Although this is the lesser of two evils. This comment and this are, it seems to me, trying too hard to be the smartest person in the room: technically correct, but only if you ride roughshod over Gricean principles. This is a common failure mode.
If “violating Gricean principles” = willfully misunderstanding what was meant, I wasn’t.
The trouble with what ismeant by “your in the wrong room” is that while it can be taken to mean “seek out intellectual superiors” is also means “avoid intellectual inferiors”. I meant to contest the latter.
How so? “You’re the smartest person in the room” means that you have no intellectual superiors in there. It doesn’t mean you have no intellectual inferiors—that’d be “you’re not the dumbest person in the room”.
If you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re in the wrong room.
this seems like it belongs in the boring advice repository, but i’ll say it anyway:
Smarter than Person X by most metrics ≠ nothing to learn from interacting with Person X
I’d modify the wording of the advice to:
“Strive to have at least one person close to you who exceeds you in your primary domains, (as well as the domains you wish to improve upon)”
Those are not the best 15 words!
Although this is the lesser of two evils. This comment and this are, it seems to me, trying too hard to be the smartest person in the room: technically correct, but only if you ride roughshod over Gricean principles. This is a common failure mode.
(My comment was kind-of tongue-in-cheek. I know what you actually meant.)
If “violating Gricean principles” = willfully misunderstanding what was meant, I wasn’t.
The trouble with what ismeant by “your in the wrong room” is that while it can be taken to mean “seek out intellectual superiors” is also means “avoid intellectual inferiors”. I meant to contest the latter.
How so? “You’re the smartest person in the room” means that you have no intellectual superiors in there. It doesn’t mean you have no intellectual inferiors—that’d be “you’re not the dumbest person in the room”.
By that standards, in every room there is someone who shouldn’t be there.
That’s why every room should have a way out.
And right here is the breakdown on why it is ok to gun for your boss’s job, because he is gunning for the next room.
By that standard, no one should be in any room.
But I’m the only one here...
...which prompts that observation that apparently we should all be showering communally and only using toilets that are already occupied.
What book is this?
The “or anything else” files.