The apriori unlikelihood of finding oneself at the crux of history (or in a similarly rare situation) is a greatly underrated topic here, I suppose because it works corrosively against making any kind of special effort. If they had embraced a pseudo-anthropic expectation of personal mediocrity, the great achievers of history would presumably have gotten nowhere. And yet the world is also full of people who tried and failed, or who hold a mistaken idea of their own significance; something which is consistent with the rarity of great achievements. I’m not sure what the “rational” approach here might be.
The apriori unlikelihood of finding oneself at the crux of history (or in a similarly rare situation) is a greatly underrated topic here, I suppose because it works corrosively against making any kind of special effort. If they had embraced a pseudo-anthropic expectation of personal mediocrity, the great achievers of history would presumably have gotten nowhere. And yet the world is also full of people who tried and failed, or who hold a mistaken idea of their own significance; something which is consistent with the rarity of great achievements. I’m not sure what the “rational” approach here might be.