Peter Thiel talked about this in Zero to One. http://blakemasters.com/post/24578683805/peter-thiels-cs183-startup-class-18-notes http://blakemasters.com/post/2

Peter Thiel talked about this in Zero to One. http://blakemasters.com/post/24578683805/peter-thiels-cs183-startup-class-18-notes http://blakemasters.com/post/24578683805/peter-thiels-cs183-... This segues to the pure celebrity version, best epitomized by Lady Gaga. Born This Way is her recent hit album and song. On one level, the whole thing is obviously completely fictional. It’s probably safe to say that she was not, in fact, born like this. The big piece must be nurture. But on another level, maybe it is nature. What sort of people would actually do this to themselves? Yes, it's the choices people make and the drive they have that produces the talent. But isn't John Carmack's ability to push himself to that degree an outlier statistic in itself? Maybe he really was born that way.