The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius • Hacker News Board

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#301

Post by dang » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 8:59 PM UTC

jakobmi wrote: post #114

tompccs wrote: post #16

I think this is correct. The bad news is we are creating systems which minimise the number of geniuses entering each field. In the past, science was an eccentric hobby, not particularly valued and certainly not a viable career option. Today it's all of these things - like becoming a doctor. Telling your mother you want to be a scientist is far better than saying you want to be a musician. A hundred years ago that wou…

The BIGGEST problem with research is this: it's HARD, not easy, to understand. Most papers written are absolute trash. Not because the content is. Because it's written in a shitty, overly braggy way (especially mathematics and physics), that's mostly shouting "I'm better than you and if you don't get it, you're an idiot". They are not written with any USER, let alone, READER, in mind. Anyone would immediately be fire…

Please don't use uppercase for emphasis.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#302

Post by panarky » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:02 PM UTC

BoorishBears wrote: post #273

Alex3917 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Competitive gaming is a particularly good example of this. Anything competitive is emphatically not a good example of this. If you're in a competition, then by definition you're doing the exact same thing as everyone else. That's a guaranteed recipe for not accomplishing anything meaningful in life. Competition can be great for cultivating positive character traits and developing certain skills, but at some point y…

What in life is not a competition? What the above comment is about applies to so much in life, from education to careers because at their core, they are competitions. > If you're in a competition, the. By definition you're doing the exact same thing as everyone else. Not true. There are people who play competitive, ranked, games 3 hrs a week and are happy with being in the top 50% of players And there are people who…

> What in life is not a competition?

The examples given in the post are not competitions.

The bus ticket collector is interested in old bus tickets, and is not competing with anybody.

Ramanujan obsessed over series, and was not competing with anybody.

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#303

Post by confidantlake » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:02 PM UTC

icelancer wrote: post #260

galfarragem wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Society deify successful people when in reality they are nothing more than serial lottery winners. For every "Ronaldo" there are a myriad of people trying to get there that will end their life as losers because they made an high-stakes bet and lost. The truth in unconfortable and nobody wants to listen about it.

>> Society deify successful people when in reality they are nothing more than serial lottery winners This is absolutely false and a terrible thing to perpetuate. Work ethic has the highest controllable coefficient to success as an output. Luck exists and the universe is probabilistic, yes, but it is not non-deterministic. This self-lashing of our community and amongst the populist movement that is growing in populari…

I believe genetics is more important than work ethic for being a pro soccer player.

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#304

Post by NPMaxwell » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:06 PM UTC

carapace wrote: post #186

NPMaxwell wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. It was a local blackout: too much load with air conditioners in the summer

Did... did they not tell him it was a joke?

No. They meant to stop him from his compulsive interest in electronics. They wanted him to play with other kids, play sports, run around. He seemed weird and they thought he would seem weird when he grew up. And running shop that fixes radios didn't look like success to them. (Until recently, "nerd" was a very offensive insult.)

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#305

Post by chubot » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:08 PM UTC

amursft wrote: post #116

Paul became incredibly successful. I wonder what he thinks his own bus ticket was? Going deep on a topic seems like great advice with kids, and I wish schools allowed for more of it.

I think he would say "writing short programs", which leads to Lisp.

He designed the Arc language before he started ycombinator. He designed the Bel language after he left ycombinator. So it seems like ycombinator (and changing an entire industry) was an interlude between Lisps :)

If you had to rate obsessions on a scale from 0-100 on how likely they are to be useful, I would rate programming languages around a 5/100. It's exceedingly unlikely to come to anything (which I know from working on my own language :) )

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6784085

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#306

Post by CamperBob2 » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:17 PM UTC

sah2ed wrote: post #256

Alex3917 wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wish there was a better word for this than pg's "disinterested" because it sounds strange to have an intense, all-consuming interest in which you're disinterested. It's interest in the sense of "conflict of interest", not in the sense of finding something fascinating.

Perhaps a word that connotes neutrality like “impartial” would be better in this context?

I'd almost say "introversion" or "selfishness" is the right term, if the latter weren't so prejudicial. You aren't collecting bus tickets or obsessing over infinite series to advance your own material interests or standing in the external world.

"Disinterest" doesn't work at all in any sense of the term. In the absence of overt mental illness, the bus-ticket collector must see it as being in his best interest to spend his time collecting bus tickets, or he'd do something else instead. ("You are your calendar.") The search for gratification, however externally meaningless, is certainly a valid expression of self-interest.

Put another way, if you would object if you were forcibly stopped from pursuing a goal, then you cannot be described as "disinterested."

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#307

Post by eli_gottlieb » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:23 PM UTC

tompccs wrote: post #16

I think this is correct. The bad news is we are creating systems which minimise the number of geniuses entering each field. In the past, science was an eccentric hobby, not particularly valued and certainly not a viable career option. Today it's all of these things - like becoming a doctor. Telling your mother you want to be a scientist is far better than saying you want to be a musician. A hundred years ago that wou…

>Telling your mother you want to be a scientist is far better than saying you want to be a musician.

Are you joking? A small child literally has a better chance of growing up to become a professional athlete than a tenured research professor!

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#308

Post by dual_basis » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:24 PM UTC

danbmil99 wrote: post #219

throwaway713 wrote: post #191

I agree with his theory, but what I find particularly interesting is that I think most people do not have an obsessive interest in anything at all. And as someone who has obsessive interests in a lot of things (some “useful”, some not), that seems really odd to me: how can you just be satisfied to go to work, come home, watch TV, and go to bed each day? (Not saying that’s the wrong way to live, just saying it is surp…

Frankly most people obsess about things like finding a mate, playing video games, collecting comics, politics, reading books, watching & discussing TV shows & movies, social websites (such as this one), sex, porn, fashion, sports, the social politics of work (as opposed to the work itself -- e.g. "The Office") and, of course, their kids. But none of these sorts of obsessions are likely to lead to fame or fortune. I t…

Many of my relatives seem to have no interests or hobbies. I mean sure, they watch TV and movies, but it's not like they are deeply interested in them, they serve more as pastimes. They don't have anything they are actually passionate about.

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#309

Post by tomxor » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:25 PM UTC

throwaway713 wrote: post #191

I agree with his theory, but what I find particularly interesting is that I think most people do not have an obsessive interest in anything at all. And as someone who has obsessive interests in a lot of things (some “useful”, some not), that seems really odd to me: how can you just be satisfied to go to work, come home, watch TV, and go to bed each day? (Not saying that’s the wrong way to live, just saying it is surp…

> I have a very intense dread of losing myself in the necessary mundanity of life; I am more financially comfortable than ever, but I also feel less like myself than I ever have. Going to meetings, making dinner, creating to-do lists — these don’t fit my personality at all, but I have to do them because they need to be done.

You just articulated my worst fear, occasionally some aspect of it creeps into my life when society demands some "busy work" from me... each time it makes me feel like wanting to retreat into the wilderness to escape from society and enjoy nature and do things I actually find interesting.

Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius

#310

Post by resu_nimda » Sat, Nov 23, 2019, 9:25 PM UTC

ramphastidae wrote: post #275

yingw787 wrote: post #243

My take on genius is that it's akin to insanity, and for some of us, insanity doesn't seem to be so insane (which itself is an insane thing to say). Nikola Tesla ended his life alone, with a box of scrap parts as collateral for his rent ( https://www.history.com/news/9-things-you-may-not-know-about... ). Friedrich Nietzsche wrote "The Parable of the Madman" ( http://historyguide.org/europe/madman.html ), and apocryph…

I am convinced that this idea of people who are just too smart for society is way overblown and quite damaging. I see it so often in tech — the “10x” engineer who is just too smart for social norms like polite communication or hygiene. They are not held to them same social standards as others because they are “just different.” In reality, these folks just use the fact that no one else knows how their code works as an…

To be fair, if someone really does produce useful code that none of their peers or coworkers can understand, I wouldn't dismiss the notion that they are somehow "different."

I know you're railing against the Linus Torvalds man-child types, and I agree that I wouldn't really enjoy working with a person like that. The parent comment wasn't really about excusing poor treatment of others though, it was just describing the isolation that can be felt.

What makes you think it would be easier for that person to develop the social skills than for their peers to learn to understand their work? Maybe those people just neglected to develop their reasoning/coding skills? Or maybe people's brains actually can work in profoundly different ways.