A new paper on my Journal:

A. Borovik, Expertise and Incompetence.  Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends 14 no. 1 (2026), 1-4.

Abstract:

I comment on a thesis which belongs to the tradition set in the famous book  Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (1963) by American historian and politolog Richard Hofstadter (1916–1970):

`The complexity of modern life makes it difficult for ordinary citizens to participate independently and meaningfully in the governance of society, which undermines trust in democratic institutions.’

and argue that it is outdated: the damning formulation now applies equally to politicians—as well as to all kinds of administrators, managers in softer lines of business (where rigorous criteria, based on principles of physics and exact sciences are absent), and the like—amidst what amounts to a pandemic of incompetence.

I call on all my colleagues in exact sciences and rigorous engineering and medical disciplines: mathematicians, computer scientists, physicists, chemists, biologists, medical practitioners, engineers, …, everyone who know that they deal with the objective reality, and have sufficiently clear and efficient criteria to distinguish between true and false, probable and improbable, possible and impossible –to be more politically active, and try to infuse a bit of rationality and common sense into the current brain-dead political discourse and practice.

Who else in this world retains this endangered skill — to think rationally?