Shooting down ideas is not a skill • Hacker News Board

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#181

Post by satisfice » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 7:15 AM UTC

sfink wrote: post #171

satisfice wrote: post #118

This article commits exactly the sin that it claims to warn against. It has obligatory positive statements about the value of critical thinking, surrounded by highly disparaging comments about how people practicing critical thinking in good faith are not adding value. The net effect will be to discourage the healthy development of critical thinking practice. Taking generic potshots at critical thinking is not a skill…

I read it as "shooting down" implying low-effort "I'm going to kill this because it makes me uncomfortable" type responses, not legitimate critique. Well-calculated rejection is indeed a valuable skill, but also hopefully won't come across as "shooting down". It's tough to write any article about any part of this topic, because there's so much nuance and the nuance matters. Yet none of us would read a post that captu…

I wrote a couple of books about testing. Yes, writing nuance is really hard. One of my readers noticed I contradicted myself across two different sections, due to a single missing word.

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#182

Post by genxy » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 7:37 AM UTC

nahfrtho wrote: post #70

dsr_ wrote: post #49

> "I haven't heard any customers request this." "We can't use Python for that, it's too slow." "That introduces too much complexity." "We tried something like that before and it didn't work." "DevOps won't want to support another service." "People are used to the way it works now." > None of these people are wrong or stupid. And none of them have added any value. Bzzt. Since all of these people are correct and smart,…

> Can't use Python because it's too slow? Show a proof of concept that is fast. Python is slow though, and for many use cases it won't work. For example, say somebody wanted to build a performant systems type software like version control. You're not really going to do that in Python. Something like that would even be slow in much "faster" Node.js. Some stuff you can't really use dynamic langauges for, if you want it…

Lol, Mercurial is written in Python (and now some Rust).

Most of the time, when someone raises a hypothetical performance criticism, it is either to further their pet language or as a cheap shot to shoot something down.

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#183

Post by genxy » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 7:42 AM UTC

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #166

reval wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your example about this hinge is nurturing behaviour. This is exactly what people should be doing- identifying issues and also at least suggesting they be fixed before proceeding if not offering a fix themselves. There is more to your reputation than what sounds like a genuine growth mindset.

Maybe. I tend to focus on "blockers," and things that can go wrong, first. I suspect a lot of people want to be buttered up, before the problems are discussed (i.e. "That's a really great idea! Have you thought about how often the hinge is stressed?") I'm a bit "spectrumish," so I sometimes miss the niceties. The Japanese were not reticent about discussing problems. It was fairly brutal, but we made great stuff.

Discussing and solving problems is different than firing off Thought Terminating Clichés to kill someone's project.

You do have to get to a working system, even if it is on a naive happy path before you can start preparing for the things that can go wrong.

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#184

Post by genxy » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 7:52 AM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #21

bob1029 wrote: post #16

It's definitely a skill. Perverting the organization into a support ecosystem for naysayers is not a trivial thing. It often takes years of meticulous, behind-the-scenes manipulation before these people can begin to reliably suppress ideas without getting called out.

> Perverting the organization into a support ecosystem for naysayers is not a trivial thing. Nor is establishing an "all ideas are good ones!" culture.

The article says nothing about all ideas being good. It doesn't talk about quality at all. It talks about how people in a team approach ideation.

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#185

Post by genxy » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 7:54 AM UTC

alyxya wrote: post #67

There's a gap in communication and vision here. The people on either side believe themselves to be the one who sees and understands more, because anything beyond what you see or understand is out of your consideration, so it's natural to only focus on what you know that the other side doesn't instead of what you don't know that the other side does.

I see a profound lack of curiosity in the comments. I'd want to work with maybe 10% of the folks judging from their replies.

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#186

Post by ChrisMarshallNY » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 9:11 AM UTC

genxy wrote: post #183

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe. I tend to focus on "blockers," and things that can go wrong, first. I suspect a lot of people want to be buttered up, before the problems are discussed (i.e. "That's a really great idea! Have you thought about how often the hinge is stressed?") I'm a bit "spectrumish," so I sometimes miss the niceties. The Japanese were not reticent about discussing problems. It was fairly brutal, but we made great stuff.

Discussing and solving problems is different than firing off Thought Terminating Clichés to kill someone's project. You do have to get to a working system, even if it is on a naive happy path before you can start preparing for the things that can go wrong.

Agreed, but it’s been my experience that anything that isn’t enthusiastic agreement, is considered “negativity.”

When I encounter someone that is so fragile, that they literally fall apart, if we aren’t cheerleading, then I can’t work with them. I’m a creative, myself[0]. I’m familiar with the process.

It’s my experience, that we often can’t see things that will kill the project, until we start drilling into the details; sometimes, not too far. Finding these things is not a death sentence. It’s the first step to success. They exist; whether or not we choose to see them.

If your feet are wet, and you see pyramids, you’re in de Nile (or a fountain in Vegas).

I have learned that this kind of introspection needs to happen, as soon as possible. It’s the way that I have been trained to work, and I’ve been shipping stuff, for my entire adult life. Shipping is not for the faint of heart. If your idea is meant to be displayed on a refrigerator, then you have the luxury of chasing off disagreement. If it's supposed to be something that people stake their careers on, and pay for, then we need to have a thicker skin.

[EDITED TO ADD] A practical reason for finding the issues early, is who will be solving the problem. The earlier you find the problem, the more likely the person addressing it, will be creative. They will have more room to work, and they will be more invested in the vision, as opposed to the implementation. Late fixes are ugly.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40917886

Re: Shooting down ideas is not a skill

#187

Post by ceejayoz » Mon, Apr 06, 2026, 10:47 AM UTC

kulahan wrote: post #179

ceejayoz wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s only ironic if the headline is correct. Or are you ironically shooting down my idea that it is a skill?

No, irony does not depend on correctness. When the discussion is X, if your only input is -X, then it's ironic in the face of a discussion on shooting down ideas.

Yes, irony depends on correctness.

It would be ironic for me to make a typo while bashing your spelling prowess. It would not be ironic if I didn’t.

It is similarly ironic that the Alanis Morrisette song about irony mostly mentions non-ironic things; “rain on your wedding day” isn’t ironic! And that’s ironic!