Professor Roger Kneebone directs the Imperial College Centre for Engagement and Simulation Science and the Royal College of Music - Imperial College Centre for Performance Science. His first career was as a surgeon, operating on trauma patients in southern Africa. He then changed direction, becoming a general practitioner in southwest England. Now, as an academic at Imperial College London, he researches what experts from different fields can learn from one another. His unorthodox and creative team includes clinicians, computer scientists, musicians, magicians, potters, puppeteers, tailors and fighter pilots. This is his first book for a general readership.
Roger Kneebone is a legend
*Mark Miodownik, author of Stuff Matters*
Fascinating and inspiring
*Financial Times*
The doctor stitching together medicine and art
*Guardian*
Examines the ubiquitous, but understudied, process of becoming an
expert
*New Scientist*
Roger Kneebone has an insatiable desire to understand what makes
people tick and for years has scratched this itch by bringing
together countless interesting people to share their experience and
knowledge. This book on experts is a wonderful manifestation of
what he has learnt. If you want to do anything better, from surgery
to embroidery, you can learn something from this book
*Christopher Peters FRCS, Clinical Senior Lecturer and Consultant
Upper GI and General Surgeon, Imperial College London*
Roger Kneebone describes a journey that has no short cuts and no
end. He tracks the inside story of becoming an expert, documenting
a time line that stretches from the state of knowing nothing to
passing on the wisdom of a lifetime. He draws out common themes
between his experiences as a medical student, surgeon, GP,
educator, academic, harpsichord player and sometime juggler with
those of men and women working creatively in design studios,
workshops and performance spaces, all of them now experts in their
own fields. His refutation of the view that experts are an
irrelevant, 'useless elite' is compelling and chilling in equal
measure. Whisper it quietly, but post COVID-19, there is a growing
realisation that experts do matter. I wish this book had been
available when I was a student - it is full of wisdom, insight,
humanity and encouragement. We should all aim to cross the
'ha-ha'
*Susan Standring, Emeritus Professor of Anatomy, King's College
London*
Roger Kneebone is our foremost expert on expertise. Expert is a
desperately important book at a moment when we've begun to wonder
just what we might still be good at
*Ken Arnold, Head of Public Programmes at Wellcome Collection*
In a world awash with knowledge, we are in danger of forgetting
what it means to be wise. Where knowledge arms us against the
onslaughts of the world, wisdom disarms. It takes the risk opening
up, to listen and attend, not presuming we already know. Wisdom
puts others before ourselves. In this superbly written,
passionately argued and very necessary book, Roger Kneebone
contends that wisdom, more than knowledge, is the mark of the
expert. In whatever vocation, as he shows us, becoming expert is a
never-ending, lifelong task. But anyone can commit to it. Those who
do should be an example to us all
*Tim Ingold, University of Aberdeen*
My time spent studying and working in Japan has left me with a deep
appreciation for the importance of skill and the mystery of its
acquisition. How do we navigate that path from knowing nothing to
being able to pass on precious knowledge and experience to the next
generation? Roger Kneebone is a supremely thoughtful and sensitive
companion on that journey.
*Rebecca Salter RA, President of Royal Academy of Arts*
Vividly practical
*Nature*
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