You're complaining about having two sets of friends? I think I'd settle for one.
But I won't dumb down.
Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
11–20 of 118 posts
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#12You sound like a socially-uncalibrated egotistical person who blames his short-comings on other people.
I don't really see what the problem is with "switching modes" depending on who you're talking to. Everybody does it. It's natural. You don't want to be the guy that yaps about the research project he's doing during the department social hour, and which is coincidentally the only thing he talks about before and after social hour as well.
Even though I can follow a conversation about graph theory and computational biology, I still avoid the guys at social hour that won't talk about anything else.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#13If you're consistently the smartest person in the room, you probably need one of two things: new friends or a reality check. Possibly both. The best advice I ever got about picking friends was that you should hang out with the people you want to be like. In your case, you seem to not want to go directly from a strip club to a social establishment and get crunked. Well, there is a fairly simple solution to that... (Ur…
> In your case, you seem to not want to go directly from a strip club to a social establishment and get crunked.
I don't mind the partying, but even in a club, a lounge is usually more intimate and people tend to strike up conversations more easily. If a few people out of the group do it it's easy just to say "fuck this bullshit let's party!!!" and you can be relatively sure that the others will agree and the conversation dies. There are times though that people just want to relax and have "serious" discussion (especially if your life revolves around partying). And it's usually these times that I just want to turn off.
[edit] Oh and in case you were wondering, I don't usually go to strip clubs. One of my friends who owns a club was invited to check the place out and a few of us tagged along.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#14People are social animals. I think as analytical people we forget this aspect of our humanity a lot.
So you need to feed that social part of yourself without doing, time-consuming and mostly pointless things, like getting drunk with the guys and watching naked women dance. If you dig naked women dancing, get HBO. Or just surf the net.
As a consultant, I go through phases of alone down-and-working hacking, when I'm not on a big contract, and working full-time with other people trying to help them when I am on a big contract.
I've found that both of these lifestyles have something positive and negative about them. I need social interaction, yet I crave just doing my own thing and being left alone also. I've found that since I don't value my social needs, I sometimes end up taking just whatever comes along, instead of actively planning. This spontaneity is cool when you're 20. But it gets less and less cool the older you get, for some reason. (Usually after you end up with a decade of spending your free time and you've in the same spot, with the same people, doing the same things you were ten years ago.)
In the past, this has sometimes led to be hanging out with people who are, or at least think they are, exciting. If I were you, I'd find something bigger than yourself to believe in and get involved with it. Church, Boy Scouts, civic groups, environmental groups, politics -- something that you find both intellectually stimulating and where you have a lot of social interaction. Make yourself do this, because you will not think that it will work until you actually do it.
And give up the I'm-so-smart routine. Trust me, you're an idiot like the rest of us, just in a different way. So you have lots factual recall ability? Aside from a promising future as a game show contestant, who cares? People with a great recall ability can be some of the most annoying people on the planet to deal with. Trust me, I'm one of them! Meet people where they are, and relate to them in an honest manner that you both can handle. Sounds like you've got a big of overly-done self importance thing going on. Once again, finding something more important than you and humbly trying to contribute to it could make you more of a person that really is smart and interesting and exciting people, like myself, would want to hang out with. (grin)
Life is about you putting stuff into it, not sitting on your ass waiting to see what comes out of it and then criticizing what you get by default. Sorry to rag on you so much -- you probably don't deserve it, but geesh, you're 30. Get a better attitude and lifestyle already.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#15We are all different people in different social circles. This is just how successful humans operate. You don't behave the same way over dinner with your parents as you are over dinner with your friends.
It seems to me you have unrealistic expectations. As you grow older you gain many different social circles, ex college, ex work, ex town etc. What binds you is different and what stimulates each group is different. If you seriously can't find something stimulating about a group of people then just stop seeing them... but remember it is also a reflection on you.
Most people offer much more then you seem to be able to extract and when addressed properly are stimulated by challenging conversation.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#16My friend, you sound like my clone. I haven't really figured it out. We may just be doomed.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#17Personally, I try not to say things like "dumbing down". It's presumptuous to assume that I'm smarter than other people; I don't need that kind of ego boost. I tend to think of it as people having different interests. Many people have a familiarity with celebrity gossip that rivals my familiarity with programming. They're just choosing to use their brainpower in a different way. I'm sure many people on HN disagree, b…
> Personally, I try not to say things like "dumbing down" I know exactly what you mean. That's why I put in quotes. It just makes it easier to talk about. Usually, "dumbing myself down" in my case means suppressing knowledge that I have. I can't fault other people for not knowing things that I do because as you say different people have different interests, and beside that I spend much more time on the internet that…
If someone say "we only use 10% of our brains", do you really view it as "dumbing yourself down" if you hold back a long lecture about the actual structure of the human brain? If so, I would say you simply lack social skills. This is not a bad judgement on you in itself, not everybody was born with equal endowment in social skills, and they can be learned. However, the way in which you ascribe your lack of ability to get along with your fellow human beings to your much vaster intelligence is a little ugly.
My default instinct is to feel bad for socially inept people, because I have had a good deal of social problems myself. However, I often find that socially-inept people are simply ugly on the inside, even after I give them the benefit of the doubt. Walking around making constant negative judgments about the intelligence of your peers is hardly a good way to get along.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#18> So when I hear people confidently repeat urban myths like "we only use 10% of our brains", or "you'll drown if you don't eat an hour before swimming" etc, I don't bother trying to explain why I think they're wrong.
Why would you do a thing like that? I just go to extraordinary lengths to do the exact opposite... correct people all the time. Over the ages, it has resulted in a lot of nicknames, sarcasm but yes... a group of friends who accept me for what I truly am and with whom I truly enjoy the time I spend. And I wouldn't have it any other way.
I really don't understand why would you do a thing like that? Why hide what you are? Who cares what others think? I say jump right in... let them know what you think, pitch your ideas, debate... what's the worse that could happen? You would be back to the dark bedroom, bright monitor, 20 tabs, right?
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#19You may not like my answer, but you asked, so here goes:
I think the only problem is with your attitude. Like ilitirit, I hate the expression, "dumbing down". I am probably similar in nature to you, and I have never had this problem, much less even thought about it.
At the bookstore over coffee, my SO reads about design & fashion while I read about Galois and number theory. So what? (I just have to remember to nod in agreement to questions like, "Aren't those window treatments beautiful?") When people talk about sports, I don't tune out; in fact, I enjoy a little football and basketball between coding sessions.
OTOH, NASCAR = for(i=0;iI don't watch much TV, don't enjoy gossip, and don't recognize many celebrities, but I can still smile and nod in most conversations. At the very least, I can usually politely direct them to something a little more interesting.
Don't forget, you're human before you're a hacker, so being among other people, no matter who they are, is important to your well being. Don't think of "dumbing down", think of "diversifying among potential users of my code". So get out of that bedroom and join the rest of us. You'll be fine.
Re: Ask HN: "Dumbing yourself down" around your peers?
#20Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Personally, I try not to say things like "dumbing down" I know exactly what you mean. That's why I put in quotes. It just makes it easier to talk about. Usually, "dumbing myself down" in my case means suppressing knowledge that I have. I can't fault other people for not knowing things that I do because as you say different people have different interests, and beside that I spend much more time on the internet that…
If someone say "we only use 10% of our brains", do you really view it as "dumbing yourself down" if you hold back a long lecture about the actual structure of the human brain? If so, I would say you simply lack social skills. This is not a bad judgement on you in itself, not everybody was born with equal endowment in social skills, and they can be learned. However, the way in which you ascribe your lack of ability to…
> However, the way in which you ascribe your lack of ability to get along with your fellow human beings to your much vaster intelligence is a little ugly.
Maybe I didn't explain myself well enough, but I get along with other people very well. People like being around me for various reasons. Don't get me wrong - I am fully aware that there is much more to life than intellectual stimulation and in no way do I base my relationships with people on this idea alone. I'm just talking about one outcome of managing my relationship with others, and I would like to find out how many other people have gone through this (or are going through this) and how they deal with it. I find that self-improvement is one of the first steps in managing relations with others. Because at the end of the day, it is my problem, not theirs.
It's difficult to convey your precise meaning when it comes to interpersonal relationships. You can try very hard to explain what you mean but there will invariably be some ambiguity (it took me a few days to figure out how I should verbalize this to HN - in the end I decided to avoid analysis-paralysis). In many cases, the best one can do is hope that what you say strikes a chord with people in similar situations (hence the opening and closing sentences). That more people are commenting on individual pieces of my post rather than sharing there own experiences could be an indication that there aren't many people that can relate to this.
Whatever the case, I am grateful for the responses.