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

Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

joanwestenberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

241–250 of 513 posts

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#241

Post by jorblumesea »

rybosworld wrote: post #120
John23832 wrote: post #12

We all know he’s wrong. The problem isn’t that he is wrong, it’s that we have elevated the wealthy into a status where they can be wrong, have no correction, and make decisions whole clothe which negatively affect the rest of us. All while being insulated from their negative world view.

Tim Dillon said summarized it pretty well - can't remember or find the exact quote. Something to the effect of: "Look around at all these things I have - how could I be wrong when I have so much?" And that's how you get the Andreessen's and Musk's of the world stating these nonsensical things as truth. In their minds, financial success is the ultimate yardstick. The fact that they have so much wealth is a testament t…

I really don't think he thought it was equivalent, he was just larping and thought he could trick people.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#242

Post by Teever »

visarga wrote: post #169
rybosworld wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tim Dillon said summarized it pretty well - can't remember or find the exact quote. Something to the effect of: "Look around at all these things I have - how could I be wrong when I have so much?" And that's how you get the Andreessen's and Musk's of the world stating these nonsensical things as truth. In their minds, financial success is the ultimate yardstick. The fact that they have so much wealth is a testament t…

> In their minds, financial success is the ultimate yardstick. In a loopy recursive way, it is. Cost gates what we can do and become. Paying back your costs to extend your runway is the working principle behind biology, economy and technology. I am not saying rich people are always right, just that cost is not so irrelevant to everything else. I personally think cost satisfaction explains multiple levels, from biolog…

No. it certainly isn't.

I'm damn near broke right now but it would be obvious to you if you spent ten minutes with me that I'm healthier both mentally and physically than either of those two and I can walk down any street with relative impunity and talk with any stranger I meet without concern that they'd recognize me and have beef with me over some stupid shit I did online. I know that when I interact with people it's because they want to interact with me and not my money.

It's true that the cage they live in is gilded but it's still a cage.

Sometimes I stumble across wikipedia biography pages a person like a mumblerapper who had a meteoric rise in fame and wealth only to die in a puddle of puke from a Xanax overdose at like 25. It's sad and everything but when I read it I just think "Man, what a fucking idiot..." Like sure this dude probably had a great few years conspicuously consuming a bunch of shit and showing off a bunch of money with some floozies hanging off his arm but where is he now? Dead and cold in a hole in the ground. And he died a pretty pathetic death to boot.

I don't know about Andressen but I'm pretty sure I'll outlive Musk. As risk adverse as he is for his physical safety he'll end up doing something downright stupid that ends in his untimely death. With Andressen there's a growing possiblity that enough people wise up to his destructive impact on society and a movement where people who are still physically capable but with inoperable brain cancer or something start taking out people like Andressen.

Slow and steady wins the race.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5jI9I03q8E

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#243

Post by sd9 »

xhkkffbf wrote: post #100
mlinhares wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the people that fawn all over every single word they say think they'll eventually have the same money as well. But in the end they'll just be dumber.

[flagged]

Isn't this whole comment section about engaging with the material itself and disagreeing with it? I don't see anybody here saying that Andreessen's ideas are bad specifically because he has money, they are saying the ideas he has are bad and he has money and that's probably letting him get away with broadcasting terrible ideas.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#244

Post by next_xibalba »

This whole debate is pretty weird and misguided, IMO. Marc Andreesen can be right about what works for him. Joan Westenberg can be right about what works for her. This would be obvious to a five year old. This whole brouhaha seems to be merely the setting for HN'ers (and everyone else) to continue their ongoing battles about how the world should and must be and why "the other side" is Wrong. Search through the comments here. Somehow Elon, Luigi Magnione, and Trump are pulled into the discussion.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#245

Post by simianwords »

keiferski wrote: post #37

This whole scenario is just the logical conclusion of American anti-intellectualism. The need for intellectuals doesn't really go away, but rather we start assuming that "good at making money" = "has ideas worth listening to, on any topic." Not really surprising that many of these people are also frequent critics of academia and professors.

[flagged]

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#246

Post by pphysch »

_fat_santa wrote: post #138
lijok wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They changed. You wouldn’t believe it but those most impacted by the mental rot that social media can induce - are the ultra wealthy.

I have a tangential theory to this. Being rich != being famous. There are tons of extremely wealthy people out there that keep a very low profile. Sure they might be well known within their circle but ask the average person and they have no clue who that person is. I would say this is the case for like 90-95% of billionaires. Musk, Andreessen, Zuck and others were all in this camp 10 years ago but they all decided th…

There's also differences between fame, infamy, popularity and elite social status, which is probably not all that clear to newly-minted billionaires that are already lacking in the social skills department.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#247

Post by heresie-dabord »

tombert wrote: post #92
foobiekr wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason he and Musk are anti-introspection is that when they do it, it hurts. Because they are terrible people. Better to just not think about it.

It says a lot that he thinks that empathy is the greatest human weakness. One of many, many, many stupid things he's said.

In one interview, Mush called it the "empathy exploit".

This is the kind of person who would benefit from being raised and humanised in a village where people co-operate. Because then, as countless others have discovered, bluster and insults work only until the self-aggrandising narcissist meets someone not only bigger, but with better principles, and an actual leader of people.

There is a reason why many satisfying movie plots involve a final, usually violent comeuppance served to a self-aggrandising narcissist.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#248

Post by stewrat »

Im so glad someone wrote this. I was literally ranting out loud to myself at the gym the other day on the treadmill about how dangerous this meme of "I have no introspection, therefore I am Leet" is. He knows it's provocative, and knows its therefore memetic. You hear the other person on the podcast turning it over in his head and going "yeah, maybe I too also don't have any introspection...yeah!". Such a strong potential for abuse.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#249

Post by andrepd »

wodenokoto wrote: post #31

Is the 1 percenters getting dumber or acting like it? Like 10 years ago, I felt like Andreesen and Elon were thought leaders. Now they sound like idiots. Did I or did they change? Did I grow up and they changed to a younger audience and what I used to enjoy was just a different kind of stupid?

To add to the answers given already, there's the matter of the sheer scale of wealth these people have (especially relative to e.g. median worker wages). The richest people on earth in the 80s were a bunch of discreet Japanese CEOs with 5 or 6 billion$ to their name. They were very rich, sure, and surely could influence politics with their wealth.

But Elon Musk has 850 billion dollars. That's 850,000,000,000$. An amount so mind-boggingly impossible to imagine that you need analogies such as these https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c96F7D57CzI. And these people got it not as a CEO of a quiet car company or such, but as owners of media and tech empires with a reach and influence Ted Turner could only dream about. It's a qualitative leap.

Re: Marc Andreessen is wrong about introspection

#250

Post by a123b456c »

visarga wrote: post #169
rybosworld wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tim Dillon said summarized it pretty well - can't remember or find the exact quote. Something to the effect of: "Look around at all these things I have - how could I be wrong when I have so much?" And that's how you get the Andreessen's and Musk's of the world stating these nonsensical things as truth. In their minds, financial success is the ultimate yardstick. The fact that they have so much wealth is a testament t…

> In their minds, financial success is the ultimate yardstick. In a loopy recursive way, it is. Cost gates what we can do and become. Paying back your costs to extend your runway is the working principle behind biology, economy and technology. I am not saying rich people are always right, just that cost is not so irrelevant to everything else. I personally think cost satisfaction explains multiple levels, from biolog…

Oh come on. So you're rooting for the evil genius in the comic book movie? You would harm millions of people to move up the financial success yardstick?

I don't think many people would agree with such positions.

I do think that people who have succeeded financially might adopt that ethos as an ex post rationalization.

Post reply on HN