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Earnestness

paulgraham.com

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Re: Earnestness

#61

Post by nindalf »

ajju wrote: post #47
kabirgoel wrote: post #42

> The most earnest part of Europe is Scandinavia, and not surprisingly this is also the region with the highest number of successful startups per capita. I find it hard to take sweeping statements like this seriously. What makes Scandinavian countries any more or less earnest than, say, Germany or France? This seems no better than to say, “The French make great lovers,” or “The British are terrible cooks.” Absent any…

Why do you assume bad faith? Having worked closely with folks from many parts of Europe as an early stage founder, folks from Scandinavia certainly seem to take “naive” or “earnest” efforts of founders more seriously than other parts of Europe (or even Asia for that matter).

GP didn’t assume bad faith. They just want some evidence for the assertion, or even an objective way to measure this quality.

Re: Earnestness

#62

Post by [deleted] »

Dumblydorr wrote: post #38

I earnestly think his writing has an overindulgent fandom here. Every single blog post rockets to the top and, in my opinion, they are usually short and lacking in citation, evidence, or persuasion. He may write snappily, but is every single post worthy of Han's top slot?

[deleted]

Re: Earnestness

#63

Post by bonoboTP »

kabirgoel wrote: post #42

> The most earnest part of Europe is Scandinavia, and not surprisingly this is also the region with the highest number of successful startups per capita. I find it hard to take sweeping statements like this seriously. What makes Scandinavian countries any more or less earnest than, say, Germany or France? This seems no better than to say, “The French make great lovers,” or “The British are terrible cooks.” Absent any…

Scandinavian countries have very high trust societies, based on any survey that looked into this. Why that is is a difficult question and leads us very far. Is it money? Where did the money come from? Oil (but that's not there in all Nordic countries)? Lack of war? Did the lack of war come from their high trust? Or the geographic distance to warring nations and empires of Europe? Is it related to the cold environment, perhaps harder to conquer and less valuable for empires? Do social temperaments have to do with climate? Is it about their genetic homogeneity? Which one is the cause of which? If they go in cycles what influences what in the strongest way? It's a very complicated issue!

It's too reductionist to take only the part "earnest, therefore startup". Sort of implying that if only other nations were also more earnest they'd also have startups and wealth, disregarding all the possibly good reasons that those other nations have not to be trusting/earnest.

But it's also too dismissive to say to this that it's "national stereotyping" therefore it immediately must be false and there can be no connection at all between earnestness/trust and startups in the case of Scandinavia.

Re: Earnestness

#64

Post by BlueTemplar »

kabirgoel wrote: post #42

> The most earnest part of Europe is Scandinavia, and not surprisingly this is also the region with the highest number of successful startups per capita. I find it hard to take sweeping statements like this seriously. What makes Scandinavian countries any more or less earnest than, say, Germany or France? This seems no better than to say, “The French make great lovers,” or “The British are terrible cooks.” Absent any…

Well, there is a well known cliché of people in Northern Europe being more cool-headed than in Southern Europe. You can see how it would translate to earnestness being more or less punished in social situations...

(Yet it would also come with being more or less "cool", which is opposite to what pg suggests, so I guess I have no idea ! XD)

Re: Earnestness

#65

Post by ckastner »

zepto wrote: post #43
Dumblydorr wrote: post #38

I earnestly think his writing has an overindulgent fandom here. Every single blog post rockets to the top and, in my opinion, they are usually short and lacking in citation, evidence, or persuasion. He may write snappily, but is every single post worthy of Han's top slot?

Yes. It’s because of who he is. If I wrote this post, it would not have the same meaning as if he wrote it. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but the reason is that we know that PG has huge experience of and access to startup founders and seen their outcomes and has had a great deal of opportunity to formulate thoughts like like this on the basis of what he has seen. I have experience of startups too. I could have…

But what you are describing is just an appeal to authority.

It's quite possible that putting the assertions of the text in the context of this particular authority does give it more credibility, but I've also heard that same authority make some very poor assertions.

Just look at the objective criticism that some of the posts gather. Sometimes, there are really major, easily contradicted flaws in these texts.

Re: Earnestness

#66

Post by longerthoughts »

Dumblydorr wrote: post #38

I earnestly think his writing has an overindulgent fandom here. Every single blog post rockets to the top and, in my opinion, they are usually short and lacking in citation, evidence, or persuasion. He may write snappily, but is every single post worthy of Han's top slot?

>they are usually short and lacking in citation, evidence, or persuasion

He’s not writing research papers. He’s just a thoughtful guy with a lot of experience sharing his ideas as concisely as possible. Part of the reason the posts are so interesting is because of the discussions they prompt - I wouldn’t mistake the level of interest on HN for everybody treating these as gospel.

Re: Earnestness

#67

Post by throwaway284534 »

zepto wrote: post #43
Dumblydorr wrote: post #38

I earnestly think his writing has an overindulgent fandom here. Every single blog post rockets to the top and, in my opinion, they are usually short and lacking in citation, evidence, or persuasion. He may write snappily, but is every single post worthy of Han's top slot?

Yes. It’s because of who he is. If I wrote this post, it would not have the same meaning as if he wrote it. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but the reason is that we know that PG has huge experience of and access to startup founders and seen their outcomes and has had a great deal of opportunity to formulate thoughts like like this on the basis of what he has seen. I have experience of startups too. I could have…

I beg someone out there, please run an experiment that reposts PG’s articles on Medium.com with a different author’s name. All things equal, I wouldn’t doubt that HN would start giving these posts a proper vote count.

But then again, some people are more equal than others. shrug

Re: Earnestness

#69

Post by bluntfang »

warent wrote: post #35
boxed wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once in my 20s I hung out with some young teenagers at a summer camp for reasons . One night we were talking and one girl started asking questions and the rest of the group sneered at her "not knowing". She ignored them and kept asking because I was earnest and knowledgeable. Five minutes turned to an hour and I think everyone in that group learned (or at least heard) more about the origins of the universe, stellar e…

The sentence you opened this up with comes across kind of concerning and gross. For reasons?

I'm with you here buddy. seems like he was doing something shady the way he expressed it. probably lonely and providing alcohol/drugs for minors in order to have company.

Re: Earnestness

#70

Post by danhak »

In my view, there is a uniquely American fiction that there exists for everyone some pursuit that both (a) will satisfy their passion and (b) be highly remunerative. Your job is to find that pursuit. And if you fail, I guess it's because you weren't earnest enough.

I don't doubt that successful founders are highly motivated by the challenges of their work. But the suggestion that the point isn't to build a business and make money is, I'm sorry to say, typical of the self-serving retconning we are starting to see from those at the top. And that we have always seen from Silicon Valley: "Don't Be Evil," "We're Changing the World," "Facebook's mission is to make the world more open and connected."

*Thanks to my mom, barber, third grade teacher, roommate, dog and barista for reading drafts of this comment.

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