Polymaths Are Late Bloomers | Hacker News Reader

Polymaths Are Late Bloomers

overcomingbias.com

52 pointsjseliger54 comments

> Being a polymath, I’ve (...)

I don't know, at this stage calling yourself polymath is a big red flag for me. Like calling yourself an "intellectual" or "thought leader".

I'd personally add "autodidact" to that list as well.

I disagree - polymath to me implies Newton or Euler, autodidact just implies that you are good at learning on your own.

Agreed, but whether or not someone is capable of accurately self-assessing how well they've learned a topic depends on how well they've actually learned the topic.

This means someone can do a bad job of learning a topic on their own, but still believe they're an autodidact. I think that happens a lot.

These days it comes off very much as “I have liked and subscribed to multiple varied topics/channels on YouTube making me quite knowledgeable and naturally that makes me special/intellectual in a world where everyone else are ASMR seeking simpletons”

I think in these intellectual bubbles, people wildly overestimate how much the average person has any interest or knowledge in the kind of breadth things like HN and OvercomingBias offer. Polymaths are highly over-represented here. There are 18m people in Greater Los Angeles. How many are involved in anything close to the variety of topics HN and OvercomingBias ponder?

My first reaction as well. His bio [1] does seem to support the assertion, and I've heard of his work on prediction markets and the term the Great Filter, but that same bio is also all sorts of red-flaggy to me. He has "1100 media mentions?" You need to put that in your university bio page?

1. https://mason.gmu.edu/~rhanson/bio.html

Most true polymaths (and autodidacts in the colloquial sense) don’t refer to themselves as such, solely looking at their breadth of work is enough

Same for multipotentiate or whatever that word is people stick on their LinkedIn

I find the term "Polymath" useless when it comes to the times we live in. Today's high school students would have ranked as a polymaths a few centuries ago. And today, someone who spends their entire time in one field - say software engineering - can be rightly called a polymath.

Gone are the days when one person can gain insights by digging deep into one specific subject. Knowledge of multiple areas is a given. Even more importantly, the days of a lone wolf discovering something new are even more dead. Today's discoveries can only happen collaboratively. Groups of people working hard, with each group egging on the other to push themselves farther (Think AI. We can no longer worship one guy as having advanced the field. There are no Newtons or Einsteins). Instead of patting our backs for being polymaths, lets figure out how best to propel our collaborative capabilities.

SP is talking about people who publish papers in scholarly journals, not people who score well at Trivial Pursuit. This is intensely specialized today; much more specialized than it was "a few century's ago". There are not many people publishing in widely separated fields.

The idea of a Polymath is actually more relevant today than earlier years.

Each field has grown into a silo with "experts" in one field barely knowing about the cutting edge of another field.

Before what was the cutting edge was knowable to anyone who really tried. Because the total body of human knowledge was extremely limited. And that's why we see so many "gentleman scientists". They were people with passive income from property and enough time to tinker where they liked. Robert Brown of Brownian motion wasn’t exactly a genius. Yet you find his name in multiple areas of Science.

Nowaday, the edge of human knowledge is far more spread out, and it is harder to be a polymath. Polymath aren’t people who can "talk about" and "hold intelligence conversations" about different fields of Science/Social Science, they are the people that do multiple areas of academic study/engineering.

EDIT: And knowledge gained in HS is extremely shallow. They don't know even one field enough, let alone multiple fields.

And High Schoolers of earlier years actually knew stuff more in-depth, because stuff weren’t diluted for "inclusive" education. I have seen the Curriculum of British Indian HS, and it was much tougher than today's curriculum. 200 marks paper of two, as opposed to one of 70, more advanced topics each year as opposed to easier topics to bump scores up and make the provincial government look good.

Not exactly relevant to Polymaths, but everyone here knows that one who was educated in 1850-1970 years, knows much more than one educated in later years (as chosen randomly among those who have a degree). I believe education dilution has happened everywhere. Even today HS Physics, Math, Chemistry in India is much harder than US. I have seen curricula and books from both.

There's a lot of progress that can be made in cross-disciplinary areas, but if it's done by one person it tends to be someone who specializes in one thing and stumble upon a low hanging fruit elsewhere. Much more often, in case of deep results, is that two very smart people in their areas talk about their work and discover an opportunity to collaborate.

Most people who claim to be polymaths are dilettantes. Even if they are really smart. People who claim they're polymaths don't have the humility to recognize it's very difficult to be at the forefront of two disciplines. A dilettante wouldn't know this because they don't know the amount of effort and learning it takes to be a true expert.

A true expert spends a lot of time on a subject and may on the surface may appear to have no more knowledge than someone who just reads and follows their papers for less than half the overall effort. This is because much of extra work is spent on trying different ideas and learning for producing the next good idea, or trying to apply it effectively in various contexts, rather than just learning other's good ideas for the sake of it.

Whether the expert is more valuable in dollar terms or potential impact than the dilettante or a humble generalist is another question. People can indeed be good at wearing multiple hats and create value. But I think someone like that should recognize that they are trading depth for breadth and not claim they are better than others at everything they learn.

I don't think you understand what a polymath is.

I am essentially self taught. I have no degrees although I did go to 5 years at a state school.

I've read more than every person born before a certain date - I estimate that date would be within my lifetime. I retain everything I read and I can revisit it in seconds if I chose and all the information is at my fingertips and I frequently access it. I read 3 volumes of encyclopedias before I was 9 - I got the Internet at around 12.

I can't spend 3 minutes googling something before I have to prove that I'm a human being.

I fell into the art rabbit hole a few years ago - I got kicked off of two different art info sites I paid for monthly access, one I got a week the other two. None of my efforts to work with their customer support could change their mind that I was using bots. I was not.

I read the translated Nag Hammadi library and then I went onto everything in English that has come out of the ground. I can kinda read Latin solely from the amount of exposure I've had to it.

I fell into Tesla and I can say that he never did wirelessly transmit electricity even tho he did "electrify" the world's fair wirelessly - I understand what I just said.

There are political systems that exist only in my head that are arguably superior to any that exist now.

I can already identify stuff from the DSM 5 that won't be in the DSM 7 or 8 bc their stupid. Truthfully much of psychology will be redone.

I fundamentally reject the multiverse as it's commonly understood. With time, our scientist will realize they are confusing aspects of our singular reality that deal with probability and possibility for "other universes" of course they will not be able to see this until they start operating under the pretense that we live in a constructed reality - which this is, I know that like I know the sun will come up and I'm not a religious man - tho I've read all/a sh*tload of that also.

I've collaborated with nobody. I try to go thru my days in first gear - that's literally how I think of it. I shouldn't be around people in third gear bc I lose a lot of social skills bc most of conversation is absolute BS and I cant deal with conversation for conversation sake.

Lastly, I don't need to pat myself on the back - I have a confidence in myself and my own ability, that is separate from my ego - it just is what it is. I don't need your approval, it changes nothing. Based on my experience what I've typed will bother a lot of people - it's all still true tho.

I'm at a point where every other living person could tell me that I'm wrong about something and I understand them to be right, they are not. That said, if someone challenges me about something and proves me wrong, even if it's the most fundamental change to my world view, I will adopt it that day.

I'm actually still chuckling at the pat myself on the back thing - like I brag about these things, I hide who I am to even those I love, bc if they understood how far away from them I actually am they would be afraid of me. I know that bc every now and then something happens and I get caught up and real intensely focused on something and I quote exactly a conversation we had 6 weeks ago or I complete a really complicated problem requiring actual math in a few seconds (everyone knows I'm bad at math) - people don't like that shit.

Anyways, tell yourself whatever - I assure you polymaths do exist, as I am here, as I am.

No amount of collaboration will arrive at my perception of reality. Nobody reading this over a certain age can catch up to me unless they have always been like me and are very committed. I'm also certain that I'm not the smartest person, there are people ahead of me, likely some I cannot catch.

I'm about to fully adopt AI into my own life - so that I'm able to consume more information more quickly and better revisit information I've already consumed. There is reason for me to do this, it's habit at this point.

So yeah, this the most I've ever patted myself on the back or ever even tried to convey what I actually am I guess. Frankly tho, I'm just sick of people believing people like me are not real.

Do you provide any evidence to support these claims, perhaps on a website?

Why? Some of those ideas would require I write books to fill in the information needed to know before they could be understood.

I've debated doing a blog or having like resource website - I haven't done those things or anything like that bc what's the point?

I could know how to cure cancer but I will never be taken seriously by the society that exists now bc I haven't played along with it and I never will.

This post was clearly a moment of weakness - I am human after all, this is literally about me and people like me, all being discussed by people that are not, all arriving at conclusions that support their world view.

That's the rant of a crazy person, right?

Produce useful work, and nobody cares about whether you played by the rules of society.

If you cannot effectively convey information to others, then, I'm not sure you are a polymath. This skill is the same skill that you should already be using to consume and comprehend information to begin with, so it should be second nature to you.

And, go ahead and go through life thinking "I am a polymath, but, I feel no need to prove it either directly or indirectly through the work that I do." If that's the path that you take, then, enjoy being completely indiscernible from everyone else, and thus effectively lying to yourself to feel special. Because you can not even trust your own perception of yourself except through the work that you do -- this is the litmus test that avoids large swaths of cognitive bias if you can pass it.

You need to produce work that others can evaluate to earn you the title of "polymath" -- otherwise you are not.

It's too easy to self-proclaim titles, and to others, naturally, entertaining statements like these are a waste of time.

All that anyone can gain from your comment are the claims that you consume a lot of information, and that you can recall said information. And that you're good at math despite others not knowing it. But, that says nothing about the ability to use said information usefully. Maybe another person consumes 10% of the total information that you do, but, they select this information more carefully, and can produce insights more effectively than you. This is at least in part the difference between fluid and crystalized intelligence.

Maybe a person that consumes 10% of the information that you do is in fact a polymath, but you are not.

Not that I really care to prove that you specifically are or are not a polymath, because, the designation is meaningless, anyway. This designation never meant anything to those that society has retroactively identified as polymaths, either.

And a few nits, because I'm personally sick of others coming up with their own contrived definitions of intelligence. All of which, unsurprisingly of course, also claim to be hyper intelligent. I wouldn't expect to have to explain any of the following to a polymath.

- The ability to consume information (or the accumulated volume of information), even with perfect recall, is by no means a direct measure of intelligence -- large performant databases of useful information are by no means intelligent. And it's clear that you at least partially believe this, given your comments on the ability for others to "catch up". As if intelligence is something that can be measured linearaly to begin with (though, of course we try to approximate it). Does the path to catching up have to be linear wrt. time, or even continuous? No. The simplest counter-example being, maybe you've been reading garbage.

- 3rd gear gives higher velocity than 1st gear, and the RPMs can be redlined in either case. Or maybe the measure is the potential of acceleration from stop, I don't know, but either way, this doesn't make sense. As a polymath I suppose your knowledge of transmissions must be a bit lacking.

- I don't think people generally have a problem believing that people "like you" (polymaths) exist. It's more likely that people have a problem with you specifically claiming to be a polymath.

- You must have repeatedly attempted to convey this belief of yourself. In this post, for one, but, moreso to the point of being _sick_ of people not believing people "like you" exist.

> There is a big literature on the ages at which intellectuals peak in life .. Physical sciences peak earlier than social sciences.

I suspect what we are really measuring is the degree to which different fields are rewarding exceptional performance vs political connection and seniority. The latter is much more common in the social sciences than in the physical sciences ime.

It's more about talent vs. experience. In some fields, you need more time to study the prior art and hone your skills before you are ready to contribute.

I'm skeptical that economics has so much more prior art than say physics.

Physics prefers studying simple systems in isolation. Economics studies certain aspects of human societies. Because human societies are complex and pretty much anything can affect the behavior you are studying, you can't be good at economics without understanding every aspect of the society. Actual economists usually don't, because human lives are short.

Physics is very broad and encompasses concepts at all scales (from subatomic to cosmological scales) and all levels of complexity——“Complex systems” is a branch of physics. Economics is a form of applied philosophy that is not yet mature enough when compared to most branches of physics and is significantly smaller in total volume of published literature when compared with all branches of physics put together. Economics does however affect policy and politics directly in the last hundred years or so, whereas physics ends up guiding the technology, which eventually feeds back to society in multiple indirect ways. Physics did have a lot of early bloomers in its young branches eg, quantum mechanics, semiconductors, lasers, computational physics, but it also tends to split up and create a new branch whenever there is a new part of the world that needs some explaining. I’d expect that with economics increasingly becoming a data-driven science, including what used to be macro economics, there will be new crowds of young people blooming until the computational simulation models become much better and practical compared to any simplified high level models we’ve had in the past. A similar transformation is already well underway in physics, where computational physics and simulation have altered the course of the study of complex systems in all branches of physics from condensed to soft matter, astronomy to particle physics, polymer, and biophysics.

Agreed. I didn’t bother replying because I thought it was obvious how they were wrong but as someone who has worked in condensed matter, the ‘simple systems’ claim is ridiculous.

Physics is simple, because it studies reality at the fundamental level. New ideas in philosophy / religion / politics / art rarely change how physical systems work. Because physics is so self-contained, you can become good at it by studying primarily physics.

Economics is complex, because it depends on every other human activity. You can't become good at economics by studying it. You also have to study everything else.

Yeah, in Social Sciences, Liberal Arts, your "reputation" matters more, which is really about connections.

the difference between quitters and polymaths is outcomes

the weirdo learning weird stuff becomes eccentric and interesting the moment they make it

the only advice there is, is most will judge you by results

success earned or unearned can change the loser into a late bloomer

To some degree, however there is a difference between specialising in weird stuff and being generally curious about all stuff.

The part about connections resonates, increasingly it feels like everything is facets of a whole rather than completely disparate subjects. I feel there is something to be gained from being able to view things in that way.

Agreed and it goes the other way too though

You will lose your vaunted place as “successful” if your great results were done through inequity

> done through inequity

What's an example of that?

Am trying to picture what you're meaning, and it's not clear (to me).

Like when Bill Cosby rightfully lost his place in society

Looks like people are really triggered by the idea of equity

Is Bill Cosby an example of inequity?

I don't personally know much about the guy, but wasn't his problem the drugging of people and then taking advantage of them?

If that's correct, then that doesn't seem like a behaviour pattern that contributed to his success somehow. (?)

If the structures and systems that you put into place are used for inequitable purposes, then the entire system is inequitable as it does not compensate the victims at the benefit of the existing beneficiaries

For example the Catholic Church and everyone associated with it is complicit and benefits from child sex abuse.

Sex abuse benefits priests, and the staff and congregation support the priests. So the existence of the Catholic church, so long as they are passively or ignorantly complicit in victimizing congregants is inequitable and therefore everything that they do inherits the complicity

Same with Cosby, he built a structure of abuse that allowed him to continue his rise to fame. Anything he did concurrently should be rightly torched and destroyed as it was misappropriated - the viewers etc did not know about that and would not have supported it had they known it

> Same with Cosby, he built a structure of abuse that allowed him to continue his rise to fame.

That doesn't really seem to make sense. Wasn't he just an actor? The abuse stuff seems incidental (or enabled) by that.

No, Bill Cosby was the executive producer, and leader for the entirety of all of his properties so any structures that set up would be implicated any of it.

This is one of those cases where it maps directly one to one because personality was the marketing factor, much like with other name brand celebrities. If the benefits that you have received monetarily are a function of a personality portrayal and expectation of behavioral coherence from the audience then this is misappropriated value.

The only argument you can make is one that is cynical, and assumes that we shouldn’t trust anybody for anything ever, and therefore all externalities have been priced into the exchange between the consumer and the producer.

> Bill Cosby was the executive producer ...

Ahhh. That makes more sense then. Now I see where you're coming from. :)

> Being a polymath

Rather presumptuous

> And while I haven’t seen data to confirm it, my personal experience suggests

Ugh

I don't know where to start criticizing this article.

Robin Hanson is [1]. He has 64 years old, is an economist with degrees in top universities yet he writes: "While my stamina and raw speed or intensity of thought is probably declining with age", probably? I can support this error from a random article but not from a polymath and scientist.

It continues with simple proofreading errors (I am not an English native speaker!) such as "Furthermore, I better know roughly want to expect re what sorts of connections won’t yet have been found, which are how valuable, and what it would take to test them or get folks to listen about them".

Then, his core assumption that "... polymaths peak later in life might be a bit discouraging news to young polymaths". Are polymath a homogeneus group? Has he done his research? Just going to the Wikipedia page about polymaths [2] falsifies his claim.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Hanson

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymath

> It continue with simple proofreading errors

Quote precisely, because it continues with ... (I am not an English native speaker!)

You can support this error? What?

If you're criticizing someone for errors or lack of research, you should strive for more authoritative references than Wikipedia pages.

It's not the kind of errors I tolerate from an academic with those degrees. It sounds more like a rant of a young someone without experience writing.

Or perhaps because English is not your first language, you miss out a bit on sardonic or self deprecating tones.

Not everyone is literal. And I suspect polymaths even less so (for instance I would expect overuse of analogy and metaphor to be a relatively common trait of people who don’t stay in their lane)

In tech there is a bias towards the newcomer's perspective due to being less encumbered by convention. I feel the perspective of the generalist or the polymath is even more valuable as their alternative perspectives and innovations are grounded in experience, not intuition.

> In tech there is a bias towards the newcomer's perspective due to being less encumbered by convention.

Where does this bias occur?

I think the main skill of the polymath is skating into journeyman knowledge while avoiding the Expert Beginner trap. Learning to learn sounds more accurate in theory, but I doubt it is sufficient in practice.

I like Robin Hanson, but does he actually publish work in different domains? I've only seen his economics-related papers.

Edit: And when I spot check, that looks to be pretty much everything (though I skimmed): https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=PjIP_WcAAAAJ&hl=en

He co-authored the "Grabby Aliens" paper that made multiple rounds around HN among other things.

> “If Loud Aliens Explain Human Earliness, Quiet Aliens Are Also Rare” by Robin Hanson, Daniel Martin, Calvin McCarter, and Jonathan Paulson, September 7th, 2021.

Does he write anything not in the format of "If x early then y late"?

Wide knowledge and learning takes time.

I think a real polymath would be an early bloomer and a late bloomer.

Wouldn't that be what makes them the most poly?

Why settle for less ;)

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