Yikes. The creep factor is very high in this article. I'm not sure I'm comfortable with the fawning over what is arguably a potentially dangerous new cult.
Do you think this cult is dangerous because you believe all cults/religions are, or do you see something particularly worrisome here?
The Terasem Movement most certainly is creepy (aren't all religions?) but we don't have enough information to determine if it is a cult (would need actually followers). I want to guess this "religion" is really meant to be satirical.
Leveraging that early wealth into other successful things is better than squandering it, but it's not a tale of heroism.
Instead of giving me actual reasons to admire Martine, this profile is just a list of things that came from that fortunate early privilege and wealth.
And yeah, the cult is an indication of some kind of mental problems to me.
Sure, tons of people live fortunate lives by skating forward on the momentum of a privileged upbringing. But I get exactly the opposite vibe from this article.
As far as "living on very little as a grad student", grad students may live on a tight budget but they don't know what poverty means.
I didn't say there was no hard work involved, but the article is not really about the work. It's about these big things that Martine was only able to do because she got very wealthy and very lucky early on.
If you're not already super rich, no amount of hard work is going to let you start a drug company to save your child.
Please don't confuse my dislike for this fawning profile with dislike of Martine. My whole point is that this article nothing but sycophantic fluff, and as a result I don't know Martine at all really. The most insightful thing in this whole article is that she started a weird cult.
It seems that the only criteria for interestingness or laudability that you'll accept is to have overcome underprivileged circumstances. I think that's a perfectly fine factor, but I'm personally interested in reading profiles of people for LOTS of other reasons: impressive accomplishments, impressive problem solving, overcoming/motivated by bad things happening to you or your close family, personal struggle, unusual ideas / perspective, hard work, humor, ... and many more (some that I'm not even aware of).
If a person's story has the right weighting of factors like that, I'm interested. And Martine Rothblatt's story was WELL OVER the bar for being someone who I'd want to learn about.
Please don't be personally abrasive in Hacker News comments, even when the other person misses a point.