What strikes me as strange is that is intelligence provides so many fitness advantages (up to a point) why is there such wide variation in intelligence especially when there seems to be very little (negligible?) biological cost. One would think you’d be normally distributed around a much tighter range.
The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
451–460 of 500 posts
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#452Earlier quoted context omitted.
> (Until recently, "nerd" was a very offensive insult.) In that sense, perhaps society has made a little progress, in socially embracing those that seem eccentric, quirky or uncomfortable - maybe not always for the right reasons, but it allows more people to be themselves and be happy.
I think it's less of actual progress, and more of economy: what was considered nerdy two decades ago, now is the easiest path to both upper-class and 1%-levels of wealth. People don't hate nerds anymore, they want to be them - not because the topics are interesting, but because they're a good career.
There's certainly some of that, but the long tail of the Internet means there are all sorts of communities and real-life meet ups of the strangest obsessions where their interests are celebrated, not made fun of. This means it's safe to declare your weird obsessions. Even if you're family doesn't understand it, they don't have to - theres a community to connect with, whereas previously there was little/no such ability, and Nerd interests were shunned. Now they're the feature of Comic Con, SDCC, Pax, etc.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#453Paul Graham is the same blogger who "realized" Microsoft is dead quite a while back. Genius.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#454Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ah, Stepmania Online...what a fun time that was. I remember putting in my 6-8 a day after school. I may not have been at the level you were at but I was roughly the same age and quite good. Then, I went to college and no longer had the same desire to play anymore. Do you still crack open Stepmania every so often for old times sake? I have no idea if any kind of a community still exists around it.
Hah I haven’t for a couple years but last time I did I was amazed and dismayed at having the sensation that my mind knows what to do, but my fingers just aren’t quick enough. I’d guess if you were a musician or athlete who hadn’t played in awhile it’d feel similar. I end up shutting it off because my brain isn’t entertained by the slow songs and my hands can’t physically keep up with the fast ones that I loved so muc…
Yeah, I remember Nima, and I also remember a similar feeling upon discovering Beatmania. Now that I'm digging into the cobwebs of my memories, I am beginning to recall a game called O2Jam which was essentially a South Korean Beatmania flavored MMO. Very challenging, and it definitely usurped some of the space I was otherwise giving to Stepmania Online. Did you ever get into O2Jam? I think it might even still be around.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#455Earlier quoted context omitted.
> 100 years ago the education and financial support for scientific invention was largely a closed shop for European-descended upper middle class men. i.e. exactly the people who were, by far, most likely to be living a comfortable, stress-free life back then. We should not underestimate the sheer amount of material progress and economic growth that has occurred since then. A lot more people can have the luxury of get…
800 karma in 73 days. I wonder what the highest karma gain in two months was, in HN’s history. (From comments only, and with the top comment removed from consideration to avoid one-offs.) I guess I’m a bus ticket collector of HN facts.
I’ve consistently gained karma faster than that. By my estimate, there’s still a handful of people who are currently accumulating karma even faster than I am (one of whom has been mentioned here), though I expect to only really be sure in a year or so.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#456Earlier quoted context omitted.
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…
That's one very interesting observation. I've commented in that vein a short while ago where I noticed that once I finally understood what some paper was about my usual response (definitely not always) would be 'That's it?'. Wikipedia has been a godsend for me, to be able to understand core principles without having to wade through what seems to be obfuscated English in order to hide something relatively trivial at t…
Wikipedia for certain topic is often just as inscrutable as papers would be. I have no idea why this is, but my guess is that it’s written by people with passing interest in the field who lack the experience to effectively distill their knowledge like paper authors might.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#457Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is possibly the greatest argument for social safety nets ever made, really. The economy of today is so efficient and supply chains are so effective at moving things to people who need them, that it seems incredibly stupid to not use it to provide some kind of basic necessities to every human being, no questions asked. If the US were to do this today, there would be more innovation, less misery, a supercharged ec…
So if you spend 14 hours a day for 5 years on a computer project that becomes useful, and a lot of people want it and pay you for it, you are willing to fork over most of that to the government since they provided you with the basic allowance that let you pursue this project, and your success is how they fund a basic allowance for everyone - you included. While your friend, who did nothing for 5 years, maintains the…
> While your friend, who did nothing for 5 years, maintains the same standard of living that you do.
Honestly, is this such a bad thing? Why do we incentivize innovation by promising people a basic standard of living? We reward people who take risks with something better than that anyways, so I see no problem with giving people not willing to take those risks something lesser than that “for free”.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#458Empirically, I'd say most progress is made not by geniuses, but regular joe-smo scientists and engineers attacking problems in their field for incremental gains in understanding. I tire of the hero worship and mythologies we place on genius when I know that most of the time genius just means right place right time on the shoulders of 'incremental' giants.
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#459I 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…
Read about and in depth how to raise kids. There is a lot of good books how you can let kids become strong individuals instead of good at following instructions. You will never be bored :p
Any advice?
Re: The Bus Ticket Theory of Genius
#460I 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 consequence of this is that these fields are filled up with careerists - people who are socially driven rather than curiosity driven. I think it's worse than this: school and academia is no longer the sole option for the ultra curious. Curiosity is better fed by the internet, which means we end up lacking a social institution which captures and unifies people like this.
Isn't the internet the social institution then?