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Comment by michaelbrave | Hacker News Reader

In truth 16% is much lower than I would have expected, expected it upwards of 50%.

I once had a debate with a friend about whether it was ethical to hire someone based on looks, because looks were something mostly inherent to the person and not earned (how well you take care of it and fitness withstanding), and he argued that it was just as ethical or even more so than hiring for intelligence which is just as inherent, but offers similar types of advantages. I've been more open minded about it since, more of the opinion of "use the pretty person to be a front/face" almost along the lines of "put the right person in the right position".

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You hire the person that's going to be best for the job.

Depends on the job.

Engineer, recruiter, and linebacker all have different needed characteristics, sometimes acquired and sometimes intrinsic.

That's the only consistent definition of "fair"

There are a lot of winners through nepotism in the world.

Your ability to craft an idea in correct logic of a language does not mean the logic is meaningful to reality.

Nepotism means hiring friends or family. The advantage there is that you start out with a greater level of trust, depending on how long you've known the person. This must be weighed against the disadvantage that there are likely more skilled individuals to be found. When dealing with delicate matters (i.e. when small mistakes cause big problems), reliability becomes more important.

There’s a lot of examples out there where hiring family was a complete flop. Show data trust in family is rational and not just low effort.

I think you’re making up a narrative that sounds roughly technical, roughly contemporary wisdom but is 100% primate throwing BS.

Hiring family is questionable.

Hiring former work associates ("work friends") is more solid. Because that relationship is based in a relevant environment.

What if the family member is looking for their first job and is well trained?

Most people trust their families more than their work acquaintances. Still, the family member must have more than trust, to do a good job in a skilled profession.

Proof? I'm not going to spend the effort to cite data here, since we have no prior relationship.

Pretty big assumption that intelligence is as inherent as beauty.

There are a lot of environmental factors that contribute to intelligence, not to mention a lot of neuro issues.

There is no pill for beauty but there are several for ADHD.

There are pills for beauty. Look at Kylie Jenner, you think that's all natural? In fact I'd say you have less control over intelligence then you do over beauty.

Growing up with a poor diet and lack of nutrients will make your skin look bad, you won’t grow as tall, and you’ll be overall less attractive. Many environmental factors directly contribute to one’s’ perceived attractiveness.

A lot of beauty is just keeping healthy and dressing well. Arguably the same as intelligence. A lot you can control, a bit is luck.

A lot of intelligence is studying hard, but you can't control whether or not you actually have the desire to pursue such a vector.

The same for looks. You can eat healthy and look after yourself, but not control if you want to.

Beauty has just as many caveats as intelligence.

“You’re not ugly, just poor.” Is a saying for a reason. There’s plastic surgery, ozempic, having the time/drive to work out consistently, dressing well, eating well, etc etc.

People can improve their beauty score by 2-3 points if they have the drive and/or money.

Intelligence is more inherent than beauty. Its 85% heritable by adulthood.

> There is no pill for beauty

There are in fact many. Grooming, diet, exercise, apparel, cosmetics, supplements, dentistry, surgery, non-surgical treatments.

A wise person once said, "there are no ugly people, only poor people."

I suppose the answer will be in the data. If attractive founders create more money for VCs then it's 'correct' they be given more funding.

And what if it were race/ethnicity?

I think it’d be unwise for VCs to discriminate on protected characteristics. Even if the investments worked the legal/political consequences wouldn’t be worth it.

However, the entire purpose of early stage VCs is to allocate capital by discriminating between founders. To that extent discriminating on non protected characteristics like education, experience and presentation skills are fair game.

I’m assuming attractiveness is a non protected characteristic but we’d need to be careful to define it in a way that doesn’t accidentally proxy for protected characteristics.

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