I think being rich usually kills motivation because very few people have positive dreams, people are usually motivated by necessity. Take necessity away and you got yet another lazy upper-class cokehead “party animal”, with few exceptions. There is a very fine line of middle-classery to walk, to be rich enough to throw resources at your goals, but poor enough i.e. “staying hungry” enough to actually have goals.
What you say about the soft skills are true for class but not money. As they are not the same thing. For example people who have class but not money are librarians or schoolteachers. Growing up as a child of librarians or schoolteachers would mean limited means but having all the right soft-skills. I think I may be using “class” a bit unusually here, largely I mean “a culture of intellectualism” because working-class culture does not have much of that. People who buy their kids books for Xmas. People who are used to their kids demanding books for Xmas. Basically I mean a “body person” vs. “head person” dichotomy here, as virtually all working-class people tend to be body people, sex, food, fighting, sports, and while many rich people are body people too, there are more head people and thus it gets associated with class—but not necessarily with money.
Basically my point is, having soft skills from class / intellectualism but retaining the motivation of low money seems to be an ideal combination, which I would roughly define as librarian parents or philosophy professor parents.
I think being rich usually kills motivation because very few people have positive dreams, people are usually motivated by necessity. Take necessity away and you got yet another lazy upper-class cokehead “party animal”, with few exceptions. There is a very fine line of middle-classery to walk, to be rich enough to throw resources at your goals, but poor enough i.e. “staying hungry” enough to actually have goals.
For one, this is a very complex claim, that I think is in some ways contrary to the evidence (mental and physical health correlate positively with socioeconomic class). But besides that, just on a sort of ideological ground, I have to disagree with it. People often claim that things like war and death are necessary. Let it be known that neither is scarcity a necessary evil. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t experience challenges, continuously improve ourselves, and live by our own strength.
What you say about the soft skills are true for class but not money. As they are not the same thing. For example people who have class but not money are librarians or schoolteachers. Growing up as a child of librarians or schoolteachers would mean limited means but having all the right soft-skills. I think I may be using “class” a bit unusually here, largely I mean “a culture of intellectualism” because working-class culture does not have much of that. People who buy their kids books for Xmas. People who are used to their kids demanding books for Xmas. Basically I mean a “body person” vs. “head person” dichotomy here, as virtually all working-class people tend to be body people, sex, food, fighting, sports, and while many rich people are body people too, there are more head people and thus it gets associated with class—but not necessarily with money.
I would agree with this but use different words, note the risk of generalizing from a small amount of anecdotal evidence, and rip out all of the causal implications because I don’t actually know what is doing what there.
Basically my point is, having soft skills from class / intellectualism but retaining the motivation of low money seems to be an ideal combination, which I would roughly define as librarian parents or philosophy professor parents.
Once again, I disagree with this final conclusion on ideological grounds. Scarcity is not necessary.
Oh good. Someone else on this site read the good parts of this site, the ones that actually give some hope for life, the ones that aren’t just a Treason of the Scientists to accompany the Treason of the Artists and the Treason of the (humanist) Intellectuals.
I’ve always wondered why people are so freaked out at even looking at the “brighter” portions of possibility-space when they spend all their time obsessing over the unrealistically dark portions anyway. It makes grown adults sound like emo-teens, but somehow it’s all taken as Very Serious Person stuff.
I can imagine lots of reasons that you might observe something like that.
Discussing x-risks pattern matches to appearing responsible, and discussing very long-term fun maximization pattern matches to fantasizing, and appearing responsible is higher status than appearing to fantasize.
Discussing x-risks is more important/higher impact than discussing fun maximization.
People who think about both x-risks and fun maximization believe that discussing fun maximization proximally to x-risks completes the transhumanism-as-religion pattern, so discussion of fun maximization is observed less frequently than discussion of x-risks. (Alternatively, people are conserving their weirdness points. That would probably be the best way to describe it elsewhere but not here.)
Different epistemic origins. I imagine that a lot of LW users come to rationalism through Traditional Rationality as students or professionals. I’m young and I cut my teeth on Robert Freitas’s work. I’ve had the transhumanist inside view for a long time and don’t remember what it’s like to think about transhumanism or the future solely in terms of imprecise, surface-level generalizations.
Robin Hanson would probably argue that people have extreme ideas about the future, and that it goes both ways and you’re just reversing the stupidity. (I would disagree.)
Robin Hanson would probably argue that people have extreme ideas about the future, and that it goes both ways and you’re just reversing the stupidity. (I would disagree.)
I don’t understand?
Different epistemic origins. I imagine that a lot of LW users come to rationalism through Traditional Rationality as students or professionals. I’m young and I cut my teeth on Robert Freitas’s work. I’ve had the transhumanist inside view for a long time and don’t remember what it’s like to think about transhumanism or the future solely in terms of imprecise, surface-level generalizations.
Just like most people, I got introduced to LW through Traditional Rationality myself. But, to me, “LWian ‘rationality’” doesn’t actually have a large “usefulness delta” over “account for cognitive biases and use statistical reasoning” without the parts about extremely strong naturalism, Fun Theory, and at least enough transhumanism to make the Fun Theory actually go.
Discussing x-risks is more important/higher impact than discussing fun maximization.
I didn’t even mean existential risks. I meant stuff like, “Which people in government or business are conspiring against me this week?” and “Is everyone a piece of shit?”, to which there are actually trivial answers like “Most people aren’t conspiring against you” and “No”.
Discussing x-risks pattern matches to appearing responsible, and discussing very long-term fun maximization pattern matches to fantasizing, and appearing responsible is higher status than appearing to fantasize.
Just like most people, I got introduced to LW through Traditional Rationality myself. But, to me, “LWian ‘rationality’” doesn’t actually have a large “usefulness delta” over “account for cognitive biases and use statistical reasoning” without the parts about extremely strong naturalism, Fun Theory, and at least enough transhumanism to make the Fun Theory actually go.
I would definitely include the stuff on philosophy of language as well. I’ve seen a lot of people report that not going in circles over word usage was one of their most significant changes in behavior after reading LW. It also sets you up for reductionism by teaching you not to confuse the way the map feels with the way the territory is.
You mean there are people to whom that’s not just obvious? I thought that treating words as pointers was something common to everyone who learns programming.
Not everyone learns programming and it happens often that skills learned in one domain don’t transfer into other domains.
Quite a lot of people care about whether or not someone is a feminist. The care about defining what true feminism is about. They treat the word like it’s important in itself and not just a pointer.
Law (especially private law) seems to be a better example of a domain where words themselves are very important, because it can hardly be any other way. For example, whether or not something qualifies as a breach of contract is important by itself.
Quite a lot of people care about whether or not someone is a feminist. The care about defining what true feminism is about. They treat the word like it’s important in itself and not just a pointer.
Not being motivated by scarcity totally exists and is an excellent thing for those who can pull it off, but AFAIK it requires a very unusual type of personality. I would say, almost abiological, since there is not much in our evolutionary past that would be about post-scarcity motivation.
Something I must add to my model: everybody I know who is wealthy had parents who were born poor. Or grandparents. I am born about middle to upper-middle perhaps but still remember grandpa’s childhood stories about travelling on the roof of trains. So a perhaps my model is better explained by saying they inherited a certain amount of scarcity mentality and then don’t know what to do when it no longer applies. I have no idea what real “old money” is about, when one is 100% secure one cannot lose their status, maybe they more easily get this kind of non-scarcity motivation.
Money is not the only thing you can be hungry for, e.g. you can be hungry for fame. Or you can be motivated by thrill of having the call in your life. Some books are described as page-turners or even unputdownable, and I think if one’s life has a “well-written” story, then being the main protagonist of that story might make having a dream and following it at least as interesting as those books. For smaller goals, perhaps feeling that your family has a certain stature that you have to maintain would be enough.
One thing that helps motivation is the sense of direction. If children have concrete examples of success (and I think that being from a rich family usually can provide some, although it is not the only source of examples), concrete roadmaps to success, then they might be more confident in trying various ambitious things. If children do not have concrete and vivid examples, they have to rely on abstract ones, and they are less likely to affect them at gut level. E.g. even if, given their talents, intellectually they may understand that A Thing is realistically within their reach, they might still not feel it emotionally, and they might choose safer and less ambitious path not because of intellectual considerations, but because that path feels more realistic, more concrete, and therefore the one that feels less uncertain, less scary. For example, someone from a remote small town who has no concrete examples of success might not even consider applying to prestigious university or company abroad, even though they knew application procedure and knew (at the intellectual level) that, given their talents, they might have a shot, because that might feel too unrealistic and scary.
I think being rich usually kills motivation because very few people have positive dreams, people are usually motivated by necessity. Take necessity away and you got yet another lazy upper-class cokehead “party animal”, with few exceptions. There is a very fine line of middle-classery to walk, to be rich enough to throw resources at your goals, but poor enough i.e. “staying hungry” enough to actually have goals.
What you say about the soft skills are true for class but not money. As they are not the same thing. For example people who have class but not money are librarians or schoolteachers. Growing up as a child of librarians or schoolteachers would mean limited means but having all the right soft-skills. I think I may be using “class” a bit unusually here, largely I mean “a culture of intellectualism” because working-class culture does not have much of that. People who buy their kids books for Xmas. People who are used to their kids demanding books for Xmas. Basically I mean a “body person” vs. “head person” dichotomy here, as virtually all working-class people tend to be body people, sex, food, fighting, sports, and while many rich people are body people too, there are more head people and thus it gets associated with class—but not necessarily with money.
Basically my point is, having soft skills from class / intellectualism but retaining the motivation of low money seems to be an ideal combination, which I would roughly define as librarian parents or philosophy professor parents.
For one, this is a very complex claim, that I think is in some ways contrary to the evidence (mental and physical health correlate positively with socioeconomic class). But besides that, just on a sort of ideological ground, I have to disagree with it. People often claim that things like war and death are necessary. Let it be known that neither is scarcity a necessary evil. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t experience challenges, continuously improve ourselves, and live by our own strength.
I would agree with this but use different words, note the risk of generalizing from a small amount of anecdotal evidence, and rip out all of the causal implications because I don’t actually know what is doing what there.
Once again, I disagree with this final conclusion on ideological grounds. Scarcity is not necessary.
Oh good. Someone else on this site read the good parts of this site, the ones that actually give some hope for life, the ones that aren’t just a Treason of the Scientists to accompany the Treason of the Artists and the Treason of the (humanist) Intellectuals.
The Fun Theory Sequence is my favorite and doesn’t get linked enough.
I’ve always wondered why people are so freaked out at even looking at the “brighter” portions of possibility-space when they spend all their time obsessing over the unrealistically dark portions anyway. It makes grown adults sound like emo-teens, but somehow it’s all taken as Very Serious Person stuff.
I can imagine lots of reasons that you might observe something like that.
Discussing x-risks pattern matches to appearing responsible, and discussing very long-term fun maximization pattern matches to fantasizing, and appearing responsible is higher status than appearing to fantasize.
Discussing x-risks is more important/higher impact than discussing fun maximization.
People who think about both x-risks and fun maximization believe that discussing fun maximization proximally to x-risks completes the transhumanism-as-religion pattern, so discussion of fun maximization is observed less frequently than discussion of x-risks. (Alternatively, people are conserving their weirdness points. That would probably be the best way to describe it elsewhere but not here.)
Different epistemic origins. I imagine that a lot of LW users come to rationalism through Traditional Rationality as students or professionals. I’m young and I cut my teeth on Robert Freitas’s work. I’ve had the transhumanist inside view for a long time and don’t remember what it’s like to think about transhumanism or the future solely in terms of imprecise, surface-level generalizations.
Robin Hanson would probably argue that people have extreme ideas about the future, and that it goes both ways and you’re just reversing the stupidity. (I would disagree.)
I don’t understand?
Just like most people, I got introduced to LW through Traditional Rationality myself. But, to me, “LWian ‘rationality’” doesn’t actually have a large “usefulness delta” over “account for cognitive biases and use statistical reasoning” without the parts about extremely strong naturalism, Fun Theory, and at least enough transhumanism to make the Fun Theory actually go.
I didn’t even mean existential risks. I meant stuff like, “Which people in government or business are conspiring against me this week?” and “Is everyone a piece of shit?”, to which there are actually trivial answers like “Most people aren’t conspiring against you” and “No”.
That would be typical Very Serious Person stuff.
I would definitely include the stuff on philosophy of language as well. I’ve seen a lot of people report that not going in circles over word usage was one of their most significant changes in behavior after reading LW. It also sets you up for reductionism by teaching you not to confuse the way the map feels with the way the territory is.
You mean there are people to whom that’s not just obvious? I thought that treating words as pointers was something common to everyone who learns programming.
Not everyone learns programming and it happens often that skills learned in one domain don’t transfer into other domains.
Quite a lot of people care about whether or not someone is a feminist. The care about defining what true feminism is about. They treat the word like it’s important in itself and not just a pointer.
Law (especially private law) seems to be a better example of a domain where words themselves are very important, because it can hardly be any other way. For example, whether or not something qualifies as a breach of contract is important by itself.
On this site?
And they’re being silly.
Just like we have a few theists on LW we also have noncoders ;)
Not being motivated by scarcity totally exists and is an excellent thing for those who can pull it off, but AFAIK it requires a very unusual type of personality. I would say, almost abiological, since there is not much in our evolutionary past that would be about post-scarcity motivation.
Something I must add to my model: everybody I know who is wealthy had parents who were born poor. Or grandparents. I am born about middle to upper-middle perhaps but still remember grandpa’s childhood stories about travelling on the roof of trains. So a perhaps my model is better explained by saying they inherited a certain amount of scarcity mentality and then don’t know what to do when it no longer applies. I have no idea what real “old money” is about, when one is 100% secure one cannot lose their status, maybe they more easily get this kind of non-scarcity motivation.
Money is not the only thing you can be hungry for, e.g. you can be hungry for fame. Or you can be motivated by thrill of having the call in your life. Some books are described as page-turners or even unputdownable, and I think if one’s life has a “well-written” story, then being the main protagonist of that story might make having a dream and following it at least as interesting as those books. For smaller goals, perhaps feeling that your family has a certain stature that you have to maintain would be enough.
One thing that helps motivation is the sense of direction. If children have concrete examples of success (and I think that being from a rich family usually can provide some, although it is not the only source of examples), concrete roadmaps to success, then they might be more confident in trying various ambitious things. If children do not have concrete and vivid examples, they have to rely on abstract ones, and they are less likely to affect them at gut level. E.g. even if, given their talents, intellectually they may understand that A Thing is realistically within their reach, they might still not feel it emotionally, and they might choose safer and less ambitious path not because of intellectual considerations, but because that path feels more realistic, more concrete, and therefore the one that feels less uncertain, less scary. For example, someone from a remote small town who has no concrete examples of success might not even consider applying to prestigious university or company abroad, even though they knew application procedure and knew (at the intellectual level) that, given their talents, they might have a shot, because that might feel too unrealistic and scary.