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The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

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Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#371

Post by [deleted] »

mattgreenrocks wrote: post #118
throwaway42668 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And people _love_ this sort of structure because it means that something other than actual competence can be the deciding factor. It's different competence. Not incompetence. It's being competent at identifying marks to exploit, attention-seeking, etc. I don't particularly care for it myself and feel pretty strongly that it's narrowing the gap between humans and apes, rather than widening it, but it's still some ki…

Good catch. It gets at technical competence, but it isn't constrained to that. It's more of "good at what the org ostensibly is about," vs "good at ensuring the org lives on."

[deleted]

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#372

Post by intended »

fragmede wrote: post #249
kstenerud wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But I'm a DM, not their therapist or their dad - I'm not obligated to hand-hold someone through a radical restructuring of their personality. Therein lies the crux of the issue. Everyone agrees that this person needs help, but also agrees that they shouldn't feel obligated to provide it. And so they continue on, blissfully unaware of the chafing they cause. Life goes on, and their contribution remains minimal.

Am I my brothers keeper? Culturally, we've just bought into the notion that I'm not your therapist, so as to absolve myself of the responsibility of fixing broken people. But if I don't do it, who will? so I take care of myself first, so that I'm sable to take care of others, but when I encounter broken people, I still try to fix them (as if people are devices like microwave ovens that need fixing) , because we all h…

This is 10 hours later.

> Therein lies the crux of the issue. Everyone agrees that this person needs help, but also agrees that they shouldn't feel obligated to provide it.

This sentence will definitely seem targeted at you. However both the following are true:

1) You are not their keeper 2) Therein lies the crux of the issue

I would say your anecdote did its task brilliantly, it described a situation fairly, which presented reasonable expectations humans can have today.

The pros/cons of this current accommodation were then discovered.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#373

Post by [deleted] »

motohagiography wrote: post #182

weird nerds depend on a kind of nobility and magnanimity from the people they work with that is perhaps a bit much to expect in academia, or anywhere that isn't a high-growth environment where participants can afford the risks of eccentricity. middling people indexed on in-group status aren't equipped to handle exceptional people who don't reciprocate what is essentially corruption, and so they force them out.

[deleted]

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#374

Post by PartiallyTyped »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #14
Yossarrian22 wrote: post #5

The author is missing a crucial pressure that pushes against weird nerds, the people that have to work underneath them. I’ve had to answer to a Weird Nerd when I was starting out in my field, it was the worst fucking experience of my life, and I’ve spent the years since warning people away from that person, their career and their contributions to their field have stagnated due to all the people like me that they burn…

Many weird nerds are on the spectrum and require very good people managers above them to mitigate their quirks, and should never go into people management themselves. The industry has really changed though. It is much easier to hire social well adapted people who can code at all than to hire a bunch of people with social problems who can code really good. The former is scalable at least, the latter breaks down as no…

> the former is scalable at least,

I’d argue that it’s not due to communication costs. The more you attempt to parallelise a problem the harder communication gets.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#375

Post by dEnigma »

ergonaught wrote: post #258
sneed_chucker wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with what you're saying, but also - everyone has problems. Is anyone truly normal or neurotypical? Why do some people's problems get the validation of the medical system and others don't? (These are non-rhetorical questions, I'm really not sure about the answers to them myself)

> Is anyone truly normal or neurotypical Yes. I get that your questions appear to be sincere and genuine, but, yes. Relative to the actual, demonstrable, neurological differences in connectivity and so forth in the “neurodivergent” brain, the overwhelming majority of people are “normal”. Relative to the actual lived experience of “neurodivergents”, the overwhelming majority of people are “normal”. These kinds of ques…

I'm pretty sure the majority of people on the internet who claim to be "neurodivergent" and/or have a diagnosis for some sort of ASD or ADHD do not show "actual, neurological differences in connectivity" though. For my little brothers it seemed like half the school suddenly had ADHD, mostly the kids who would in the past have been described as lazy, which I find hard to believe to be based on actual neurological differences.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#376

Post by intended »

jchw wrote: post #90

> Any system that is not explicitly pro-Weird Nerd will turn anti-Weird Nerd pretty quickly. Wow. Sure as hell feels that way. See, I actually feel like this is happening across the Internet, too, in a different way. Firstly, I'd consider myself some sort of "Weird Nerd" but certainly not a genius or even especially intelligent; I would be willing to indulge in the idea that my contingent and I have some unusual qual…

someone else said it well here.

Weird nerds are suited for environments with high growth that need experts and will transfer resources to get the most out of them.

This is in general true - groups will spend resources on an advantage, when the need for it is painfully obvious.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#377

Post by TeMPOraL »

dEnigma wrote: post #375
ergonaught wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Is anyone truly normal or neurotypical Yes. I get that your questions appear to be sincere and genuine, but, yes. Relative to the actual, demonstrable, neurological differences in connectivity and so forth in the “neurodivergent” brain, the overwhelming majority of people are “normal”. Relative to the actual lived experience of “neurodivergents”, the overwhelming majority of people are “normal”. These kinds of ques…

I'm pretty sure the majority of people on the internet who claim to be "neurodivergent" and/or have a diagnosis for some sort of ASD or ADHD do not show "actual, neurological differences in connectivity" though. For my little brothers it seemed like half the school suddenly had ADHD, mostly the kids who would in the past have been described as lazy, which I find hard to believe to be based on actual neurological diff…

> For my little brothers it seemed like half the school suddenly had ADHD

ADHD is simultaneously overdiagnosed and underdiagnosed; the case of your brothers' school could be the former, or correction of the latter (or both).

> mostly the kids who would in the past have been described as lazy, which I find hard to believe to be based on actual neurological differences

ADHD manifests as laziness to observers making snap judgements, so this actually tracks - turns out, some of the specific symptoms that, in the past, would make someone branded as lazy, are actually a disorder.

The problem with calling people lazy is that it's a moral judgement, which sometimes may be helpful as a form of corrective social pressure, but absolutely does not help when "laziness" is a result of a disorder like ADHD; it only makes them suffer that much more.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#378

Post by [deleted] »

CalRobert wrote: post #343
ianbicking wrote: post #4

There's definitely been a move to demand individuals be good at everything... old stereotypes of the nerd brought a lot of negatives, but they were also apologetic, acknowledging the trade off, that paying attention deeply to one thing does lead to being worse at other things. The exact stereotype differed by domain... the performer who is a diva, the self destructive author, the manic artist... each with a hint of n…

This bizarre romanticization of autism is frustrating for those who are or have loved ones who are nonverbal, stim all day, etc.. I almost wonder if nerfing autism to the point where it's a fun thing to talk about having on tiktok is a way to demonize effective interventions so insurance companies won't have to pay for them.

[deleted]

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#379

Post by thfuran »

sneed_chucker wrote: post #67
walt_grata wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I duno on some of that. Until I was about 39 I was a "weird nerd" and then my wife (Dr of special education) finally convinced me to talk to a Dr and get get tested for autism. Turns out I'm ASD 1, would have been Asperger's in the past. Autism has a very wide range of ways it shows itself.

Well, to me your comment also speaks to the increasing degree to which we medicalize personality traits. I'm sure your diagnosis is legitimate, but also I'm inferring from your comment that you are married and gainfully employed; so it sounds like you're able to build and maintain relationships, as well hold conversations with strangers or non-close acquaintances when necessary. In years past would any professional h…

This is like saying that you can't have a physical ailment unless you're bedridden.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#380

Post by esskay »

CalRobert wrote: post #343
ianbicking wrote: post #4

There's definitely been a move to demand individuals be good at everything... old stereotypes of the nerd brought a lot of negatives, but they were also apologetic, acknowledging the trade off, that paying attention deeply to one thing does lead to being worse at other things. The exact stereotype differed by domain... the performer who is a diva, the self destructive author, the manic artist... each with a hint of n…

This bizarre romanticization of autism is frustrating for those who are or have loved ones who are nonverbal, stim all day, etc.. I almost wonder if nerfing autism to the point where it's a fun thing to talk about having on tiktok is a way to demonize effective interventions so insurance companies won't have to pay for them.

It's been a similar pattern with ADHD, it feels like its almost been turned into a trend. Although that being said we've had a number of people at our place been diagnosed with ADHD, Autism and in some cases both, all developers, all within the last 3-5 years, and you know what, they're absolutely correct diagnosis.

It's a mix of romanticization and a change in acceptance and understanding of the two, and they do often go hand in hand as we've seen.

But things like the tiktoks mentioning "My Ausistic brain" or "My ADHD brain" are a bit over the top and are making it feel like it's being treated as a 'cool thing' to have.

For me personally I knew I had some sort of autism or ADHD decades ago. It was only when I started having massive issues focusing on work a couple of years back, combined with stimming and an increase in sensory issues that I decided it was time to investigate and sure enough, diagnosed with both. Out of the ~20 developers at my workplace a good 2/3 of them are either diagnosed with one or the other, or exhibit strong signals that would indicate they've likely got at very least ADHD.

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