The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs • Hacker News Board

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#451

Post by derbOac » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 3:41 PM UTC

mrcartmeneses wrote: post #332

It’s really harsh that Katalin Karikó got such a backlash for calling academia like it is in her book. Academics are as much courtiers these days as they are researchers.

I agree, I think it's victim blaming or a diversion tactic or something.

I think the real problem isn't so much the skillsets of the researcher involved as much as is what is implied about the environments and the vagaries thereof.

The argument this piece is referring to and the way it is responding to it seem to deflect attention from the real problems, or rather, recasts it in the wrong way. My focusing on whether or not Karikó is "too weird" or whether it's time to abandon "weirdness", it deflects attention from all the problems that people are dealing with in academics. For every person who is "weird", there are many others who are not and still get screwed, or still others who are not but also not particularly bright and still "milk" the system or are in the right place at the right time.

This whole debate strike me a bit like climate change debates, specifically the criticism that berating people for not recycling or using plastic straws or whatever is just blaming the victim, or is hiding the real offenders behind the curtain. In the same way it strikes me as kind of besides the point whether Karikó is weird or not, or how weird is too weird, or whatever. The bottom like is academics is no longer really about science in many fields, and not even really about how socially skilled you are, it's about politics and random dynamics of fate.

My impression of academics is that it blew way past "social skill" long ago and is now in a very different realm altogether. I've seen too much fraud and manipulation to blame anyone who has good ideas for "not being socially skilled enough."

I didn't read the original tweets but the idea that Karikó should be shamed for complaining because "that's just the way it is" seems like condoning the problems and then blaming her for calling them out. The next step is complaining about people calling out fraud because "that's just what everyone does".

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#452

Post by derbOac » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 3:51 PM UTC

fragmede wrote: post #237

programjames wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're talking past me. I understand that getting research done requires social infrastructure. Do you understand that I don't consider that research?

Right, the "Did Steve jobs make the iPhone?" conundrum.

I've thought a lot about the analogy with Steve Jobs and the iphone, but it's also a bit misleading to me because academics doesn't even credit things the same way as in business.

The iphone is made by Apple after all, and we can get into discussions about how much credit Apple even deserves for the iphone or whether Steve Jobs deserves credit for whatever portion of that we give.

But in academics we still act as if it's just "Joan Smith" doing their research and hiring people to get things done, and acting as if they're brilliant for doing so, when in fact many other people probably have the exact same ideas, or happened to be in the right place in the right time, or know the right people in the grant agency, or whatever; or their grad students or postdocs are the ones with the ideas, etc. etc.

I keep thinking about a colleague of mine who, whenever someone like a grad student would have an original idea, but required his grant money or whatever to pay for it, he would take credit on papers saying "ideas are a dime a dozen; it's the work involved getting it to happen that matters." But if there was a paper that was the result of a relatively unoriginal idea that required a lot of RA, grad student, and postdoc labor, it was always "it's the idea that counts, and not whoever follows through with it."

I feel like that's the atmosphere in academics now.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#453

Post by mattm » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 3:51 PM UTC

ModernMech wrote: post #420

michaelt wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of the stuff I hear people describing as masking is stuff that a few decades ago would have been called professionalism, or manners, or charm, or empathy. When I'm meeting with representatives of a client, and one of them makes a suggestion that I know won't work, and I refrain from instantly and publicly shooting down their idea and instead I make a show of considering it, then ask them a probing question or t…

I think maybe you're misunderstanding what masking is. Masking isn't just not being an asshole. I'll give you some examples. My face is usually flat, and my tone is usually monotone. Most people modulate their face and their tone naturally and don't have to think about it. When I socialize, I have to think about my face and my tone constantly. Yes everyone is doing this at some level, but for autistic people it takes…

Thanks for sharing. A lot of this resonated with me.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#454

Post by mattgreenrocks » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:06 PM UTC

_yb2s wrote: post #449

mattgreenrocks wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want to check that I’m parsing this correctly. Caring about something beyond a typical amount for intrinsic reasons is a neurodivergent marker? Is this really the HN I grew up with?

There are many types of neurodiversity. I am arguing that being very introverted is itself fairly rare, and a type of neurodiversity- however not at all rare among the HN crowd. I would think it goes without saying that the HN crowd is a lot more neurodivergent than the general population. I'm not sure why people are so upset about this suggestion... I'm not sure if they just disagree, or if they don't like being lab…

It's not about neurodivergence.

Being interested in something for its own sake beyond an "average" interest is extremely typical.

Our brains are wired to incentivize this interest via the delivery of pleasurable feelings, determination, and motivation. These experiences shape our personality and inform future higher-than-average interests. This is a good feedback cycle, and not something to be lumped together with other facets of personality.

Implying otherwise suggests that people are weird for liking things that they like.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#455

Post by banannaise » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:17 PM UTC

michaelt wrote: post #403

abracadaniel wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The anti-diagnosis attitude is surprising on a site like this. Everyone could do better with a better understanding of their own mind, whether it meets the criteria of a disorder or not. And with any kind of better understanding we need more and better categorizations.

> The anti-diagnosis attitude is surprising on a site like this. Did you know, up until the 1970s, homosexuality was considered a mental disorder [1] by the psychiatric profession? Can you understand why many homosexuals felt that they were just being themselves, and that them being themselves didn't warrant inclusion in a diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders? With that thought in your mind, can you…

The good news is that we eventually decided (mostly) that the solution to that "disorder" was not to try to fix the individual, but to fix the society around them.

Many autistic advocates are, in fact, advocating for improving society such that autism is no longer a major barrier to success. Until we have that, autistic people often require medical care.

It is perhaps important to also note the recent pushback against autism's equivalence of conversion therapy (ABA).

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#456

Post by banannaise » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:24 PM UTC

akozak wrote: post #104

I have a lot of experience working with the weird nerd archetype and watching them navigate large orgs. First it's absolutely true that orgs that purport to support weird nerds will revert back to rewarding politicians. I've seen it happen, and typically has to do with who is doling out money. However, in my experience the vast majority of brilliant nerds way overextend themselves, and are much too confident outside…

> However, in my experience the vast majority of brilliant nerds way overextend themselves, and are much too confident outside their domain. They're also much more likely to be jerks and will tumble from conflict to conflict until they get their way by attrition or status. Conflicts are strangely more personal because so much ego is tied up into it. They're more likely to assume they're right in every (non-tech/science related) situation.

If this behavior is rewarded, then you haven't eliminated politics - you've reinforced politics but eliminated social cohesion and decorum as elements thereof.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#457

Post by outworlder » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:34 PM UTC

me_me_me wrote: post #448

CalRobert wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My sister didn't say her first word until she was almost 5 and would bang her head against the wall. Hearing people say that autism "isn't a disability, it's a differentability lol!" or "oh I must be autistic because I'm awkward", or worst of all "don't try to treat people with autism it's cruel!" (aka don't force insurance companies to cover ABA, which is the only reason my sister can even talk now) is really upsett…

The biggest problem is that they rolled up the asperger syndrome up with autistic spectrum. So any psychologist is forced classify functional and non-functional together. Its a disservice to both worlds and I am not sure why was it done. People with asperger syndrome need guidance to navigate the world, while traditionally autistic people need to be taken care of, why lump both together with a single term

> People with asperger syndrome need guidance to navigate the world, while traditionally autistic people need to be taken care of, why lump both together with a single term

One of the reasons is that autism was recognized to belong to a spectrum. It is not a boolean (you have aspergers or you have not, you have autism or not). It is, to keep with the metaphor, a bunch of stats expressed in floats. To what degree are you unable to filter external stimuli? How can you handle social situations? What about social cues? And so on.

The binary classification came with lots of issues.

Another issue was that Hans Asperger was funded by the Nazi regime, and protected intelligent children, while allowing other children to be "euthanized". So there was pressure to remove the actual name too.

If you still need a binary classification, I believe "high functioning" and "low functioning" are still in use.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#458

Post by intended » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:34 PM UTC

gavinhoward wrote: post #442

intended wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just checking - have you considered switching projects, with your next project being social engineering your sales? (Cold turkey switch, not "let me get these features added, before I switch projects" etc.) Its quite possible you have thought of this, but I cant be sure. If you have thought or acted on it, how long were you able to sustain it? Being able to switch your obsession is something we are able to do, but it…

I have considered, but I won't. I actually can't switch my obsessions. Not intentionally. I have tried. It has taken me 7 years of marriage to go from uncanny valley social skills to appearing normal at first glance. Social engineering skills would probably take me another 100 years. And on that point (and this is purely my belief, not objective truth), unlike most people, I want clients to choose my software because…

Hmmm.

I respect your position. I am going to push against a few errors made on my part.

Social engineering was used incorrectly by me. I should have said marketing and sales. You cannot switch to something you find uninteresting, much less something you feel is in opposition to your values.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#459

Post by detourdog » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:39 PM UTC

ModernMech wrote: post #422

detourdog wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think another comment said the opposite was schizophrenia.

I have no idea what that comment is talking about, the "opposite" of autism is not schizophrenia -- there's no "opposite" of autism and if there were it wouldn't be schizophrenia, I don't see how that possibly follows.

The were describing connections to the nervous system. Autism was at one end of the quantity of connections and schizophrenia was at the other end. I think it was this thread somewhere.

Re: The Weird Nerd comes with trade-offs

#460

Post by Mathnerd314 » Mon, Jun 10, 2024, 4:48 PM UTC

kristjansson wrote: post #57

makeitdouble wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The line you draw between "weirdness" and "neurodivergence" is interesting. Would neurodivergence have to be native (so, not grown "naturally") and at which point does weirdness fit on the spectrum ? Recently I think people are more receptive to lower degrees of neurodivergence. I see it the same way people understand that you have a gradation between having difficulties climbing stairs and not being able to walk. We…

At some point the question is “why?”. We can keep atomizing human variability into smaller, more graduated buckets of neurodivergence, but what’s the point, esp. for those that don’t really suffer negative impacts, and for which there isn’t really any remedy besides acceptance?

Maybe this will be an unpopular opinion, but hear me out: it is the video platforms like YouTube, TikTok, etc. Before these platforms, it was relatively difficult to find videos of "ordinary" people in everyday situations. Sure there was funniest home videos and other carefully curated channels, but now it is easy. And with consumption of these videos comes the desire for a vocabulary to classify and describe them. Like how food is spicy or sweet and has different ethnic styles, or music has a tangled mess of genres and substyles, the teenagers of today are developing a classification of (videos of) human behavior. And part of this is non-neurotypical behavior - I don't know why, I haven't really investigated this, but it is clear that some (a lot?) of people enjoy watching content from autistic people, ADHD people, etc. For them, or at least the ML algorithms that feed them content, it is a genre like any other, and in the incestuous cycle of hunting for views, whether the origin was man or machine, at this point it has become branding.

What I'm not clear on is whether this translates to better real-world interactions. Certainly, it raises awareness of the conditions, but just watching a video does not necessarily lead to smooth conversation. Generally meetings with famous actors are pretty awkward and it is even less clear to me that someone who watches ADHD videos would necessarily enjoy meeting an ADHD person irl, particularly one that doesn't make engaging videos with millions of views.