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Comment by troymc | Hacker News Reader

If you liked this story, there are more like it, e.g.

Natalie Portman - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/01/science/01angier.html

Brian May - http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jun/07/science/sci-queen7

I like finding out things like this about people. Very talented athletes who are also very smart are not as rare as people would think. (Anecdote warning) Many of the most talented athletes I know are very intelligent people. Here are some more examples of athletes:

http://www.sportingnews.com/mlb/feed/2010-09/smart-athletes/...

If you think an engineering degree is tough, try doing one while also training 30+ hours/week. ;)

The list of multi-talented musicians and actors is also fun to read about. Greg Graffin, the lead singer of Bad Religion, has a PhD in Zoology from Cornell. Here are some more: http://entertainment.time.com/2012/09/07/school-of-rock-10-s...

I was never a pro level athlete, but I did play a very time consuming sport in college at a decently high level. Most people have no idea how hard it is for athletes, especially when getting a degree in something like engineering, or in my case Computer Science. During each spring semester, I missed roughly 30-40% of my classes because of travel. Some weeks I would be gone for 3 of the 5 days.

That was why I passed up playing Division I tennis in favor of my studies (math & physics) - in retrospect, I should have probably at least tried, since competitive athletics comes with people surrounding you who do their best to make sure you get your work done, and the intense exercise would have been great for me.

I have a lot of respect for college athletes who pursue difficult majors.

The greatest lie ever told is that athletes and rockstars are 'dumb'.

All serious musicians I know are nerdier than most denizens of /b/. You have to be if you have to devote 8+ hours to an instrument (in the case of athletes, that instrument is their body).

They just manage to do a very good job of masking it.

Honestly, I might have had a different career trajectory had I known that you could be nerdy and still be a cool rockstar or athlete.

Really, I relate "nerdiness" with any kind of deep interest or passion. Although, not every person who is stereo-typically "nerdy" enough to browse /b/ necessarily devotes their time to something productive: be that learning an instrument, training your body, hacking, or whatever. There's a distinction to be made between "stereotypical nerd" (Poor social skills, good with computer, basement dweller) and what I consider "actual nerds" (those with a passion or deep interest in something that they then attribute an ungodly amount of time to).

> There's a distinction to be made between "stereotypical nerd" (Poor social skills, good with computer, basement dweller) and what I consider "actual nerds" (those with a passion or deep interest in something that they then attribute an ungodly amount of time to).

Isn't that what most people consider the difference between "nerd" and "geek" to be?

No, there's no real consistency in what people see the difference between those two being, or even in which, if any, has the more positive (or less negative) connotation.

most here probably want there to be as distinction between the 2(including me) because their personal identity is tied to being a geek. They see it as a badge of honour. Being a geek to them(me) means applying yourself to things that are important/interesting without caring if it's cool or effects your social life. However language doesn't work that way. So our(my) aspergerness gets lump with all. So even though i spent my weekends competing at ski races since i spent weekday excelling at math, programming, watching syndicated Star Trek, and generally making little eye contact and mumbling to myself. I get lumped as a nerd/geek with anyone that watches star trek and lacks social skills.

I don't see Ryan Lochte in the list?!

> If you think an engineering degree is tough, try doing one while also training 30+ hours/week. ;)

At least it sounds like nice variety. It's probably easier to do 40 hours of study + 30+ hours of exercise a week, rather than 70 hours of studying medicine or whatever.

And Dolf Lundgren: degrees in chemistry and chemical engineering, awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to MIT, speaks seven languages (three fluently), twice European Heavyweight Kyokushin Karate champion, accomplished musician...

Also Danica McKellar (Winnie Cooper from the wonder years) http://www.mathdoesntsuck.com/

Not sports, but here's Dan Snaith's (of Caribou, Manitoba, Daphni) PhD thesis: http://wwwf.imperial.ac.uk/~buzzard/maths/research/notes/sp2...

Yeah, imagining him touring while writing his thesis has been a source of inspiration lately.

Fun fact: Her sister graduated Harvard Law and works for Peter Thiel's late stage growth fund Mithril Capital.

I'll throw in Blossom too:

http://alumni.ucla.edu/share/alumni-stories/stories/mayim-bi...

Bob Parson (Godaddy founder) is also not your typical SV founder although I'm not sure he belongs in that list. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Parsons

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