Simple Truths Smart People Forget | Hacker News Reader

Simple Truths Smart People Forget

marcandangel.com

187 pointsedo45 comments

Weird. How did this spammy self-help blah-blah make it to the front-page? Must be a slow news day or simply vanity: "Hey, I am smart, I want to see what truths I forget! Vote up, cause we're all smart here."

I'd normally agree, but many of the points resonate well with entrepreneurs and the psychological issues therein.

I am starting to think that certain people upvote things to read later if they are blocked by their corporate firewall (like this site for me). As HN gets more popular, I think the trend is for these votes to get more frequent while the old-timers still don't upvote much at all.

I have been thinking of this for a while, and this might seem like a good enough of an example. Anyone else have any thoughts?

Just counting old-timer votes doesn't seem to change the ranking much: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2073513

#11 People who understand psychographics will cater content to you by stroking your sense of intellectual superiority.

#12 there seems to be an endless supply of this drivel / content spam being upvoted in HN.

Perhaps it is a new kind of SEO?

I think it's just the old type of SEO ...

#2 – Happiness and success are two different things.

Could not agree more. Our definition of happiness often includes "Success". And people's definition of success is quite relative, depending on other people's current perceptions and ideas of how we should be or what people envy, or image.

I retired 6 years back, spend more time sitting and walking in parks, feeding and playing with stray dogs, and remaining in the present moment. I've never been happier. Others see mine as a life wasted - dropping a high paying job, loads of money to spend, and becoming a miserly bum !

I strongly disagree - Success is "The accomplishment of an aim or purpose" (OED), not "becoming a high-powered executive with a tastefully thick, subtly off-white, watermarked business card" or whatever mystery definition of success this article seems to be using. It has absolutely nothing to do with other people.

Anyone who claims to be successful but not happy, has failed in setting the right goals, and is therefore not truly successful.

You are evidently successful, because you are happy. Your goal seems to be to retire from work and chill out in the park. A goal which you have achieved. The surfer in the article appears to have the succeeded in being able to surf all the time.

I was not going by dictionary definitions, but by what people around me seem to think. In my country, success has very much to do with whether you are in a coveted job (usually meaning an MBA or engineer/doctor/civil services). This changes over the years, e.g. software engineer came and went. MBA is now going out.

People feel they are happy if they are conforming to the societal definition of success. Your society may be quite different.

Dictionary definitions only reflect the actual meaning of words in conventional use by the speakers of the language. If the OED were prescriptive, then the definition of success would simply be "outcome", whether positive or not, as that is the original meaning of the word.

Perhaps your language has a different word which is conventionally translated into English as "success", but would better be translated as "prestige". In that case, you are right - happiness and prestige are two very different things. History is littered with notoriously unhappy, yet highly prestigious individuals.

I do concede that achieving a degree of prestige is a popular goal, and it is an obvious way of demonstrating success; but prestige is not synonymous with success.

people's definition of success is quite relative, depending on other people's current perceptions and ideas of how we should be or what people envy, or image.

You can easily replace success with happiness in that sentence.

For example, spending more time sitting and walking in parks, feeding and playing with stray dogs, and remaining in the present moment (whatever that means) sounds extremely boring to me. It would make me miserable rather than happy.

It's more complicated than it looks.

> You can easily replace success with happiness in that sentence. Yes, but my point was that often people's definition of happiness contains other concepts, which are not investigated by ourselves. Or, we accept moving/relative definitions for these that are not our own. One concept depending on other concepts etc.

>It's more complicated than it looks. I think when we investigate the meaning of happiness (for ourselves) then its actually simpler.

#4 – Having too many choices interferes with decision making.

I think most of us are painfully aware of this in everyday live. At least, I find it very hard to buy a new TV or stereo or phone, because I want to have the best device for my budget. Comparing all devices from all manufacturers on all interesting dimensions (size, price, power usage, brightness, CI+ support, ...) is almost impossible. The result is that I usually either buy nothing, or buy the product from Apple.

I've given up on having the best device for my budget in some arenas. I want a new TV, but I'm not going to evaluate all the options. The time it would take to do so is worth more than the value I can gain by finding the best TV for my budget, so it would be a net loss.

I'm finding it's quite liberating when you stop caring! Even if I do evaluate every option I often feel unsatisfied after a purchase, worried I got the wrong thing, and more often than not a better option comes along a week later. For my new TV I will walk into a shop, ask them for the best ones for my price range, pick one that seems good, and I'll be happy with it. Who cares if a better model comes out the next week for the same price? Not me, anymore!

With consumer electronics, I think that's a wise move. There's very little difference in most devices that are in the same price range these days. I don't recall that being the case 20-30 years ago.

I went shopping with my grandfather a couple years ago for a new monitor for his computer. We got a flat panel 20" for about $160 (IIRC). It was a name he hadn't heard of. He was only looking at the Sony and Dells initially, cause he hadn't heard of the other company before. We spent a few minutes looking at the 'off brand' one, and we went with it, saving about $40. Absolutely no real diff in the quality, weight, performance of this one vs the 'name brands' in this case - certainly not for his needs.

I think that is because in the old days, brands manufactured their own stuff. Today, major brands subcontract out manufacturing and assembly to some no-name outfit in China.

Now, if the owner of said outfit has ambitions, he'd want to sell his stuff (that he sees being sold by the big names at 2x the cost) directly to the consumer. But he has no brand name; so it'll end up being sold as some generic name as "lucky star" or "super max"; or he'll license the brand-name from an old brand (I'm looking at you, Westinghouse).

The classic story is that of Lenovo. They used to make Thinkpads for IBM; and then one day decided to just buy the brand from IBM.

I heard once that there are basically only 3 laptop manufacturers in the world; all the laptops you see (Dell, HP, Gateway, Acer, etc. etc.) are all made by one of these 3.

So, to answer your question: compare the specs of the no-names with those of the big-names. If you find specs that are mostly identical, then you're basically getting the same thing at a lower price. However: you won't get the customer service and after-sales support that big-names carry. Plus, there's the possibility that the no-name may be selling the stuff that the big-name's QA rejected, so the quality may be suspect.

I used to obsess over monitors. Read THG on every one, check the color profile range, &c &c. It took me embarrassingly long to realise that if it looked fine to me, that was all that mattered. I'm a lot happier with purchases now :)

The consumer market (especially for electronic doodads) is segmented into low, medium and high-end products (for a given function, e.g. tv, phone, computer, etc). I find that the best value is in the middle because the low-end is often poorly built or poorly engineered and does not last (too many corners cut, missing critical features, etc). The high-end gear usually well-built but includes fancy bells and whistles that I don't or won't use (with some exceptions). The best strategy that I use is to shoot for the mid-range product made by a manufacturer that offers high-end products. To create a mid-range product a manufacturer often has to gussy up a low end product or plain jane a high end product and the latter approach usually works better in the end.

Completely agree, this is similar to what I do. It's worth noting though that there are some brands that don't do high-end that are worth considering, in some markets. Buying the most expensive stuff is never good value, the law of diminishing returns kicks in.

I'm pretty sure choosing the best device along all interesting dimensions that fits your budget is NP-hard.

Great talk on the subject: http://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_on_the_paradox_of_ch...

There's a remarkable number of tools that most people don't know about that are all designed to aid in decision making among a large number of choices (or even two choices). They sometimes sound quaint or silly, but even a pro/con list can be a very valuable exploration of a decision process.

For more complex problems, the pseudo-rigor of something like a Pugh Matrix can be very helpful. I often find myself using them when deciding on things with a large number of choices -- like electronics purchases.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_Matrix

The result is that I usually either buy nothing, or buy the product from Apple.

I think Apple does so well by shortcutting this kind of decision matrix and making sure they are just at the top of a certain segment of the population's results. Even if they come out only one point higher than everybody else, that's a sale. They can optimize to target people where "price of product" has a low weight in this kind of matrix and can use that from a business perspective to maximize profit. It seems to work, they are wildly profitable despite not being a leader in any particular market in terms of raw numbers shipped. All their competitors end up operating on desperately thin margins because they try and optimize to win at any cost. It's actually kind of a cool hack.

No matter how you make a living or who you think you work for, you only work for one person, yourself.

This advice is the key to remaining motivated in a job that doesn't challenge you. The best manager I have ever worked for got me thinking from the perspective that I should treat the organisation I work for like it was my own business. Once I applied that mentality I found that I was a lot more focused and determined to have an impact on the bottom line.

I still spend half my day on HN though!

> I still spend half my day on HN though!

You should fire yourself. ;-)

I can only think that way for so long. Because eventually, your boss or manager will push the company in a direction you don't agree with..and then it will make you realize why you want to have your own company.

#11. The proper marketing can make even the most mediocre content irresistible.

  - turn prose into a list
  - target a specific audience
  - challenge them by telling them they're doing something wrong

For example:

"Common Sense" --> "10 Simple Truths" --> "10 Simple Truths for Smart People" --> "10 Simple Truths Smart People Forget".

But it's good to be remembered of common sense, isn't it?

Cosmo copywriting: it works. (You could write a book on how playing on people's aspirations to be Smart People, 10X Engineers, etc etc works at getting their attention, too. It's almost as effective as "... That $DISFAVORED_OUTGROUP Doesn't Want You To Know")

10 Simple Truths That'll Drive Him Crazy In Bed

10 Things Smart People's Bosses Don't Want Them To Know

Hm good point. In this fashion, how would you target say Concert Pianists or Firemen? And where would you post that link?

I'll tackle the Firemen.

You could do, "10 Things Your City Doesn't want you to know about funding" to score political points. You could also do "10 Products That Will Save your Life" to sell products.

What I've seen on Facebook is that when one firefighter posts something relevant it either gets liked or copied by others. This is hugely powerful. So I'd try to get some firefighter to post it on Facebook.

The other thing is that there are a ton of firefighter forums on the internet that you can register for and build a reputation up there. It all depends on what your goals are.

    #11.1: Never believe your own marketing.

Yeah, eat your own dogfood but don't drink your own koolaid :-)

Irresistible, and instantly forgettable. That's how we keep clicking on these articles, and how they keep getting written.

Having too many choices interferes with decision making.

I think humans are optimized for pair-wise decision making. We do "okay" with 3 or 4 things but beyond that, I've noticed a distinct inability for most people to make wise decisions.

I'd also add #11: Most people don't make rational decisions. I've noticed that quite often, even in the face of mountains of evidence to the contrary (all signs point to "this is a bad decision!") people will continue to make poor decisions. They usually survive that by also having an amazing ability to justify poor decision making.

and #12: Most people make their way in the world more less/fine with IQs of around 100. If you believe you are smart, you should be able to do anything that any normal person can do if you set your mind to it. And normal people can get an impressive amount of mileage out of 100 IQ points. I've noticed that many very smart people tend to use their intelligence as a crutch or excuse for why they can't do something. Usually it's w/r to socialization, but can also affect other areas -- simple things like paying their bills on time or showing up to meetings on time. The stereotype of the absent minded professor comes to mind.

Regardless of what have been said above I like to be reminded. It helps to stay afloat.

I completely disagree with #8. A bad friend can be a cancer in your life, and blaming yourself for their failures is an extremely common way of dragging yourself down. Assuming that it's usually something to do with yourself, or that it's better to forget the past is just asinine.

The author wrote "smart" in the title, but the content is valid for everybody, smart or not. ;-)

I guess the use of "smart" in this title is just marketing to atract readers. Everybody knows that most people think that they are smarter than the mean! ;-)

I think you could replace "smart" with "ambitious" because a lot of this is advice for people to simply slow down a bit and reflect.

#7. Though this example may be hold true, I don't always relate corporate promotions to being 'good' at something. One thing that I've definitely learning is the people you know (your 'visibility') is as important (maybe more) than what you know.

From the guidelines:

> If the original title begins with a number or number + gratuitous adjective, we'd appreciate it if you'd crop it. E.g. translate "10 Ways To Do X" to "How To Do X," and "14 Amazing Ys" to "Ys."

"Happiness and success are two different things."

My favorite take on the topic is the old one:

Success is when you have what you want. Happiness is when you want what you have.

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