When I converse with junior folks about what qualities they’re missing, they often focus on things like “not being smart enough” or “not being a genius” or “not having a PhD.” It’s interesting to notice differences between what junior folks think they’re missing & what mentors think they’re missing.
There may also be social reasons to give different answers depending on whether you are a mentor or mentee. I.e., answering “the better mentees were those who were smarter” seems like an uncomfortable thing to say, even if it’s true.
(I do not want to say that this social explanation is the only reason that answers between mentors and mentees differed. But I do think that one should take it into account in one’s models)
+1. I’ll note though that there are some socially acceptable ways of indicating “smarter” (e.g., better reasoning, better judgment, better research taste). I was on the lookout for these kinds of statements, and I rarely found them. The closest thing that came up commonly was the “strong and concrete models of AI safety” (which could be loosely translated into “having better and smarter thoughts about alignment”).
+1, though I will note that skills 2-5 listed here are pretty strongly correlated with being smarter. It’s possible the mentors are factoring the skills differently (more politely?)
There may also be social reasons to give different answers depending on whether you are a mentor or mentee. I.e., answering “the better mentees were those who were smarter” seems like an uncomfortable thing to say, even if it’s true.
(I do not want to say that this social explanation is the only reason that answers between mentors and mentees differed. But I do think that one should take it into account in one’s models)
+1. I’ll note though that there are some socially acceptable ways of indicating “smarter” (e.g., better reasoning, better judgment, better research taste). I was on the lookout for these kinds of statements, and I rarely found them. The closest thing that came up commonly was the “strong and concrete models of AI safety” (which could be loosely translated into “having better and smarter thoughts about alignment”).
+1, though I will note that skills 2-5 listed here are pretty strongly correlated with being smarter. It’s possible the mentors are factoring the skills differently (more politely?)