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Fierce Nerds

paulgraham.com

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Re: Fierce Nerds

#71

Post by spamizbad »

helen___keller wrote: post #21

I enjoy reading Paul Graham's musings on nerds / nerdiness, but I can't help but have difficulty relating. Maybe it's a generational thing (born in '92), but Graham often seems to paint a picture of nerds similar to what you might see in movies and TV shows depicting the 80s, like the kids in Stranger Things. Even this article, while I can certainly conjure which of my friends growing up were the "fierce nerd", it st…

I think after the dotcom craze, it stopped being "edgy" or "different" to be passionate/ambitious about technology. If anything, it's the most straightforward thing to pursue ideas or business interests with these days, especially if you have a "fierce" personality.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#72

Post by NikolaeVarius »

MyHypatia wrote: post #20

I met a lot of nerds in graduate school. In my experience the "fierce" nerds weren't smarter or successful than the "nonfierce" nerds. The fierce nerds were just more insecure and emotionally immature. They felt more threatened by being surrounded by other people who might smarter or more successful than them. It threatened their identity of being uniquely intelligent. They responded by lashing out. It may be that th…

I heavily disagree. Any fierce nerd ive known all know they are VERY good at what they do (in terms of some intellectual persuit) and know how to assert themselves

Re: Fierce Nerds

#73

Post by carapace »

To young "fierce nerds": The single best piece of advice I got for dealing with normals was, "Act like a dumbass and they'll treat you like an equal." (from the Book of the Subgenius.)

- - - -

There's a lot to unpack in this essay, some good some bad IMO.

One thing I feel is worth mentioning: I don't think the cure for bitterness is success, I believe it's helping others.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#74

Post by zug_zug »

spamizbad wrote: post #14
HDMI_Cable wrote: post #5

Does anyone else feel sort of weird when Paul Graham talks about nerds? It feels like he's trying to deal with something on his end, and we're just watching him rationalize to himself.

I feel like the Gen-X terminology of a nerd just isn't a thing anymore. Being an older millennial, I fully understand what sort of person Graham is talking about, however I don't think Zoomers or even younger Millennials would describe these people as "nerds". Also, these days if you are a smart ambitious person looking to make an impact with technology you're not terribly edgy and you certainly aren't defying any ma…

So what would the modern generation call somebody like this:

In 9th grade insists "I don't see the point of these classes I'm going to be a programmer," takes AP comp sci as sophmore finds it insultingly easy [gets in trouble for going ahead of teacher], resents homework vocally and refuses to do it on principle but still gets great scores on tests, places in the school math competition but initially gets kicked out of the award ceremony for refusing for the "National Honor Society" performance, 12-grade gets official permission to work half-time coding and only take half classes.

That's what I was, and I don't think anybody else has ever given me a word for it. I knew pedantic nerds, and intense nerds, and condescending nerds, but few with real conviction.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#75

Post by Bukhmanizer »

javajosh wrote: post #31

The first rush of comments are all negative, mostly of the ad hominem sort, accusing PG of publicly psychoanalyzing himself. And yet, I really liked the essay because it reads like a lifeline to those who doubt themselves, perhaps profoundly. To PG the same qualities that alienate a "fierce nerd" in so many contexts are precisely the same qualities that could lead to success (even dominance) in other contexts. The us…

> And yet, I really liked the essay because it reads like a lifeline to those who doubt themselves, perhaps profoundly

Do they? I mean one of the define characteristics is an overconfidence in themselves.

I think PG is trying to justify some kind of assholish behaviour in his past by reframing it as a virtue.

Really, I think the “fierceness” is incidental. Do immensely successful people need to be somewhat competitive? Sure. Do they have to interrupt everyone, lack social awareness, etc? Probably not.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#76

Post by jack_riminton »

CoastalCoder wrote: post #7

Nobody who knows me would call me "woke", except as part of some joke. But as the father of a kid with Asperger Syndrome, and as someone with a likely diagnosis myself (according to neuropysch testing), I'm a little bothered by the broad brush with which P.G. is painting.

As someone who is in the same boat, I think it'd be fair to say PG is too

Re: Fierce Nerds

#77

Post by helen___keller »

spamizbad wrote: post #71
helen___keller wrote: post #21

I enjoy reading Paul Graham's musings on nerds / nerdiness, but I can't help but have difficulty relating. Maybe it's a generational thing (born in '92), but Graham often seems to paint a picture of nerds similar to what you might see in movies and TV shows depicting the 80s, like the kids in Stranger Things. Even this article, while I can certainly conjure which of my friends growing up were the "fierce nerd", it st…

I think after the dotcom craze, it stopped being "edgy" or "different" to be passionate/ambitious about technology. If anything, it's the most straightforward thing to pursue ideas or business interests with these days, especially if you have a "fierce" personality.

To be fair, there's a lot more to the "nerd" archetype than just technology. But, from my experience, it was not particularly edgy or differentiating to be passionate about video games, board games, card games, literature, obscure TV, fanfics, internet culture, etc.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#78

Post by HeyImAlex »

helen___keller wrote: post #21

I enjoy reading Paul Graham's musings on nerds / nerdiness, but I can't help but have difficulty relating. Maybe it's a generational thing (born in '92), but Graham often seems to paint a picture of nerds similar to what you might see in movies and TV shows depicting the 80s, like the kids in Stranger Things. Even this article, while I can certainly conjure which of my friends growing up were the "fierce nerd", it st…

Same, born in 92 and his characterization of being nerdy and young seems super antiquated. “Nerdy” interests don’t make you a social pariah, they transcend groupings all together; the star quarterback plays dnd, the head cheerleader builds robots in her basement, the stigma on having unique or “nerdy” hobbies and interests is mostly gone. When I think of what PG is describing, it’s characterized by poor social skills and bad hygiene.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#79

Post by shalmanese »

PG gets dunked on on Twitter for defending Antonio Garcia Martinez but he knows he's right even though everyone is making fun of him so his natural defense mechanism is to go back and create an elaborate framework to prove he's right and it's just that nobody else can see he's right.

You see, AGM isn't a misanthrope misogynist, he's fierce! He says the things everyone else is afraid to say and thinks the things everyone else is too afraid to think because he's an Unconventional Thinker (TM). Everyone else is simply just too threatened to acknowledge this and that's why they're bullying PG.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#80

Post by commandlinefan »

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #68
miobrien wrote: post #36

It's weird to read an "essay" about "nerds" from a 56 year old. It's like he never got over the high school caste system of cliques.

I dont understand. He grew up as a teen during the age of D&D and core scifi/nerd culture. How is not qualified to speak of this stuff?

I've noticed as I myself get older that a lot of things that older people used to say, which seemed particularly out of touch then, are actually starting to make some amount of sense to me. I even find myself repeating some of those things. However, I try to be careful to temper that with my memories of hearing them from older folks when I was young. I think part of the disconnect is/was that older people actually do forget what it was like to be young or how they thought/felt when they were young. I'd suspect that's what's going on in OP's mind - he's mostly forgotten the trials and tribulations of youth (maybe even defensively blocked out some of the traumatic memories) and to him it doesn't even make sense for an older person to remember how important social interactions are to teenagers.
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