I am probably more negative on the impact of business schools on this front — in part because in that world when I issue this warning, I get called anti-intellectual and anti-science. Those are both incredibly reactionary responses. And not from junior people: Ed Snyder and Tom Davenport respectively. There are a hell of a lot of data fanatics in the business school world.

I agree on the certainty point but it begs the question, how did people become so enamored with certainty? In part it is probably human nature. But I think in part is because they were taught that it is reasonable to expect certainty. In COVID, people expected the scientists to give them certainty. The only certainty that scientists actually provided was the certainty that they were wrong yet again. That they were consistently wrong wasn’t their fault. They were (and still are) grotesquely overmatched. That they were certain was their error. And a bad one at that.