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Life is Short

paulgraham.com

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Re: Life is Short

#441

Post by ubernostrum »

bittercynic wrote: post #364
forgetsusername wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Commenters stating that the essay blames poverty on the poor really are reading something into the essay that wasn't there (at least for me). He did call those who disagree with Zuckerberg's letter envious losers, so how can you read something like the Inequality essay without that colouring it? https://medium.com/@girlziplocked/paul-graham-is-still-askin...

I skimmed the linked article and searched it for "envious losers" but didn't find the phrase you mention. It did have a nasty tone, and seemed more like a personal attack and attempt to incite anger than a reasoned response to the ideas presented.

The article presents, as an image (presumably for archiving purposes in case the tweet is deleted), a tweet from pg saying, and I quote:

@sama I think the reason you're surprised is that not being a loser yourself you underestimate the power of envy.

(in response to a tweet saying "It takes a lot for the internet to surprise me, but the general reaction to Zuck's letter did it")

As to the rest of your comment... I think you're reading something which takes an aggressive tone in promoting its argument, and mistaking that for a personal attack. There is quite a strong critique of the "startups create value" idea, beginning with the observation that they don't, really -- VCs confer value and legitimacy upon certain startups, and not on others. Which means that in a startup-based economy, such as the one pg argues for, pg and his friends would wield an enormous amount of power. In a true startup-based economy, VCs would literally be the central planners, signing off on which businesses can and can't be started (I mean, in theory someone in such an economy might privately have access to enough capital to get going without VCs, but the deck would still be heavily stacked against those people, and there aren't exactly a lot of them). And it is entirely fair game to question the motives of someone who has such a strong incentive to favor a true startup-based economy, which of course the essay does.

Re: Life is Short

#442

Post by eruditely »

dang wrote: post #440
eruditely wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sound like an idiot. How in the world is this comparable to something oprah says? This reminds me of how Karl Popper critiques people's opinions, at times he rejects both the pro/anti side of something, as he did in anti-naturalist history vs naturalist history arguing that both were based on a misunderstanding of the logical content of the thing in question. In this regard you have misunderstood the logical cont…

> You sound like an idiot. This comment breaks the HN guidelines. Please edit incivility out of your comments when posting here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

Why? The other side gets to drown us in attacks and we can't fight back? Sorry moderator your civility warnings are unwarranted and its why people lose these sort of fights. If a Nobel prize winner will get pushed out in England due to being flanked from all sides, while the nice people can't fight back.

Re: Life is Short

#443

Post by wfo »

argonaut wrote: post #321
wfo wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you pay any attention to current political discussion, e.g. the field of Republican candidates they do NOT argue in favor of inequality. They describe it as a problem just as the Democrats do. And of course that's false. The Democrats of the 1900s are conservative; the new deal is the most iconic conservative movement we've ever seen yes? And Hoovervilles were created by socialist thought?

What? The New Deal was socialist, which is liberal on the American political spectrum. Calling it part of American conservatism is clearly untrue. Virtually no Republicans have a stated goal or platform of reducing economic inequality. Pretty much every Democrat running for president does. To claim otherwise is also clearly untrue. I suspect you are mixing up the fact that in American politics, conservatism (which is…

It was sarcasm.

Re: Life is Short

#444

Post by iamcasen »

egroat wrote: post #375
jacquesm wrote: post #336

If you can't see past the link to the other essays here please try to isolate this one for a bit, especially if you're young and you don't have kids yet. This essay is rich in realizations that come with age, and in some sense I would have potentially gotten a lot of mileage out of it when I was 20 or so (but then I would probably have lacked the background to fully comprehend it), and even more when I was a young fi…

> when I was 20 or so Ok. "20 or so" describes me. And things aren't going so well. Out of uni, and life feels pretty empty. Family has fallen apart, friends are friends of convenience, work is very intense - perhaps too much - and everything is going into keeping going. The brave face, making sure I eat, making sure I run, cycle, climb. The dreams I had even six months ago, feeling ever more impossible. The lure of…

Are you me? My life seemed to slowly "fall apart" after college, and after I began working in the full time world. From the outside in, I am a wonderful success. I have a great job, enough money to be comfortable. I travel, I hike, I golf.

But I can't help but feel like it's all wrong. Work hard for what? So you can amass enough money for when you're too old to work? That whole way of life seems counter to the "life is short" argument. Because of that, I find myself needing to constantly move on, ever searching for something truly fulfilling. Work seemed to fulfill me for 4 years or so, but I feel like I've achieved what I set out to achieve, and now it is hollow.

Re: Life is Short

#445

Post by clock_tower »

wfo wrote: post #229
argonaut wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have your history all wrong. If you try to squeeze the Republican party of 1900's economic policy into the current American liberalism vs. conservatism spectrum (I say squeeze because obviously the political positions of that time were different than today's), they would be liberal, and the Democrats of that time would be conservative. So the fact that once upon a time red meant liberal, but no longer does, does…

If you pay any attention to current political discussion, e.g. the field of Republican candidates they do NOT argue in favor of inequality. They describe it as a problem just as the Democrats do. And of course that's false. The Democrats of the 1900s are conservative; the new deal is the most iconic conservative movement we've ever seen yes? And Hoovervilles were created by socialist thought?

> [T]he new deal is the most iconic conservative movement we've ever seen yes?

The New Deal was economically liberal but socially conservative; I'm inclined to say that it _was_ an iconic conservative effort. In particular, it was what gave the country enough social cohesion to win WWII; and it was what made the South lose interest in a second attempt at secession. The Southern Agrarians had spent the 1920s building a new argument for an independent CSA; once the New Deal started up, they mostly switched to supporting the US.

Re: Life is Short

#446

Post by clock_tower »

sjg007 wrote: post #167
xiaoma wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "His argument was that technology is the creator of inequality and it can't be stopped." Not quite. The argument was that technology is a lever that multiplies the differences in productivity between us, not that it is the creator of it. > "That startups (and stock options) capture a lot of that wealth is a side effect." Businesses generally capture this wealth. PG has argued in many essays that start-ups are a gre…

One loophole was the use of corporate benefits in lieu of higher pay. So yes, ideally you should organize to capture your value. Either in a startup, or a union, or a country, or a planet. Wealth is not capital. It is human ingenuity.

> Wealth is not capital. It is human ingenuity.

How much human ingenuity is equivalent to the United States' railroad network? To the Three Gorges Dam? To the physical infrastructure of the Internet? Human ingenuity allows more effective use of capital, but the sheer fact of ownership of capital can often be more valuable.

Re: Life is Short

#447

Post by totalrobe »

Pyxl101 wrote: post #269
totalrobe wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Truth. His last essay actually hurt me pretty personally. There aren't too many figures in the business or tech world that I actually admire, and I was really disappointed when a guy that has been this lucky is too scared to acknowledge that life simply isn't fair, and that hard work isn't always enough. PG has become a beggar like the rent seekers he claims to abhor.

> There aren't too many figures in the business or tech world that I actually admire, and I was really disappointed when a guy that has been this lucky is too scared to acknowledge that life simply isn't fair, and that hard work isn't always enough. I think you've seriously misunderstood his last essay, and should read it again with a less emotional and more logical eye. He acknowledges the truth of exactly what you…

Totally understand what you're saying, but instead of even attempting to tackle any of the issues he mentions, pg just comes across in this as "I am rich because I'm productive and if I couldn't earn a lot of money I wouldn't work hard so don't take my money," which is rather short sighted and self absorbed.

Re: Life is Short

#448

Post by dang »

eruditely wrote: post #442
dang wrote: post #440

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You sound like an idiot. This comment breaks the HN guidelines. Please edit incivility out of your comments when posting here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html

Why? The other side gets to drown us in attacks and we can't fight back? Sorry moderator your civility warnings are unwarranted and its why people lose these sort of fights. If a Nobel prize winner will get pushed out in England due to being flanked from all sides, while the nice people can't fight back.

Everyone always perceives themselves as "fighting back", i.e. sees the other side as the aggressor and oneself as merely defending. Since this bias is shared equally by all, it's guaranteed to produce nothing but escalation unless we develop the ability to be a bit more objective and respectful in our arguing.

Re: Life is Short

#449

Post by blakethorne »

"One heuristic for distinguishing stuff that matters is to ask yourself whether you'll care about it in the future."

Great advice. But I sometimes struggle with this as it requires a bit of forecasting (you need to put yourself in the 'future' mindset before deciding if you'll care -- this can be hard).

My heuristic is this. It works about 95 percent of the time.

Ask yourself: What motivated the person who made this?

If the answer is, simply, "anger" "money" "boss made me" "had to hit my quarterly numbers, or some similar reason, you're probably better off skipping it.

You want to look for the answers that are more genuine: "love" "practicing a craft" "desire to build something."

This generally helps me decide if something is worth putting in my brain (or my body). It helps me avoid M&Ms (junk food) and to guilt-free enjoy my mom's homemade cookies over the holidays. It helps me avoid clickbait and spend time reading quality essays.

Re: Life is Short

#450

Post by eruditely »

dang wrote: post #448
eruditely wrote: post #442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? The other side gets to drown us in attacks and we can't fight back? Sorry moderator your civility warnings are unwarranted and its why people lose these sort of fights. If a Nobel prize winner will get pushed out in England due to being flanked from all sides, while the nice people can't fight back.

Everyone always perceives themselves as "fighting back", i.e. sees the other side as the aggressor and oneself as merely defending. Since this bias is shared equally by all, it's guaranteed to produce nothing but escalation unless we develop the ability to be a bit more objective and respectful in our arguing.

>"Since this bias is shared equally by all, it's guaranteed to produce nothing but escalation unless we develop the ability to be a bit more objective and respectful in our arguing."

Do you honestly believe that it is 'us' who will escalate? Or is it them? Does it look like they're looking for anything else? Look at the egregious response to the essays. Yes, i'm sure we are the ones at fault. I guess i'll stop, but you are wrong in a very plain and ordinary way and I think that request was in poor taste.

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