Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Other People’s Problems

seths.blog

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 154 posts

Re: Other People’s Problems

#121

Post by 6510 »

My experience was that if you successfully help people they will come back with new problems. Hell, they wont come back until they have new problems for you.

Helping people is hard, I found a much easier approach. You have to make it worse for them: You won't solve your problem because it isn't in your nature. I'm convinced you will never find a new partner or a new job, you wont be able to pay your bills, you will be out on the street soon! If they are old I go with: If only you paid more attention in school.

Then they run out the door in rage and go do all of the things they should have done years ago. Ill pay for stuff if money gets in their way but ill remind them it is pointless, I might as well set fire to the money.

Sometimes they come back to pay me and to tell me what an asshole I am. Sometimes they come back with new problems for me to make fun of and to tell me what an asshole I am but then I at least know they need help since there is nothing convenient about my "help".

Re: Other People’s Problems

#122

Post by mech422 »

atoav wrote: post #52
jmbwell wrote: post #28

It’s true that sometimes an outsider can offer a fresh perspective. From where you sit, there might be a solution you can’t see. The nearest exit might be in the row behind you. Maybe this applies more often when the one giving advice has more experience than the one receiving it, or when the person who is stuck has habituated a narrow perspective or some form of learned helplessness. But I recoil at something I thin…

As you say this can cut both ways. A good example would be the US where people constantly wonder whether $thing-that-29-out-of-30-developed-countries-do-since-decades could truly work. Yeah it works, we have seen it work, it is currently working. Now imagine you are a software developer entering the offices of a group of bueraucratic clercs that keep an intricate fax-and-scanner-based system of bullshit just barely a…

while I agree we need some sort of nationalized health care and should learn from the countries that have implemented it, I'm not sure thats the strong success you think it is?

Just recently we had a bunch of comments here on HN about how bad candian health care can be if you live in the 'wrong' area. UK has had issues with NHS for decades at least (hell, they ALSO have 'private' insurance which seems to be almost a requirement). And several other EU countries have hit issues with healthcare lately (charge fat people/smokers more since they use more resources was fairly divisive recently.

Personally - I think it all boils down to scale. As these systems grow, it becomes harder to sustain them. That doesn't bode well for the US with 10x the population of Canada :-(

It sucks because I'd really like it, and I'd love not having my health care tied to my job ...

Re: Other People’s Problems

#123

Post by richrichie »

jprete wrote: post #19
richrichie wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It goes both ways. And some times it is simple that the insider cannot see for a host of reasons. Outsider can spot a simple solution because they dont have self imposed constraints that come from being on the inside for long.

The insider constraints are real, though. Sometimes they're self-imposed, and that can be for good reasons (value system, long-term goals) or bad reasons (emotionally stuck, a disproportionate fear of small risks, etc.).

Agree, valid points.

Re: Other People’s Problems

#124

Post by maraphon »

maraphon wrote: post #111
WalterBright wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some moderate level of inflation is a pretty basic economic principle The US had zero net inflation from 1800 to 1914, and fantastic prosperity.

US property owners enjoyed vast expanses of unexploited resources to tap and legally protected exploitation of whole classes of people to help them do so. I hope you are not claiming that that (limited) prosperity wasn't generated by wiser and more humane policies than today's.

Edit timer expired before I noticed and could correct "wasn't" to "was" here.

Re: Other People’s Problems

#125

Post by DavidPiper »

arkh wrote: post #7
yetihehe wrote: post #2

Tip: when your solution contains "just (do something)", it's never that simple.

When estimating time for a task, every occurrence of the word "just" doubles the estimate. "Just" always hide a lack of knowledge. Of the problem, of the environment, of the team, of what the future will be.

My favourite take on this:

> If your solution to some problem relies on “If everyone would just...” then you do not have a solution. Everyone is not going to just. At no time in the history of the universe has everyone just, and they’re not going to start now.

https://squareallworthy.tumblr.com/post/163790039847/everyon...

Re: Other People’s Problems

#126

Post by d0mine »

bluGill wrote: post #82
datadrivenangel wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is easier to help someone else organize their house than to organize your own.

Sure, like my sister in law who moved all the yellow books together. Fiction, all different non-fiction, different series - all over the place, but the shelf looks nice by color even though I can't find anything without reading every title.

Can chatgpt help you find the book on the photo of your shelf?

Re: Other People’s Problems

#127

Post by EnigmaFlare »

al_borland wrote: post #94

It’s easy to tell people how to solve their problem, as it doesn’t include the burden of actually doing the work. The classic example would be that it’s easy to solve someone else’s weight problem. Tell them to eat a proper diet of X, get enough sleep, get to the gym X times per week, etc. Saying all these things is very easy, but overcoming the barriers to actually implement each one in a life isn’t already doing th…

I'd generalize burden to cost. Difficult problems usually have no good solution. Every option has some cost. Sometimes the cost of continuing to suffer from the problem is (or appears to be) lower than that of solving it.

Re: Other People’s Problems

#128

Post by headstorm »

lostlogin wrote: post #37
kayodelycaon wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I also don't see what is insulting about making a sincere attempt to help, whether it ends up being helpful or not. It's the equivalent of people wanting to escort you across a road without getting run over. They don't think you're capable of understanding the risks of crossing a road. Or giving someone in a wheelchair tips on how to walk normally. Or your completely tech illiterate grandparent telling you how to w…

> It's not uncommon I can't eat any of the food at a social event. I'm used to that and I'm not bothered by it. But everyone else feels bad for me and decides to tell me so. Being vegetarian seems to generate this problem.

I think that celiac disease diagnosis is far more limiting than being vegetarian for social events, based on my experience.

Re: Other People’s Problems

#129

Post by matheusmoreira »

tonymet wrote: post #109

There are funny videos of Swedish people advocating for immigrants and then balking when being asked to commit to taking an immigrant into their home. I've found people are long on advice and short on actual help. When people offer me advice, I usually turn it back around on them to see if they are willing to help. Recently I was taking care of some shared property repairs and received a lot of complaints that the co…

It's always some undefined "somebody". Somebody should do something. Somebody should pay the costs. They never suppose that they might be that somebody though. Challenge them to actually be somebody, they disappear into thin air.

Re: Other People’s Problems

#130

Post by thefaux »

> Loosening the constraints always makes a problem easier to solve.

In a vacuum, I disagree quite strongly with this although I understand what the author is getting at. It is easy to get stuck with arbitrary and unnecessary constraints. Dropping those is great.

On the other hand, I find that adding constraints is one of the absolute best things you can do to enhance creativity. True freedom can only be found in the presence of immutable constraints.

Post reply on HN