My comment on a 2-day thread in Ozarque's LJ...or... books, STUDIES vs. articles about...
http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/25/news/garcia_men.fortune/
(for reference)
Ozarque, although I appreciate your intent in saying you should have read the book first, [see http://ozarque.livejournal.com/552714.html ] that such a mainstream magazine is willing to make such wide "accusations" about half of the population is worth knowing about, all by itself.
dteleki: Many good points.
Although I have to disagree with:
I'm going to assume
that the entire book
is like the excerpt writ large.
I have no basis to judge,
other than the excerpt.
The article has different objectives, and different editors, than the book.
The article is in a magazine, which has its own intended audience, its own editors, and its own limitations that it set on the author when he wrote this "adapted from" article -- NOT a "book excerpt" as so many comments keep stating. (The book and the article are written by the same guy -- Guy Garcia, to be exact. Who comes from a culture where "taking care of your own" is a BIG part of being a Man.)
And the writer's purpose in placing the article is twofold: to make money from the article, and to get people to buy his book.
However, I have no way of knowing how his article was edited by the magazine editors.
I probably can know something about who the editors consider their audience to be, and (perhaps) how past "based upon" articles in the same magazine compare to the books that are supposedly their basis.
Any comments on this, readers of Fortune?
All of which is very frustrating,
and reminds me of something else
that DRIVES ME CRAZY...
ALMOST ALL newspaper
(and other periodicals')
articles about
"studies" are based,
NOT on the study itself,
but on a PRESS RELEASE
ABOUT the study.
These are often incomplete
and misleading
and politically motivated...
and ALWAYS come out
LONG before the actual study
is published!
BY THE TIME
the ACTUAL study
comes out,
it is "old news" --
and besides that,
embarrassing to admit
where there may be
HUGE differences
between what the study
actually SHOWS
and
what the media
have shouted
from the rooftops...
Not to mention any scrutiny
of the study's methodologies...
SIGH.
OK, end rant.
For the moment.