According to philosopher Isaiah Berlin, people think in one of two different ways: They’re either hedgehogs, or foxes. If you think like a hedgehog, you’ll be more successful as a communicator. If you think like a fox, you’ll be more accurate. Isaiah Berlin coined the hedgehog/fox dichotomy (via Archilochus) In Isaiah Berlin’s 1953 essay, “The Hedgehog and the Fox,” he quotes the ancient Greek poet, Archilochus: The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one thing. Berlin describes this as “one of the deepest differences which divide writers and thinkers, and, it may be, human beings in general.” How are “hedgehogs” and “foxes” different? According to Berlin, hedgehogs relate everything to a single central vision. Foxes pursue many ends, often unrelated or even contradictory. If you’re a hedgehog, you explain the world through a focused belief or area of expertise. Maybe you’re a chemist, and you see everything as chemical reactions. Maybe you’re highly religious, and everything is “God’s will.” If you’re a fox, you explain the world through a variety of lenses. You may try on conflicting beliefs for size, or use your knowledge in a wide variety of fields to understand the world. You explain things as From this perspective, X. But on the other hand, Y. It’s also worth considering Z. The seminal hedgehog/fox essay is actually about Leo Tolstoy Even though this dichotomy Berlin presented has spread far and wide, his essay is mostly about Leo Tolstoy, and the tension between his fox-like tendencies and hedgehog-like aspirations. In Tolstoy’s War and Peace, he writes: In historic events the so-called great men are labels giving names to events, and like labels they have but the smallest connection with the event itself. Every act of theirs, which appears to them an act of their own will, is in an historical sense involuntary and is related to the whole course of history and predestined from eternity. In War and Peace, Tolstoy presents characters who act as if they have control over the events of history. In Tolstoy’s view, the events that make history are too complex to be controlled. Extending this theory outside historical events, Tolstoy also writes: When an apple has ripened and falls, why does it fall? Because of its attraction to the earth, because its stalk withers, because it is dried by the sun, because it grows heavier, because the wind shakes it, or because the boy standing below wants to eat it? Nothing is the cause. All this is only the coincidence of conditions in which all vital organic and elemental events occur. Is Tolstoy a fox, or a hedgehog? He acknowledges the complexity with which various events are linked – which is very fox-like. But he also seems convinced these events are so integrated with one another that nothing can change them. They’re “predetermined” – a “coincidence of conditions.” A true hedgehog might have a simple explanation, such as that gravity caused the apple to fall. Tolstoy loved concrete facts and causes, such as the pull of gravity, yet still yearned to find some universal law that could be used to predict the future. According to Berlin: It is not merely that the fox knows many things. The fox accepts that he can only know many things and that the unity of reality must escape his grasp. And this was Tolstoy’s downfall. Early in his life, he presented profound insights about the world through novels such as War and Peace and Anna Karenina. That was very fox-like. Later in his life, he struggled to condense his deep knowledge about the world and human behavior into overarching theories about moral and ethical issues. As Berlin once wrote to a friend, Tolstoy was “a fox who terribly believed in hedgehogs and wished to vivisect himself into one.” Other hedgehogs and foxes in Berlin’s essay Other thinkers Berlin classifies as foxes include Aristotle, Goethe, and Shakespeare. Other thinkers Berlin classifies as hedgehogs include Dante, Dostoevsky, and Plato. What does the hedgehog/fox dichotomy have to do with the animals? What does knowing many things have to do with actual foxes? What does knowing one big thing have to do with actual hedgehogs? A fox is nimble and clever. It can run fast, climb trees, dig holes, swim across rivers, stalk prey, or hide from predators. A hedgehog mostly relies upon its ability to roll into a ball and ward off intruders. Foxes tell the future, hedgehogs get credit What are the consequences of being a fox or a hedgehog? According to Phil Tetlock, foxes are better at telling the future, while hedgehogs get more credit for telling the future. In Tetlock’s 2005 book, Expert Political Judgement, he shared his findings from forecasting tournaments he held in the 1980s and 90s. Experts made 30,000 predictions about political events such as wars, economic growth, and election results. Then Tetlock tracked the performances of those ...
