Ask HN: Is it true: An Unreasonable Person Runs the Show?

2 points·I_Nidhi··4 comments

The reasonable person adapts themselves to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to themselves. Therefore, all progress depends on unreasonable people. (adapted from George Bernard Shaw)

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Even assuming it’s true, the fallacy in the quote is ignoring all the unreasonable people who try to adapt the world to themselves in ways that are harmful to everyone else. If the first sentence is true, then all destruction also depends on unreasonable people.

This is one of those quotes that sounds profound, but is actually fairly meaningless. How do you define a "reasonable person"? In the quote, it's defined as "someone who adapts themselves to the world", which is a strange definition that is eminently debatable. Therefore, the quote is a tautology. It's the same as saying "trying to change things is unreasonable, so only unreasonable people try to change things".

It's often quite reasonable to try to change the world, so I think this is wrong.

Sometimes the world is even easier to change than yourself.

It's likely a mixture of somewhat, not at all, and very reasonable people.

How many are they? It's a distribution, the more influence one has, and willing to exercise it, the more they contribute to running the show.

A few holds disproportionate amounts, but the numbers add up, granted a bit of coordination is at play.

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