The Entrepredator combines the intelligent mind of modern civilised man but also incorporates his inescapable basic and predatory antecedence.[1]
Timing is critiEntrePredator – The Power of Context and Economic Geographycal in an entrepredator’s fortunes. In North America, during the Pleistocene epoch (that ended around 10,000 years ago) megafauna or large mammals, disappeared (during the latter stage of the epoch). This correlates with the appearance of man (an apex predator) in the region. Smilodon’s (Sabre toothed Tiger) extinction correlates with a man’s arrival. Ten thousand years or so later in North America, another epoch began, but this was a commercial one. The epoch correlates with the appearance of another predator. The new environment was as sponsored by the animal spirits and herd instincts of investors and corresponds with the arrival of the entrepredator species called – the Arbitrageur. Knowledgerush.com define Arbitrageur as …the practice of taking advantage of a state of imbalance between two (or possibly more) markets… Warren Buffett is a member of this ‘species.’ His ‘phenotype’ was Suit Able to the landscape, he was lucky enough to be born into. Bill Gates highlighted the point saying “Warren says if he’d been born a few thousand years ago, he’d probably have been some animal’s lunch. But he was born into an age that has a stock market and rewards Warren for his unique understanding of the market”
In Gates and Jobs’ case it was the January 1975 “Project Breakthrough” launch of the Altair 8080 accompanied by the headline “World’s First Microcomputer Kit to Rival Commercial Models.” It was the launch of the personal computing industry and the beginning of one of the most valuable industries in the world today. They were both twenty years old at the time (similarly the Rockefeller brothers). Dutch Schultz rise occurred during the heights of the prohibition era. His notorious temperament and ambition made him attractive prospect to gansterpreneur and owner of tenement speakeasy, Joey Noe. The duet established themselves after going on to control beer supply to the New York Bronx. Schultz’s temperament combined with the prohibition environment would concoct multi-millionaire dollar fortune for the iconic gangster.
Richard Dawkins writes in his book The Selfish Gene “If we were told that a man had lived a long and prosperous life in the world of Chicago gangsters, we would be entitled to make some guesses as to the sort of man he was, We might expect that he would have qualities such as toughness, a quick trigger finger, and the ability to attract loyal friends. These would not be infallible deductions, but you can make some inferences about a man’s character if you know something about the conditions in which he has survived and prospered. The argument of this book [referring to his book but equally applying to this one] is that we, and all other animals, are machines created by our genes. Like successful Chicago gangsters, our genes have survived, in some cases for millions of years, in a highly competitive world. This entitles us to expect certain qualities in our genes…”
On page 62 of Outliers author Malcolm Gladwell lists fourteen entrepreneurs, five of which I featured in my previous book This extract from Outliers addresses the same point directly. Gladwell highlights the reason for why fourteen of the seventy –five (or 20%) of those he list as the world’s richest people in history were born between 1830 and 1840. This time frame suggested momentous change was taking place in and around this time as highlighted earlier. He writes “In the 1860’s and 1870’s, the American economy went through perhaps the greatest transformation in its history. This was when the railroads were being built and when Wall Street emerged. It was when industrial manufacturing started in earnest. It was when all the rules by which the traditional economy had functioned were broken and remade. What this list says is that it really mattered how old you were when that transformation happened. If you were born in the late 1840’s you missed it.” Gladwell supports his case citing Sociologist C. Wright Mills who wrote “The best time during the history of the United States for the poor boy ambitious for high business success to have been born was around the year 1835.” Gladwell overlooked James J Hill. He was born in 1838! Paul Allen and Bill Gates founders of Microsoft were born 1955 and 1953 respectively. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak founders of Apple were born in 1955 and 1950 respectively, Bill Joy of Sun Microsystems was born 1954. Nagavara Murthy founder of Infosys one of India’s largest IT companies, Azim Premji founder of Wipro, one of the largest software companies in India and Shiv Nadar, founder of HCL Technologies, a global leader in IT Services were all born 1946, 1945 and 1945 respectively this time in India.
Of course there are men and women that are successful in the above named individuals industries that were born much earlier and much later. But the clusters of birthdates do support the idea that there is a correlation between peculiar characteristics, environments and great success.
[1]Nietzsche also spoke of the Übermensch (the superman to come) who is destined to become embarrassed by his ancestors (ordinary man) who is equally embarrassed by their own perceived humble evolutionary origins. Homo Economicus, or Economic human, is the concept in some economic theories of humans as rational and broadly self-interested actors who have the ability to make judgments towards their subjectively defined ends.
A major difference between an economic-geographical perspective and the assumptions of economic orthodoxy concerns the notion of a ‘rational man’ – homo economicus. Mainstream economists assume that people are always behaving as rational, profit maximising individuals responding to market signals. However, life is more complex than that and people’s behaviour is not always the outcome of rational decision-making. Rather, it can be influenced and conditioned by their gender, race, age, class, religion, culture, health or disability. Geographers are keen to take these aspects on board when studying economies. A ‘geographical man/woman’ – or what I will call here homo geographicus – can behave very differently from the way they are supposed to behave according to economic orthodoxy
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