VCs analyze opportunities largely by pattern recognition. They detect correlations between their past successes and then ride them for all they're worth when looking at new deals. The "no sex life" thing is a particularly peculiar correlation that Doerr is focusing on, but his process of pattern recognition investing is pretty normal.

Important to note: these patterns and correlations, not causations, and no one is claiming them to be causations. Doerr clearly does not think that "nerdy, white, no sex life" necessarily leads to "billion dollar dot-com success". As Founders at Work (Jessica Livingston's book) very clearly outlines, successful founders look very different from each other and take very different paths to success.