Live data from Hacker News

Your Most Improbable Life

kevinkelly.substack.com

21–30 of 126 posts

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#21
post #2

> Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: The authentic you. Your particular mix of talents, native abilities, personal inclinations, genetic limits, life experiences, and ambitious desires points to a mixture that is distinctly unique (...) The more you-ish you become, the less competition you have, because you are occupying your own niche. This is profoundly true, and the corollary is: beware of title…

> Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: The authentic you

On the contrary, this is profoundly bullshit.

Firstly, anyone arriving at a "life's goal" via what a blogger says should be their life's goal is not being "authentically them".

Secondly, why does a broader, less likely mix of talents and experiences make you more "you"? It doesn't. Just because you've become more unique does not make you more "you-ish".

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#22
post #12

> Your life’s goal should be to become the most improbable person you can be. Your life's goal should not be dictated by Substack philosophers. > Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: > The authentic you. Your particular mix of talents, native abilities, personal inclinations, genetic limits, life experiences, and ambitious desires points to a mixture that is distinctly unique – if it is allowed to bl…

Society strongly rewards predictability. If I try to minimize predictability of my actions I will very quickly be hit by a car and die. Similar outcomes should be expected in most other areas of life. Stop predictably paying your bills and delivering value… Individualism in the west pretends to value uniqueness, but in practice it values belonging to sollte specific subgroup of consumers and avoiding solidarity with…

[deleted]

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#23
post #2

> Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: The authentic you. Your particular mix of talents, native abilities, personal inclinations, genetic limits, life experiences, and ambitious desires points to a mixture that is distinctly unique (...) The more you-ish you become, the less competition you have, because you are occupying your own niche. This is profoundly true, and the corollary is: beware of title…

> Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: The authentic you On the contrary, this is profoundly bullshit. Firstly, anyone arriving at a "life's goal" via what a blogger says should be their life's goal is not being "authentically them". Secondly, why does a broader, less likely mix of talents and experiences make you more "you"? It doesn't. Just because you've become more unique does not make you more "…

We're all influenced by our past experiences, the books we've read, the movies we've watched, the people in our lives, and yes, blog posts and essays as well. Our past is part of what makes us us. I don't know how you can claim that being influenced by a blogger is any less authentic than being influenced by anything else.

> why does a broader, less likely mix of talents and experiences make you more "you"?

Because it's highly improbable that any one person's natural mix of talents and experiences would be narrow and similar to everyone else's.

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#24
post #6

> Your life’s goal should be to become the most improbable person you can be. Your life's goal should not be dictated by Substack philosophers. > Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: > The authentic you. Your particular mix of talents, native abilities, personal inclinations, genetic limits, life experiences, and ambitious desires points to a mixture that is distinctly unique – if it is allowed to bl…

So, you liked nothing about the post ? What would you salvage from it ?

Are we required to like something and report on that?

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huh. The post in effect is about a choice of one's career, about what one offers to the world. Of course the execution of the chosen career must remain flawless. One must develop one's own unique offering. Don't let the world trap you in its box. I came across a bus driver today that told me he owned a juice bar on the side, and invited me to visit. I thought this was most unexpected. This didn't make him a bad drive…

Sadly people are fulfilling the very probable nerd stereotype of aggressively misunderstanding philosophy and then trashing on it. I'm not sure how someone could even come to the conclusion that living an improbable life = swerving into oncoming traffic, but here we are.

"Luke Rhinehart"'s The Dice Man isn't the stagecoach of life I should be riding?

Damn.

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#26
post #9
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, you liked nothing about the post ? What would you salvage from it ?

Well, let's start with the second sentence: > Your path, your character, your life, should be the most unlikely, the most unexpected, the least predictable version you can make. Now, I ask you, is that really what I want from my kid's school bus driver?

[dead]

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't understand the urge to diminish individualism when it's the basis of our modern ethics and human rights. Where did I diminish individualism? The point I made was that, perhaps, you don't need someone else telling you that you're not being yourself and not living up to your potential, and then offering you a path you weren't naturally inclined to take to get to where they tell you you're supposed to be. > Th…

> you don't need someone else telling you that you're not being yourself and not living up to your potential, and then offering you a path you weren't naturally inclined to take to get to where they tell you you're supposed to be Who is doing that? The average person probably doesn't need to be "obsessed" with self-actualisation or authenticity, but that doesn't mean it's not a worthwhile goal. People don't need to b…

> Who is doing that?

The author of the post:

> Your life’s goal should be to become the most improbable person you can be. Your path, your character, your life, should be the most unlikely, the most unexpected, the least predictable version you can make. Improbable lives have fewer competitors, more unique rewards, and are harder to replace with AIs, since AIs run on the predictable.

> You can align yourself with this grand arc moving from the expected to the unexpected and aim to become the most improbable person you can be.

And so on.

From the very first sentence, the author is telling you what you should be and do. There is nothing in the post that asks the question of what the reader actually wants to be and do.

What if I want to be a part of a community, meet someone I can build a life with, raise a family, and have a job that allows me to support my family and engage in simple activities I enjoy?

How does someone telling me I should become "the most improbable person" I can be help me? How does minimizing my "competitors", obtaining "unique rewards" and trying to make myself AI-proof align to building community, finding a compatible partner, raising happy children, and finding work that supports the life I want to live?

> People don't need to be "obsessed" with eating healthy, but they should at least consider it.

Many people do eat healthy without buying a bookshelf full of books about how to eat a healthy diet.

> People learn from books, they learn from other peoples experiences, and they can use that learning to help themselves.

There is a difference between learning from other people's experiences where their experiences resonate with you and seeking out advice from people who are trying to sell you on a life they say you should have.

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#28
I found this hard to read.

At one point in my life I came to an epiphany on this topic. Everybody's life is improbable. Literally everybody, all the time, without any effort.

Through the lens of this I saw myself as being the type of person who looks at things in life through averages, sizing up what's likely, and I realized that in my own story there were a lot of very improbable occurrences. Even if we understand statistics, we shouldn't let our knowledge of what's likely or most common get in the way of appreciation this uniqueness, or cloud our view of it. I took this observation to mean to be less judgemental, less the type to want to size something up and put it in a statistical bucket.

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#29
Is exotropy really the opposite of entropy? I was glad to stumble upon this word, but on searching the internet, it does not seem to be. Could someone informed shed some light on the matter?

Re: Your Most Improbable Life

#30

> Your life’s goal should be to become the most improbable person you can be. Your life's goal should not be dictated by Substack philosophers. > Here is what you gain with your most improbable life: > The authentic you. Your particular mix of talents, native abilities, personal inclinations, genetic limits, life experiences, and ambitious desires points to a mixture that is distinctly unique – if it is allowed to bl…

The next level of realization is that every path you've been following your entire life has been laid out by someone else, or chosen due to the value system imparted by someone else, so there's not really an authentic "you" in the way that people like to believe.

I realised this in 2006 when I committed the faux pas of wearing a cerulean blue sweater to a screening of The Devil Wears Prada.
Post reply on HN