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Fierce Nerds

paulgraham.com

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Re: Fierce Nerds

#161

Post by Der_Einzige »

capableweb wrote: post #138
CoastalCoder wrote: post #4

> Fierce nerds also tend to be somewhat overconfident, especially when young. I wonder if that statement is overly specific. AFAIK, young people in general, or at least young men in general, have a reputation for being overconfident.

Maybe it's because I'm living in a latino country, but it certainly seems like men start with too much confidence since teenage years, and slowly brings it down so everyone stop calling them arrogant, then there is their appropriate level. While for females (again, at least here in this latino country) it's the opposite, they start off being super humble and careful, and while growing up gaining more and more confide…

Sounds right in line with my experiences and exposure to the "Machismo" portions of many Latino cultures. I always brought this up to my far leftist friends who tried to pretend that the cuban revolution was somehow good for the LGBT minority of Cuba. LOL you think that they abandoned machismo just because they got a hammer and sickle? They call queerness "capitalist decadence" there...

Re: Fierce Nerds

#162

Post by pwinnski »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #123
tchalla wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think PG is trying to justify some kind of assholish behaviour in his past by reframing it as a virtue. I wonder how much Bill Gates triggered this write up.

If we really want to go in this direction and criticize other people calling famous tech businessmen assholes, at least give credit where it's due - Jobs deserves this much more than Gates. Gates documented unethical behavior was mostly against other companies, not so much individuals, with a few notable exceptions.

I doubt Jobs--who died nearly ten years ago--was as likely a trigger for this essay as Gates, who is currently in the daily news due to his alleged bad behavior.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#163

Post by Bukhmanizer »

GavinMcG wrote: post #85
Bukhmanizer wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 competitiv…

Overconfidence and self-doubt can go hand-in-hand: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vulnerable_narcissism

Is there a clear definition of self-doubt that doesn’t overlap with underconfidence? Because if the terms we’re using are so broad that a person can both be described as overconfident and underconfident, then as I say elsewhere this just looks like cold reading.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#164

Post by zozbot234 »

dkarl wrote: post #159

This essay falls flat for me because I think Paul Graham is only talking about nerds of my generation, people who are in their forties and older. I don't see any nerds like myself and my friends in the generation that is in their twenties now. It's interesting to think about the difference, though, and he does nail a few things about nerds from my generation. Most importantly, that being socially awkward was a prereq…

> When they feel like they're about to say something inappropriate, their instinct is to pause and recheck their thinking

This is something all intellectually honest people learn to do, one way or the other. We're all very familiar with claims that are simple, mostly plausible, and totally wrong for $COMPLICATED_REASON. After a while, you learn to double-check your thinking to avoid being nerd-sniped by someone saying "Bzzzzzzzt, that's wrong."

Re: Fierce Nerds

#165

Post by morelisp »

iafiaf wrote: post #69

> The bad news is that if it's not exercised, your fierceness will turn to bitterness, and you will become an intellectual playground bully: the grumpy sysadmin, the forum troll, the hater, the shooter down of new ideas. I like this.

It's just a twist on prosperity gospel, a way to a priori dismiss anyone who disagrees with him as a bitter bully.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#166

Post by TigeriusKirk »

soheil wrote: post #67

> 7 of the 8 richest people in America are now fierce nerds I wonder if he's counting Warren Buffet as a fierce nerd, I would.

He replied to a Twitter comment saying he doesn't. He said he didn't know anyone who knew Buffet well enough to say.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#167

Post by hardwaregeek »

Surprisingly, I'd argue that athletes are an example of fierce nerds. I think people vastly underestimate how nerdy top athletes are. They're people willing to devote their entire lives to obsessively analyzing a single game. Somebody like Jordan had to spend hours, days, years of their life just constantly shooting a ball at a basket. Not to mention the obsession with meta and strategy.

We like to see people like Jordan or Kobe as normal people who happen to be really good at basketball. I disagree. They're nerds who happened to do a profession that doesn't seem nerdy to the public.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#168

Post by morelisp »

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?

> the age of D&D

Is right now. It's orders of magnitude more popular than it has ever been.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#169

Post by sangnoir »

Bukhmanizer wrote: post #75
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 competitiv…

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

I couldn't help but read part of it as a response to/rationalization of the recent pushback he (and other "fierce nerds") have been receiving lately...the former underdogs are now the establishment.

The bad news is that if it's not exercised, your fierceness will turn to bitterness, and you will become an intellectual playground bully: the grumpy sysadmin, the forum troll, the hater, the shooter down of new ideas.

Re: Fierce Nerds

#170

Post by Der_Einzige »

shohpanhandler wrote: post #151
bradleyjg wrote: post #144

Why do we need to reclaim nerd? A lot of us have painful memories associated with the term, can we just let it fade into well deserved obscurity?

Plus it's not as though people don't still make fun of nerds. They just don't throw the term itself around anymore. Twitter (not that we should be paying any attention to the thought pit anyway) is rife with jabs at smart/technical people and some of our more common idiosyncrasies.

The butthurt at our (collective) success is also obvious from a wide variety of sources. My gun-loving red state relatives have impressed upon me multiple times about how the high pay that engineers get and general cushy life that they get is really bad for society and that eventually when the power turns off due to a solar flare we will be essentially their slaves. There's even a comic of this exact scenario that gets posted all the time on 4chan which I cannot for the life of me find but documents this exact scenario happening.

It really sucks I guess to make 45K fixing tractors all day with demanding managers hearing all about how the person half your age is making 4x what you make by writing yaml files with basically no stress and good WLB.

The right answer to "how do I stop getting exploited" for many is unironically "learn to code" (yes, including to many of those coal miners in WV), but they HATE when you say this. Kinda sad too since most of the hate is from people that never even tried it. They seethe at our success, and would take it away from us in a heartbeat if ever given the chance. Just look at the culture war being waged against "big tech" right now.

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