Gladwell's Culture & Air Crashes Analysis Badly Flawed

Koreantoast writes "As a recent Slashdot article showed, interest in Malcolm Gladwell's theory on the impact of culture on airline crashes has come up again following the tragic accident of Asiana Flight 214. Yet how good was Gladwell's analysis of the Korean Air Flight 801 accident which is the basis of his theory? A recent analysis by the popular Ask a Korean! blog shows serious flaws in Gladwell's presentation: ignorance of the power dynamics amongst the flight crew, mischaracterizations of Korean Air's flight accident record (three of the seven deadly incidents characterized as 'accidents' were actually military attacks or terrorism) and manipulative omissions in the pilot transcripts to falsely portray the situation. 'Even under the most kindly light, Gladwell is guilty of reckless and gross negligence. Under a harsher light, Gladwell's work on the connection between culture and plane crashes is a shoddy fraud.' Perhaps Gladwell should have asked a Korean before writing the chapter."

Comments

Re:Yeah but it makes a good story

[jdmuskrat]

Gladwell must work for Fox News Corp.

Re:Comment on Korean pilots

[The Evil Atheist]

"Different cultures have inherent strengths and weaknesses. Therefore, it must be the cause of this aircraft accident". Sorry, but it is NOT GOOD ENOUGH. You have to prove the link, not merely make an assertion that one fact somehow translates into another.