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How To Be Fucking Awesome

gilesbowkett.blogspot.com

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Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#21

Post by kirubakaran »

time_management wrote: post #17
kirubakaran wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. At 4 hours a day, you'll need 2500 days. [6.8 years] If you did it full time (40 hours a week), you'll supposedly be fucking awesome in 4.8 years. If this were true, I should be an awesome programmer. But I know I am not yet one. Far from it. So I call bullshit. (Some popular 'fucking awesome' programmers for reference: Steve Yegge, RMS, John Resig)

It's 10000 hours of deliberate practice, not mere activity, that's necessary according to this theory. Deliberate practice requires that you're constantly challenging yourself and attacking more ambitious goals. The conversion ratio on paid work for very few jobs is anywhere close to 1.0; a job where it's 0.5 would generally be considered excellent.

I understand. I was not talking about 'day job' type of hours. However I agree that I may not have put in 10k hours of intensive coding.

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#22

Post by migpwr »

aneesh wrote: post #3

Another equally important thing is choosing your battles: you have to not only work hard, but work hard at the right things . I could practice basketball for 10,000 hours, but there's no way I could do it professionally. You have to figure out what your natural abilities are, and work hard in those areas.

If you practiced basketball for 10,000 hours then you would be fucking awesome, regardless of having a contract.

The right things don't exist... or have we already forgotten the whole "do what you love" concept?

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#23

Post by jrockway »

adldesigner wrote: post #9
tptacek wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the point is that you spend much more than one hour a day at it.

Agreed. I felt like doing some math. :) Anyway, one hour a day is what many of us have to pursue other personal goals different from work, family, etc.

> one hour a day is what many of us have to pursue other personal goals different from work, family, etc.

Perhaps this lifestyle precludes being "fucking awesome"?

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#24

Post by mdakin »

PieSquared wrote: post #8
aneesh wrote: post #3

Another equally important thing is choosing your battles: you have to not only work hard, but work hard at the right things . I could practice basketball for 10,000 hours, but there's no way I could do it professionally. You have to figure out what your natural abilities are, and work hard in those areas.

And be sure to avoid confusion 'natural abilities' with talents. I agree with aneesh that you shouldn't focus on something that you are inferior at genetically - obviously a seven foot tall guy will be better at basketball and a normal sized person if both play professionally - but make sure you don't give up by saying, "I can't seem to do very well at this one thing. Eh, I suppose it's just not a natural ability."

Spud Webb is only 5'6" tall. He played in the NBA for 13 years and won the 1986 slam dunk contest with a "180-degree reverse two-handed strawberry jam."

He was better than all the seven-feet-tall guys in that contest in 1986.

Assessing potential is hard. For example, one might assume that "height" is a phenotypical requirement for being an elite basketballer. But Webb proved that assumption is incorrect.

You'll likely make similar mistakes assessing your own potential. So why bother? Do what you love and let the chips fall where they may.

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#25

Post by fallentimes »

mdakin wrote: post #24
PieSquared wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And be sure to avoid confusion 'natural abilities' with talents. I agree with aneesh that you shouldn't focus on something that you are inferior at genetically - obviously a seven foot tall guy will be better at basketball and a normal sized person if both play professionally - but make sure you don't give up by saying, "I can't seem to do very well at this one thing. Eh, I suppose it's just not a natural ability."

Spud Webb is only 5'6" tall. He played in the NBA for 13 years and won the 1986 slam dunk contest with a "180-degree reverse two-handed strawberry jam." He was better than all the seven-feet-tall guys in that contest in 1986. Assessing potential is hard. For example, one might assume that "height" is a phenotypical requirement for being an elite basketballer. But Webb proved that assumption is incorrect. You'll likel…

Anomalies aren't evidence.

The strawberry jam was awesome though:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-IoInRUjDM

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#26

Post by raganwald »

unalone wrote: post #11

Flagged: it's a fun little post, but it's repeating the key claim that Gladwell made in his new book, which appears here in 3 other top-page stories right now, and it's not adding anything new other than the title.

those are reasons not to upmod it, but I thought the flag was for spam. do I misunderstand? am I to flag everything I consider a waste of time??

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#27

Post by unalone »

raganwald wrote: post #26
unalone wrote: post #11

Flagged: it's a fun little post, but it's repeating the key claim that Gladwell made in his new book, which appears here in 3 other top-page stories right now, and it's not adding anything new other than the title.

those are reasons not to upmod it, but I thought the flag was for spam. do I misunderstand? am I to flag everything I consider a waste of time??

I don't know. I very rarely flag things. But today, for whatever reason, Hacker News seems flooded with extremely similar articles. Today is Gladwell Day. And this post didn't seem to be adding anything relevant to the conversation. I saw it as spam. But it's still here, so I guess my flag wasn't a good one.

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#28

Post by bloch »

kirubakaran wrote: post #13
rokhayakebe wrote: post #12

4 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, you will be fucking awesome.

No. At 4 hours a day, you'll need 2500 days. [6.8 years] If you did it full time (40 hours a week), you'll supposedly be fucking awesome in 4.8 years. If this were true, I should be an awesome programmer. But I know I am not yet one. Far from it. So I call bullshit. (Some popular 'fucking awesome' programmers for reference: Steve Yegge, RMS, John Resig)

"Finally, deliberate practice is an effortful activity that can be sustained only for a limited time each day during extended periods without leading to exhaustion (effort constraint). To maximize gains from long-term practice, individuals must avoid exhaustion and must limit practice to an amount from which they can completely recover on a daily or weekly basis." (K. Anders Ericsson)

"A number of training studies in real life have compared the efficiency of practice durations rangingfrom 1-8 hr per day.These studiesshowessentiallyno benefit from durations exceeding 4 hr per day and reduced benefits from practice exceeding 2 hr (Welford, 1968; Woodworth & Schlosberg, 1954). Many studiesof the acquisition oftyping skill (Baddeley & Longman, 1978; Dvorak et al.. 1936) and other perceptual-motor skills (Henshaw& Holman, 1930) indicate that the effective duration of deliberate practice may be closer to 1hr perday." (K. Anders Ericsson)

projects.ict.usc.edu/itw/gel/EricssonDeliberatePracticePR93.pdf

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#29

Post by mdakin »

fallentimes wrote: post #25
mdakin wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spud Webb is only 5'6" tall. He played in the NBA for 13 years and won the 1986 slam dunk contest with a "180-degree reverse two-handed strawberry jam." He was better than all the seven-feet-tall guys in that contest in 1986. Assessing potential is hard. For example, one might assume that "height" is a phenotypical requirement for being an elite basketballer. But Webb proved that assumption is incorrect. You'll likel…

Anomalies aren't evidence. The strawberry jam was awesome though: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-IoInRUjDM

Anomalies aren't necessarily evidence but in this case, and in many important general cases anomalies can be critically important evidence.

He and his career constitute evidence that "height" is not a requirement to be an elite basketball player. It's definitional and not arguable.

In science today's "anomaly" is sometimes the evidence that leads to tomorrow's breakthrough.

Re: How To Be Fucking Awesome

#30

Post by tdavis »

raganwald wrote: post #26
unalone wrote: post #11

Flagged: it's a fun little post, but it's repeating the key claim that Gladwell made in his new book, which appears here in 3 other top-page stories right now, and it's not adding anything new other than the title.

those are reasons not to upmod it, but I thought the flag was for spam. do I misunderstand? am I to flag everything I consider a waste of time??

I flag anything that makes me think, "I could have spent those X minutes/seconds of my life reading something worthwhile." This screams of a plug for Gladwell's book, which may well be worth reading, but doesn't really offer anything interesting beyond "Bill Gates spent lots of hours programming and made a successful software company so practice a lot."

Well, yeah, duh.

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