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Willingness to look stupid

sharif.io

171–180 of 273 posts

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#171

On top of fear of looking stupid, my bigger concern is lack of novelty in my work. Seems like any idea I have for a blog post or book, or any photo I'm planning has already been explored in depths by someone else. I know the joy is in the process mostly, not the result. But doing something while knowing it is certainly not original make it really hard.

It probably has. It's super difficult to be truly unique in a world where billions have learned to read and write. It doesn't matter however. The people who see your work haven't seen/read everything out there. You can be unique for them.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#172

Plot twist: anything original will look stupid, until some cultural event makes the original thing the new "way," then all the small minds will act like that was the only way the thing should have been done all along. "The emperor has no clothes" is a much deeper story about society and human nature than people realize.

> Plot twist: anything original will look stupid

Clearly not true, lots of original things that instead looks like "Ah yeah, obviously, duh!" once they're public, rather than looking stupid. Browsers/WWW, the iPhone and putting wheels on suitcases are things that come into mind that the amount of people thought "looked stupid" was very low, and they became very popular relatively quickly.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#173

This posts observation have interesting side-effects. Measurements, metrics and surveillance kill creative work. And hierarchies and the fear of embarrassment do too. So, the more you try to force "excellence" into existence via external pressures and resource tracking, the more it disappears. Which leaves as observation, you can only do truly creative work - in a high trust society, where people trust you with the r…

recently execs in companies think software dev isnt creative work because llm can churn out equivalents. So they are openly tracking all sorts of metrics on devs now.

[flagged]

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#174
post #17

If you haven’t had the pleasure of Los Angeles public-access television’s Let’s Paint TV… https://www.letspainttv.com/ Or, to save your eyes, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let's_Paint_TV For more than 20 years, Mr. Let’s Paint TV (artist John Kilduff) has encouraged viewers to “EMBRACE FAILARE”—charitably put, to pass through the valley of incompetence as it’s the only path to the slopes of mastery. Just do the thing…

> “EMBRACE FAILARE”—charitably put, to pass through the valley of incompetence as it’s the only path to the slopes of mastery Instructions unclear. Have pushed secrets to github. When will slope to mastery commence?

Once you realize your mistake, and only do it once or twice more times in your life, often when stressed or some other external stressor causes you to not follow your hunch.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#175

This posts observation have interesting side-effects. Measurements, metrics and surveillance kill creative work. And hierarchies and the fear of embarrassment do too. So, the more you try to force "excellence" into existence via external pressures and resource tracking, the more it disappears. Which leaves as observation, you can only do truly creative work - in a high trust society, where people trust you with the r…

Fear of failure is a stumbling block for science. That's why many universities declare in their charter that research doesn't have to be practical. The practicality of RSA asymmetric encryption only became practical with the advent of the internet ;)

> Fear of failure is a stumbling block for science. That's why many universities declare in their charter that research doesn't have to be practical.

No, universities do that because it's limiting to only focus on practical science, not because scientists are afraid to fail. Theoretical breakthroughs often find their use in practice with time.

Fear of failure is because we only put money on success, so researchers' livelihood, dignity and prestige depend on their research bearing fruit.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#177
post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I teach at an art university for 8 years now. I would highly doubt that: The most creative people are those who measure both high intelligence and low neuroticism . In my experience that isn't the complete picture. I have met highly creative people who are extremely (unhealthy so) concerned with what others think, yet go their own path anyways. It is true that creative people often tend to do things in a way that app…

I did not base my comment on personal observations. It comes straight from psychology and the big 5. I was also once an art student myself. Creativity extends far beyond individual contributions, which becomes evident in resource and personnel management. Creativity is highly correlated to openness, as is intelligence, and is least restricted by those who are most eager to exercise decisions and try new things withou…

Two folk who set the direction of the modern world - Isaac Newton and Charles Darwin.

https://historycollection.com/16-examples-of-the-madness-of-... https://www.science.org/content/article/origin-darwins-anxie...

Can't vouch for the accuracy of these descriptions but they don't suggest lack of neuroticism however brought on. Bodily dysfunction of whatever kind can be causative of course.

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#178

Plot twist: anything original will look stupid, until some cultural event makes the original thing the new "way," then all the small minds will act like that was the only way the thing should have been done all along. "The emperor has no clothes" is a much deeper story about society and human nature than people realize.

I think the best example for this are the Airpods

like, it was such a joke at first but then it just became the "new normal"

Re: Willingness to look stupid

#179

Plot twist: anything original will look stupid, until some cultural event makes the original thing the new "way," then all the small minds will act like that was the only way the thing should have been done all along. "The emperor has no clothes" is a much deeper story about society and human nature than people realize.

> Plot twist: anything original will look stupid Clearly not true, lots of original things that instead looks like "Ah yeah, obviously, duh!" once they're public, rather than looking stupid. Browsers/WWW, the iPhone and putting wheels on suitcases are things that come into mind that the amount of people thought "looked stupid" was very low, and they became very popular relatively quickly.

Those things are all incremental improvements based on existing patterns that people were familiar with. Also, Apple is the king of "no clothes". People shill Apple products even when they suck.
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