PG's Rarely Asked Questions • Hacker News Board

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#201

Post by pg » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 3:45 PM UTC

dgreensp wrote: post #40

>I never had to manage anyone in our startup, even though I was the president. The other hackers were my peers, and would have given me the raspberry if I'd tried to "manage" them. We operated by consensus. And the rest of the company reported to our experienced COO, who was also more of a peer. Operating by consensus and not valuing the role of "manager" only goes so far. It may work when you're a few people living…

Yes, you're right. I was implicitly assuming the startup never gets big enough that you have to become a real manager. Obviously in the unlikely event the startup turns out to be Google or Facebook, consensus may no longer work.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#202

Post by shoham » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 3:58 PM UTC

"I'm about to become a teacher. How can I be a good one?"

Also, be ready to put up with bullshit from parents, admins and other teachers who insist on the path of least resistance.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#203

Post by Alex3917 » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 4:14 PM UTC

jackfoxy wrote: post #36

What should I read to learn more about history? I used to consider my knowledge of history better than at least 95% of the population, but while reading The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire I realized how sketchy my view of history really was. So at the ripe old age of 35 I set off on a course of study centered on two series of books, The Story of Civilization , by Will and Ariel Durant, and Timeframe , a Time-Li…

Do you find that at some point reading more history has diminishing returns in terms of your ability to understand current politics?

It seems like having good political sense requires two things: having a solid understanding of the current state of people and assets, and having a good understanding of the impacts of policy. (As well as having some understanding of the whole human experience thing.)

While history is obviously important for understanding this stuff, it seems like after a certain point one would get more insight from other places. I don't doubt that most people don't know enough of history to understand politics, but at the same time most people don't know enough of anything else to understand politics either.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#204

Post by shoham » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 4:38 PM UTC

pg wrote: post #110

onan_barbarian wrote: post #105

The tendentious answer on philosophy is an invitation for what would be another "Dabblers and Blowhards" drive-by shooting. It's not enormously surprising that this question is 'rarely asked'. One would learn a lot more about philosophy ("what questions are these guys asking?" "what are some of the answers they've come to?") from even a mediocre introductory text or a chat with a TA/tutor, than by assuming that this…

It's hard to get that deep in a couple paragraphs. But there is a longer version here: http://paulgraham.com/philosophy.html

Very interesting article; although here's what I think gets missed when folks teach and talk about Philosophy since Russell: anything that smells even vaguely religious just doesn't count -- don't read it -- too spooky, too irrational. The only reason Greeks get away with it is, I think, because nobody takes the Greek gods seriously anymore (or at least no one is worried about too many people doing so, and causing trouble in the name of Zeus!)

So no King Solomon, no Vedas and probably no Confucius either, as secular as he tended to be.

You mentioned at the end of the article that"...philosophy was hopelessly intermingled with religion. It didn't shake itself free till a couple hundred years ago..." I'd have to counter that philosophy without religion is generally new, hollow and unworthy of much study -- which in some ways I think is your point.

I'm genuinely curious: Why (or if) you think that this decoupling is a good thing? So few other disciplines (only Religious Studies, and perhaps The Arts) ever touch upon the idea of spirit at all -- which I think is at the core of Philosophy -- the nexus of Sapience and Sentience. If one is not a fan of religion on principle (its over-adherence to both dogma, and dominance are two criticisms that I have), then certainly this is a strength of Philosophy -- the decoupling of religion from matters of the spirit/soul. Spinoza's The Ethics; and Nietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil are two interesting books for students of Philosophy to consider.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#205

Post by jodrellblank » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 5:30 PM UTC

siglesias wrote: post #200

Goladus wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no evidence that cutting a cabbage causes it pain and suffering. We don't have as much evidence and the evidence we do have isn't as visceral or widely discussed. That doesn't mean there is no evidence.

You're distorting my position anyway. I'm not stating that it is categorically unethical to eat living things, only that any enjoyment we get out of meat over vegetables isn't worth animal suffering. In no way does a weak position that plant suffering is possible make a strong case for animal suffering inadmissable to our eating choices. That's simply absurd.

And you focusing on plant suffering is distorting my position. By killing plants, we stop them from being alive and furthering their goals, for our purposes.

By focusing on pain and suffering you are implicitly drawing the line I mentioned about important/non-important living things there, and calling other views 'absurd'. But you aren't objectively right.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#206

Post by imjk » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 5:49 PM UTC

kragen wrote: post #165

imjk wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it unreasonable to think that if someone has put in ten thousand hours into a general field such as programming (across various languages, as opposed to just focus on one language) that there are enough general principles to extrapolate for them to be considered an expert programmer? Is your argument against Gladwell's idea (not really even his idea) that the professions he site has too many sub-components that un…

> Is it unreasonable to think that if someone has put in ten thousand hours into a general field such as programming (across various languages, as opposed to just focus on one language) that there are enough general principles to extrapolate for them to be considered an expert programmer? Well, maybe. But maybe Jeff Fox is right, and you really need ten thousand hours of programming in Forth to perform at an expert l…

I think you're correct and I still don't think you invalidate Gladwell's point. Remember Gladwell originally proposed his idea on what it takes to become a "genius" to dispel the conventional notion of what it takes to become the Bill Gates's, Wayne Gretzkys, and Mozarts of the world. He's challenging the notion that these geniuses achieved their success by way of some innate talent in their fields. Whereas, he applies the ten thousand hours theory to show that the idea of some innate genius is a myth, but rather requires much work to achieve that level of success (not that profound). I think it's hard to argue with this point.

Where you (and many other people including myself) find trouble in Gladwell's work is that it's too cursory and often overreaching. It's true that he's doesn't go into the specifics of various fields in defining the specific areas that each requires to achieve that genius level. But such a study would be extremely exhausting, if not impossible. It's also not where Gladwell sees his role; he's a pop scientist, not an academic. His job isn't to take academic studies and dig deeper. Quite the opposite. As a pop scientist, he takes academic research proposed in academic fields such as psychology, sociology, and anthropology and he extrapolates these ideas into popular culture to cater to a much broader audience. Taken in this context, I think you'll have a much different experience reading his work.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#207

Post by siglesias » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 6:10 PM UTC

jodrellblank wrote: post #205

siglesias wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're distorting my position anyway. I'm not stating that it is categorically unethical to eat living things, only that any enjoyment we get out of meat over vegetables isn't worth animal suffering. In no way does a weak position that plant suffering is possible make a strong case for animal suffering inadmissable to our eating choices. That's simply absurd.

And you focusing on plant suffering is distorting my position. By killing plants, we stop them from being alive and furthering their goals, for our purposes. By focusing on pain and suffering you are implicitly drawing the line I mentioned about important/non-important living things there, and calling other views 'absurd'. But you aren't objectively right.

I suspect because if you seriously believed killing living things for food is wrong, it would be suicide

I don't believe that killing living things for food is wrong. Of course you could be using the generic "you," in which case your point is irrelevant to the conversation.

so the only conceivable answer is to reason in such a way that it comes out with the answer you want

I don't disagree. If you find flaws in the reasoning by all means point them out.

- draw your arbitrary cutoff between important-living-things and not-important-living-things somewhere above plants and bacteria while staying comfortably below humans.

My cutoff isn't arbitrary (again I presume you are addressing me), and this is a mistaken presumption. If you endeavor to minimize suffering among things in the world capable of suffering, eliminating animal suffering is a net plus.

If you want to argue that since all living things suffer and therefore all of our food sources suffer and therefore any attempt to delimit an ethical food source is arbitrary, good luck. I eagerly await your finding that vegetables feel pain.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#208

Post by sthlm » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 6:20 PM UTC

robertk wrote: post #168

sthlm wrote: post #13

The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. What tempts programmers to become managers are companies with old-fashioned corporate structure, where the only way to advance in salary and prestige is to go into management. I have to disagree with that. I've met many people, especially in larger enterprises, who started in development but then…

"And a manager who was a distinguished developer will be much better suited for leading a team of developers -- even if he doesn't program any longer. " I am not so sure about that. I would say a distinguished manager who was a developer might satisfy your criterion. Social skills, leadership, empathy, and other such traits might be (perhaps even overwhelmingly) more important. That suggests an interesting applicatio…

That's a much better point than the one I made.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#209

Post by Goladus » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 7:01 PM UTC

siglesias wrote: post #207

jodrellblank wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you focusing on plant suffering is distorting my position. By killing plants, we stop them from being alive and furthering their goals, for our purposes. By focusing on pain and suffering you are implicitly drawing the line I mentioned about important/non-important living things there, and calling other views 'absurd'. But you aren't objectively right.

I suspect because if you seriously believed killing living things for food is wrong, it would be suicide I don't believe that killing living things for food is wrong. Of course you could be using the generic "you," in which case your point is irrelevant to the conversation. so the only conceivable answer is to reason in such a way that it comes out with the answer you want I don't disagree. If you find flaws in the r…

I eagerly await your finding that vegetables feel pain.

I will not be surprised when it happens. Plants have nervous systems and sophisticated sensory capabilities. They don't have voices and their body language moves too slowly for humans to make sense of it without looking for it deliberately (such as with time-lapse photography). Plants display a variety of defensive behaviors.

http://www.ted.com/talks/stefano_mancuso_the_roots_of_plant_...

Although technically, vegetables probably don't feel pain in the same sense that meat doesn't feel pain.

Re: PG's Rarely Asked Questions

#210

Post by sthlm » Mon, Sep 19, 2011, 7:05 PM UTC

Apteris wrote: post #188

sthlm wrote: post #13

The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. What tempts programmers to become managers are companies with old-fashioned corporate structure, where the only way to advance in salary and prestige is to go into management. I have to disagree with that. I've met many people, especially in larger enterprises, who started in development but then…

I have to disagree with that. I've met many people, especially in larger enterprises, who started in development but then became more abstract over time. They weren't bad people, in fact, they were excellent at their job. This neither confirms nor infirms Paul Graham's thesis. In fact, while PG's assertion was a bit too specific--pointy-haired boss means in general "bad manager", not "programmer turned manager"--I do…

PG is of course correct in suggesting that if you want to keep programming, don't accept a promotion to a non-programming role.

That's not what he is suggesting though: His statement doesn't include "if you want". He formulates it as an at-all-costs mantra -- stay in programming, for the worst could happen. It can be absolutely horrid advice to a number of people who would excel even more at other IT roles or management roles (see interesting comment from robertk [1]). I myself was long not considering applying to non-development roles, because many of those great opportunities are more and more looked down upon as "not programming". I know some people who've come as far as "Be Mark Zuckerberg or die trying", completely rejecting any business model that isn't two guys coding in a garage. I didn't actually read PG's comment like that -- I have the utmost respect for PG; but this is the background for why I authored such an opposing comment. I don't actually think the RAQs we are discussing were designed to be put under lawyer-like scrutiny ;)

Depends on what your goal is

Completely agree. Casual focus will rarely lead to greatness.

they should get out of the way and enable programmers to work optimally

For someone to get out of the way, he first has to be in the way. You make the general assumption that a manager is bad unless he actively changes his style. I cannot challenge this assumption for I have no data or ideas on where to find some concerning if managers are universally good or bad. And even then employee satisfaction might not be the only metric to measure success. Although I do think that having fun at work is one of the most, if not the most important metric. Many things would be better if everyone enjoyed their work.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3012765