/weak in the same person, that there’s more of a spectrum, or that they’re a set of characteristics that may or may not cluster the way you’ve described. I’m not really sure what shape you meant for this to take, or how well it applies in these intermediate cases.
I’d note that I expect these clusters (and I suspect they’re clusters) to be a minority of intellectuals. They stand out a fair bit to me, but they’re unusual.
I agree Bryan Caplan leans disagreeable, but is less intense than others. I found The Case Against Education and some of his other work purposefully edgy, which is disagreeable-type-stuff, but at the same time, I found his interviews to often be more reasonable.
I would definitely see the “disagreeable” and “assessor” archetypes as a spectrum, and also think one person can have the perks of both.