So, over the last several months, I’ve had reason to contemplate how someone who is a complete fraud could become incredibly influential, to the point where he can lead seminars, write books, and have a profitable consultancy on a subject that he obviously knows absolutely nothing about.

I’m not going to name who I’m talking about, though if the guy who fought Goliath had the last name of the dude from Half Life, you might get some idea of who I’m talking about. If you don’t know the particulars of why I’d be thinking about this, drop me a line, and I’ll gladly elaborate.

But it’s interesting to me, why this situation gets so under my skin. This man is supposedly an “expert” and people pay to attend his seminars and his talks. He has a published book that supposedly teaches others about the subject he’s supposedly an expert on, and has made at least some money in the process, which boggles my mind.

Now, the thing is, the guy’s a total fraud. I’ve seen him feebly attempt to ply his trade, and it’s an embarassment. The guy is as skillful at his supposed craft as an inept fourth grader. If you saw it out of the blue, you’d laugh at its incompetance. If I told you he was a successful consultant, specializing in this particular thing, I’m sure you simply wouldn’t know how to respond.

The funny thing is, the other day, I found someone else who I feel belongs in the same category, for a completely different field. But basically, the same *type* of person. A fraud.

Now, I thought to myself, these two people are *obviously* frauds. They clearly have no idea what they’re talking about, and both bury their ignorance under piles of large words they don’t understand. They’re both comically inept at what they are supposedly masters of, and yet, have both achieved a measure of success plying this particular trade. They both drive fancy cars, and have a measure of power and control in their fields.

Why? How do they get away with it?

Well, the issue is that both of these people work in relatively subjective fields. If they were scientists, for instance, you could instantly quantitatively prove they didn’t know what they were doing. Their past successes and failures are largely irrelevant because of the positions they’ve achieved in their careers – people don’t actually ask you the specifics of what you’ve worked on, because the generalities sound good enough to invoke some measure of authority.

The most important thing, though, is that both of these people work in positions that other people aspire to. That is, because these people hold positions that other people want to achieve, their advice finds a willing audience who will listen to it [i]uncritically[/i], and treat it as though it has value. The ‘uncritically’ part is the important bit.

Thing is, because these people hold a particular title, their ideas have a certain value. The problem is, that’s the *only* value those ideas have.