--- title: The Essential Power of the Hive Mind description: Western society tends to lionize individual intelligence--pilots who fly planes and architects who design skyscrapers, the thinking goes, must surely possess powerful brains. While that... canonical: https://time.com/4696447/the-knowledge-illusion-review/ author: Sarah Begley article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-03-09T11:53:02.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T03:45:20.021Z article:section: Ideas og:title: The Essential Power of the Hive Mind og:description: Western society tends to lionize individual intelligence--pilots who fly planes and architects who design skyscrapers, the thinking goes, must surely possess powerful brains. While that... og:url: https://time.com/4696447/the-knowledge-illusion-review/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Essential Power of the Hive Mind twitter:description: Western society tends to lionize individual intelligence--pilots who fly planes and architects who design skyscrapers, the thinking goes, must surely possess powerful brains. While that... twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # The Essential Power of the Hive Mind by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Mar 9, 2017 11:53 AM UTC by [Sarah Begley](https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Mar 9, 2017 11:53 AM UTC Western society tends to lionize individual intelligence–pilots who fly planes and architects who design skyscrapers, the thinking goes, must surely possess powerful brains. While that may be true, Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach argue in their new book _The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone_ that even the greatest thinkers do not think in a vacuum; we all rely on a “hive mind”–not just our own intellect–to get stuff done, even if we don’t realize it. Pilots, for instance, collaborate with co-pilots, instruments and system designers in order to seamlessly fill any gaps in their understanding of flight. Architects, too, depend on various sub-experts to bring their ideas to fruition. So yes, it’s good to be smart. But ultimately, Sloman and Fernbach conclude, “the contributions we make as individuals depend more on our ability to work with others than on our individual mental horsepower.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4696447/the-knowledge-illusion-review/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4696447/the-knowledge-illusion-review/"},"headline":"The Essential Power of the Hive Mind","datePublished":"2017-03-09T11:53:02.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T03:45:20.021Z","description":"Western society tends to lionize individual intelligence--pilots who fly planes and architects who design skyscrapers, the thinking goes, must surely possess powerful brains. While that...","url":"https://time.com/4696447/the-knowledge-illusion-review/","keywords":["Books"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Sarah Begley","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/books/","name":"Books"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4696447/the-knowledge-illusion-review/","name":"The Essential Power of the Hive Mind"}}]}] ```