Compared to you, most people seem dumb • Hacker News Board

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#81

Post by rblion » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:21 AM UTC

nikster wrote: post #68

grellas wrote: post #54

People are not really stupid, it is just that you know a lot more. Don’t let knowledge blind you. The points made in this piece are very good ones but it is not primarily an issue of intelligence - rather, it is mostly about one's point of reference. Early in my legal career, I worked at a firm that represented a group of Nob Hill condo owners who had had a series of problems with contractors and who had suffered a v…

As Einstein said: Make it as simple as possible. But not simpler. This is an art, and it applies to every form of user interface design.

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." - da vinci

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#82

Post by JabavuAdams » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:23 AM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #24

golgo13 wrote: post #9

My dad is a Master Electrician but he still asks me questions about his hotmail account and to resend a link to my Picasa albums. He deals with megawatts of electricity on a daily basis. I would hesitate to call him dumb...

Ditto for my stepdad, electrical engineer, holds more patents than I own books, and has put something on fucking Mars . Still can't get his webcam to work, and keeps every document on his desktop. It's just a matter of different knowledge domains. If you tossed me into the woods with experienced naturalists, they'd probably laugh every time I wiped with poison oak, too.

Actually, you'd probably laugh at them because they were naked.

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#83

Post by donaq » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:25 AM UTC

It seems to me the problem is that there are many more opportunities for people working in computing to feel superior because of the way computers (and the internet, in particular) have become ubiquitous in our society. I mean, supposing you were a marine biologist. Not everyone is an expert in your domain, sure, but equally, people just don't normally ask you that many questions about it. If, on the other hand, a marine biologist gets asked daily whether a common species of seaweed is safe to eat, she might, after a while, start wondering why people are so stupid that she has to keep answering the same question. The problem is that in this hypothetical world, enough people eat seaweed often enough that this knowledge is required of our marine biologist on a regular basis, yet any particular person doesn't eat seaweed often enough that he would remember which species were safe to eat. Of course, it doesn't help that there are so many species of similar-looking seaweed or that there are just enough marine biologists around that she meets a group of them with whom she can feel smug at every party she attends!

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#84

Post by ams6110 » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:26 AM UTC

boredguy8 wrote: post #48

lancewiggs wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you are changing your oil every three months then you are almost certainly wasting money. You should trust the integrity of the oil change shop about as much as you would trust an 'SEO expert.' There might be good ones, but most are looking to maximize profit at your expense.

This is just multiplying my inhibitions :) It's a '94 Mercedes 500SL, so...better safe than sorry?

Read the owner's manual. Are you using the type and grade of oil and filter they recommend? If you're getting your oil changed at Jiffy Lube, I can assure you that you are almost certainly not.

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#85

Post by elblanco » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:30 AM UTC

pjscott wrote: post #38

jrockway wrote: post #6

The underlying issue is that people are afraid to try and explore. They form a mental model of how to do something, look for something that fits into that model, and then are happy. If they guess the wrong model, though, then they are stuck forever. Skilled computer users, on the other hand, don't let a failing model bother them. They just try something else. Most people will do this for anything but computers, thoug…

Exactly. I think the fundamental disconnect is between people who see an unfamiliar user interface and immediately try to figure it out, and people who see an unfamiliar UI and think "Oh no what the hell is this, I don't remember it! Panic, panic, panic!". Obviously it's not as sharp a dichotomy as that, but it definitely exists. A lot of people learn to use computers by memorizing a sequence of steps which, if follo…

> Maybe the problem will go away on its own. How many younger people read the manual for their cell phones, or a video game? And yet they figure it out anyway, by exploring.

I agree, this seems to be a problem I notice far more intrinsic to older generations.

I'm going to give another anecdote (I'm full of them today, see my other post in this subject): I once worked a very interesting job where we staffed people who traveled with an extremely sophisticated technology package into a workspace, and literally "embedded" as a super-user of the package, who acted as the user-lead for the package, and got the rest of the users up to speed by solving real world problems. There were literally dozens of components, pieces of software, data sources, etc. The data flow graph of the system covered a wall when printed out on a plotter.

Between cycles acting as a super user, we'd rotate on a cycle of training new hires (about an 8 week training cycle) to do this job. Intrinsically it was a problem solving job. You'd go to a site with the package, and when the users had problems, you'd craft a solution. Over time, you'd more or less build a work book of solutions to most of the common issues that particular user team would see.

From time to time we'd end up with an "older" person filling that position and going through training. I ended up on a couple of the training rotations with these folks, all great guys, but simply unable to put together a solution to very simple problems. To the person, every one of them asked us to build out a procedure manual covering all these various problem solving exercises.

Let me repeat that, they wanted to field novel problem solving questions by looking them up in a procedure manual for the appropriate solution. We're talking about a system with dozens of components, each of which with an operating manual the size of a phone book, and an 8 week training course covering thousands of slides, dozens of exercises, review, scoring, scenarios, private discussion etc. If a procedure manual could have existed for every conceivable problem scenario, it would have been tens upon tens of thousands of pages.

They simply couldn't fathom not having a procedure manual. And to the man, they left shortly after ending up in their field assignments because they "couldn't solve any problems and didn't have a procedure manual". Other than being a terrible waste of everybody's time, it was a repeatable pattern time and time again. Whenever we hired somebody over about 50, they always seemed to fall back in the need for procedures.

And as you've said, that's a terribly brittle kind of knowledge.

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#86

Post by barrkel » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:30 AM UTC

corin_ wrote: post #27

golgo13 wrote: post #9

My dad is a Master Electrician but he still asks me questions about his hotmail account and to resend a link to my Picasa albums. He deals with megawatts of electricity on a daily basis. I would hesitate to call him dumb...

I have no reason to believe your dad is dumb, and I'm not someone who thinks you're dumb if you're not computer savvy (such as your Dad). That said, I've known and employed electricians whom I would call dumb, despite the fact that they can do their jobs. I'm not having a go at electricians, I can't do what they do, and I'm certainly not trying to make any point along the lines of "electricians are dumb except when i…

I think you could replace the word "electrician" in your quibble there with just about any other profession, with a corresponding change to the "dealing with megawatts" boast, and it could still be true.

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#87

Post by johnglasgow » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:31 AM UTC

Let's say I go to the mechanic with a light on in the dashboard, and he'll immediately notice the gas cap isn't tightly secured so it set off a car sensor. He probably went back to his mechanic friends, told them the story, and everyone laughed.

The computer and everything about it is our profession/hobby/passion and that is the main reason we know so much more than everyone else about it.

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#88

Post by corin_ » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:32 AM UTC

barrkel wrote: post #86

corin_ wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no reason to believe your dad is dumb, and I'm not someone who thinks you're dumb if you're not computer savvy (such as your Dad). That said, I've known and employed electricians whom I would call dumb, despite the fact that they can do their jobs. I'm not having a go at electricians, I can't do what they do, and I'm certainly not trying to make any point along the lines of "electricians are dumb except when i…

I think you could replace the word "electrician" in your quibble there with just about any other profession, with a corresponding change to the "dealing with megawatts" boast, and it could still be true.

Most professions, sure. Still, I prefer to see people being assumed clever for their job than those who are assumed dumb for theirs.

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#89

Post by sukuriant » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:33 AM UTC

ivank wrote: post #75

jdietrich wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My grandma calls me up and says "I want to move my computer into the other room, will you come over and plug everything in for me?". I tell her "the plugs will only fit one way round into the correct sockets, you literally can't go wrong". She calls me back, saying that her mouse isn't working. I go over and take a look. She'd forced the USB connector on her mouse into an Ethernet socket with such force that she crac…

You've never plugged a USB cable into an Ethernet socket? Often it doesn't even take any force.

There was such force that the network card was broken. That's a bit more force

Re: Compared to you, most people seem dumb

#90

Post by barrkel » Tue, Oct 26, 2010, 2:35 AM UTC

corin_ wrote: post #27

golgo13 wrote: post #9

My dad is a Master Electrician but he still asks me questions about his hotmail account and to resend a link to my Picasa albums. He deals with megawatts of electricity on a daily basis. I would hesitate to call him dumb...

I have no reason to believe your dad is dumb, and I'm not someone who thinks you're dumb if you're not computer savvy (such as your Dad). That said, I've known and employed electricians whom I would call dumb, despite the fact that they can do their jobs. I'm not having a go at electricians, I can't do what they do, and I'm certainly not trying to make any point along the lines of "electricians are dumb except when i…

I think you could replace the word "electrician" in your quibble there with just about any other profession, with a corresponding change to the "dealing with megawatts" boast, and it could still be true.

Even IT technicians and PR guys.