181–190 of 286 posts
Could someone elaborate on "Being enthusiastic is worth 25 IQ points" ?
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I think we can put property taxes aside, you’ll have to pay your landlords property taxes if you rent after all. If you can afford the cost of a down payment (more on that later), then buying a home does have some utility in wealth generation. You’re right that most of the initial mortgage payments go towards interest, but even collecting 25% of your monthly payment towards your own net worth is a big deal compared t…
"Here in SoCal purchasing a home with a traditional 20% down would involve locking up $200,000 that could be put into the market productively" I've been saying this for years, maybe after this year it'll make more sense: It is not sensible to model "the market" as if it makes steady X% (for X somewhere in the 5-8 range) returns every year. It can and has gone decades being flat-ish, or slightly down after inflation,…
> Buying tools: Start by buying the absolute cheapest tools you can find. Upgrade... Strong "no" on this one. Always buy quality tools. These are priced at a premium, but unlike "inexpensive" tools will: • Do the job expected of them w/o creating a new problem • Be enjoyable to use • Last a long time (often, a lifetime)
Like the power-of-2 realloc trick, the amortized cost of finding the tool you need is at most 2x.
But cheap tools do something worse than break. They ruin work, they frustrate you, they can be dangerous.
(Perhaps in KK's youth, the cheapest tools were still acceptable. But today, the cheapest tools literally cannot do a single instance of the task they're ostensibly made for.)
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It is both the hardest bit of advice on the list to follow, and the most profound. Many religions have some version of a holy man/woman going to a mountain/cave/ocean/forest and coming back with divine/enlightened wisdom. What they all have in common is some version of 'Unity: we are one'. It makes violence much harder, among other things. What left hand wants to shoot the matching right hand? Pragmatically, this mea…
Ultimately, you can say everyone is human. But some humans are more human than others, at least in my system of ethics. I don’t necessarily blame the bad apples, but in the same way that I don’t blame my infected finger. It’s still going to require a strong dose of antibiotics.
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That's dated. This used to be true, absolutely. But the size of various eco-systems is such that if you want to really master something now you have to invest a lot of time and if you bet on the wrong horse then you can lose a lot of time and effort for little return. Front end is especially brutal in this sense.
Mastery is hardly needed for the bulk of software development work. Just like with the building trades, most coding can be done "good enough" with apprentice or journeyman skill levels as long as the team has a few masters to provide guidance and check the results.
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I did not buy a house because I expected it to appreciate in value. I bought a house because the alternative was to pay rent. Rent is a service. A renter does not get anything of inherent, transferable value out of the exchange. A renter is also subject to the whims of his/her landlord and, from my experience, a renter has to move regularly to avoid rent increases and bad landlords. The majority of my mortgage paymen…
> The majority of my mortgage payment goes towards ownership of a product - my house For many (most?) people that's not true. Even ignoring that mortgage payments often include property taxes and/or private mortgage insurance, you can expect to pay more interest than principal for the first fifteen years or more of a thirty-year mortgage.
> Everyone is shy. Other people are waiting for you to introduce yourself to them, they are waiting for you to send them an email, they are waiting for you to ask them on a date. Go ahead. Maybe take this one with a grain of salt.
The point of that game is that it's surprisingly hard to get rejected (unless you ask for something completely silly and/or impossible). So if you need something, you may as well ask for it, and stop feeling so afraid and vulnerable about being rejected. Other people turn out to be happy to help or accommodate you (just like you are, if someone asks you for something). I've tried this in the past with some small things, I don't think I've managed to get one rejection. A surprisingly large number of people, myself included, are just more shy than it's optimal.
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Just a question, and I know it is completely dependent on culture, do people really believe > Trust me: There is no “them”. I feel like there is constantly a them. The way I interpret it is that you should not modify your behavior based on other people's opinion. Or is it about people who don't matter? How do you know people who don't matter? I have never known from the beginning of a relationship that this person wi…
Sure. We're social primates that evolved in the context of lots of inter-troop and inter-tribe violence. As well as plenty of intra-troop violence, competition, and coalition-building. We are primed to see a "them", because our ancestors not always a little worried about "them" died out. It's like how we're hardwired to see snakes. [1] But as conscious beings, we can choose to indulge the wiring or work against it. Snakes freak a lot of people out, but if they calm down they can appreciate them as cool animals and fellow ecosystem participants.
But I think his point here is that beyond the continuous us-vs-them processing we're doing as social primates, there's a deeper truth. That we're all people. We're all connected. We're all, like it or not, in this together.
> Don’t be the best. Be the only. No, if you are "the only" you are going to do that for the rest of your life. Also, it is at odds with the second previous point "Hangout with, and learn from, people smarter than yourself". You can't have people smarter than yourself if you are the only. And it is at odds with all the other points promoting sharing and generosity too. If you are the only, it means you didn't share y…
Maybe you're reading it wrong. It makes no sense to provide wisdom that clashes with other points. So.. you might be applying it wrong. You could be the only love of someone's life. Or the only that made a difference. Or the only father. Or brother. I didn't read it in terms of competition, where you STRIVE to be the only. It's a matter of perspective.
Sometimes when there's a tradeoff to be made, it's best to present the opposing principles one at a time. Yes it's worthwhile to seek to go beyond being the best and be the only. Yes it's good to surround yourself with people smarter than your. These are in tension. You have to figure out the balance for yourself.