Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
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Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#2I don't get why this is on HN.
We have methods to kill Paula Beans in their tracks. Liberal arts does not.
Is this anything new?
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#3I don't get why this is on HN. We have methods to kill Paula Beans in their tracks. Liberal arts does not. Is this anything new?
Well, I'd never read it before, so it was new to me. And it was an interesting story, and I expect there to be conversation about the value of metrics when any metric can be faked. The first thought I had after reading this was "What matters at all statistically speaking if none of the facts can be trusted?" How do we know that pagerank or daily hits means anything when they can be as effectively bullshitted?
The liberal arts are just as good at stopping bullshit from coming through. That they rarely choose to do so demonstrates how cowed many people in the liberal arts are, and that's an entirely separate discussion. But there's a simple test in the liberal arts wherein when somebody doesn't make sense, you ask them to clarify, and repeat the process until they make sense or admit they were faking.
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#4I don't get why this is on HN. We have methods to kill Paula Beans in their tracks. Liberal arts does not. Is this anything new?
It's a review of the book by the guy who wrote two articles from the Atlantic article that were popular on HN recently:
[http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200501/kirn]
[http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200711/multitasking]
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#5Wow, sounds like me, only more pathological.
I spent almost my entire school career seeing how much I could get away with, writing fake personal essays, falsifying scientific "evidence" (as if 7th grade science fairs matter), manufacturing fake "drafts" which were really my first and final version but deliberately messed up, doing my homework as the teacher came around to collect it. Manufacturing saccharine, bullshit, fake answers that teachers always swallowed. Reusing essays from freshman year of HS for university English class. (Haha.)
I rebelled against being forced to do so many stupid things, that it became a game. Nobody ever noticed, so I realized that I couldn't respect or listen to people I could fool and conquer so easily.
You can do it in non-liberal arts. It's still easy.
The trick is, you have to be smart enough to do the real work to fake it. You don't necessarily have to know the given facts, though.
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#6Wow, sounds like me, only more pathological. I spent almost my entire school career seeing how much I could get away with, writing fake personal essays, falsifying scientific "evidence" (as if 7th grade science fairs matter), manufacturing fake "drafts" which were really my first and final version but deliberately messed up, doing my homework as the teacher came around to collect it. Manufacturing saccharine, bullshi…
Ouch.
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#7Wow, sounds like me, only more pathological. I spent almost my entire school career seeing how much I could get away with, writing fake personal essays, falsifying scientific "evidence" (as if 7th grade science fairs matter), manufacturing fake "drafts" which were really my first and final version but deliberately messed up, doing my homework as the teacher came around to collect it. Manufacturing saccharine, bullshi…
Ouch.
shrug I'm more well-adjusted than almost anyone else, now.
Institutionalized schooling just hobbles anyone who doesn't fit the mold, one way or another.
Taking it seriously is one way. Taking nothing seriously is another.
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#8I don't get why this is on HN. We have methods to kill Paula Beans in their tracks. Liberal arts does not. Is this anything new?
From the HN guidelines: "Please don't submit comments complaining that a submission is inappropriate for the site. If you think something is spam or egregiously offtopic, you can flag it by going to its page and clicking on the "flag" link."
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#9"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be." -- Kurt Vonnegut
Re: Faking It (The Undereducation of an Overachiever)
#10Wow, sounds like me, only more pathological. I spent almost my entire school career seeing how much I could get away with, writing fake personal essays, falsifying scientific "evidence" (as if 7th grade science fairs matter), manufacturing fake "drafts" which were really my first and final version but deliberately messed up, doing my homework as the teacher came around to collect it. Manufacturing saccharine, bullshi…
Sounds more like someone who needs to be special.
I was the same way in highschool. ;)