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To answer your first question, a strong yes. You are a worse engineer for not losing your family over it. That's a hard pill to swallow for everyone but it's al

To answer your first question, a strong yes. You are a worse engineer for not losing your family over it. That's a hard pill to swallow for everyone but it's also true; the engineer that lives in his work will be better than you and might be 2-5x more effective than you at any given company. What the issue is at traditional companies doesn't matter, the fact is that they suck and they cultivate lazy engineering. I hope that 100,000 engineers kill themselves working for Tesla because humanity itself will not survive without their effort, and then the trillions of humans that have lived and died will have done so in vain, and all of that is much more important than your kid's star trek drawings and warm-fuzzies.

quickthrower 9y ago
Most of us are not saving humanity in our jobs. We're helping some other people get rich (or lots of people save for their retirement). What we put in is an expense and what we get out is profit. We should think of THAT like a small business in itself. In that regard, while I'm not saying how many hours you should or shouldn't work it's something to bear in mind. Working your ass off when it doesn't stack up to do so is simply stupid. Now for some stacking up could mean saving the planet. For others it could be earning enough to support their family and having some time to spend with them. I believe family structure is important for the human race to exist. Growth at any cost has got us into the mess where we are worried about bailing out of this planet ASAP. It's a more nuanced picture than you seem inclined to believe.
outworlder 9y ago
I felt compelled to downvote due to the tone of this answer. But I'll try to resist that temptation. Objectively speaking, someone who does not have a family can work more hours, not necessarily produce better work. But they can, potentially, as long as the "extra" hours are also focused on work. Not sure how long that is sustainable. I'd like to ask this: if we need to kill hundreds of thousands of people to try to save the human race, are we even left with something worth saving? It is not clear to me that workers need to sacrifice themselves to death in order for us to survive. There is no evidence of any impending catastrophe that would require such sacrifice.
scottLobster 9y ago
I don't think you know what day of the week it is friend. A study by the Standford CS department shows that total productivity sharply declines after 50 hours of work in a week. Mistakes get made, inefficiencies are introduced. I only shoot for 60 because I can typically vary the work and disperse it over the weekends, which helps. https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs201/projects/crunchmode/econ-hours-productivity.html https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs201/projects/crunc... Also my fiancee supports me in my efforts and gives me an extra reason to go to work in the morning. She makes me more productive and provides much needed support and motivation (we largely depend on my salary at the moment). Now sure if I had no desire for a family or friends or life experiences and became some kind of solitary engineer-warrior-monk, and was able to do so without falling into severe depression, maybe I'd be marginally better, but the difference would not be nearly enough to warrant the sacrifice. Even Elon Musk spends some (albeit limited) time with his family and talks about how he's had to tone it down recently (from getting 4 hours a night to 6 hours), and recently tweeted about having a fun night mixing wine and ambien. I have no doubt he works harder than me, but even he has a family and down time. Also, I work at a big traditional defense contractor. Large companies are hardly monolithic. Some programs suck and are staffed by lazy/ineffective engineers, but my program's customer is quite satisfied at the moment, as are other programs' customers. That's why we get business, we do have competition that will take it from us if we don't deliver. You can't paint 100,000+ employees with one brush, and trying to do so makes you sound unintelligent. Correspondingly your statement "What the issue is at traditional companies doesn't matter, the fact is that they suck and they cultivate lazy engineering." makes it clear that you're not interested in discussing the issue and more interested in validating your own beliefs, which you have no evidence for beyond having "read some interviews". Once again, that diminishes your credibility. And I don't give a damn what you think about my 3rd grade drawings (fyi you clearly rushed through reading my post and missed the phrasing, I don't have a 3rd grade kid). It was meant to support the statement that I actually am passionate about space tech and would love to work on what SpaceX works on, nothing more. And warm-fuzzies are clearly something you need more of in your life. Tesla will probably help save the world, but they're hardly the only force out there, or even the decisive force when it comes to combating climate change. Even if they fold I don't think you have too much to worry about. I've been polite up to this point, but I'll be blunt: You sound like a 14 year old who's sole knowledge of the world comes from blog posts. Which is fine, but don't expect anyone to take you seriously. You have to earn that when you're in a room of strangers (which is what this forum largely is), and you've only done the opposite.

quickthrower 9y ago

Most of us are not saving humanity in our jobs. We're helping some other people get rich (or lots of people save for their retirement). What we put in is an expense and what we get out is profit. We should think of THAT like a small business in itself. In that regard, while I'm not saying how many hours you should or shouldn't work it's something to bear in mind. Working your ass off when it doesn't stack up to do so is simply stupid. Now for some stacking up could mean saving the planet. For others it could be earning enough to support their family and having some time to spend with them. I believe family structure is important for the human race to exist. Growth at any cost has got us into the mess where we are worried about bailing out of this planet ASAP. It's a more nuanced picture than you seem inclined to believe.

outworlder 9y ago

I felt compelled to downvote due to the tone of this answer. But I'll try to resist that temptation. Objectively speaking, someone who does not have a family can work more hours, not necessarily produce better work. But they can, potentially, as long as the "extra" hours are also focused on work. Not sure how long that is sustainable. I'd like to ask this: if we need to kill hundreds of thousands of people to try to save the human race, are we even left with something worth saving? It is not clear to me that workers need to sacrifice themselves to death in order for us to survive. There is no evidence of any impending catastrophe that would require such sacrifice.

scottLobster 9y ago

I don't think you know what day of the week it is friend. A study by the Standford CS department shows that total productivity sharply declines after 50 hours of work in a week. Mistakes get made, inefficiencies are introduced. I only shoot for 60 because I can typically vary the work and disperse it over the weekends, which helps. https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs201/projects/crunchmode/econ-hours-productivity.html https://cs.stanford.edu/people/eroberts/cs201/projects/crunc... Also my fiancee supports me in my efforts and gives me an extra reason to go to work in the morning. She makes me more productive and provides much needed support and motivation (we largely depend on my salary at the moment). Now sure if I had no desire for a family or friends or life experiences and became some kind of solitary engineer-warrior-monk, and was able to do so without falling into severe depression, maybe I'd be marginally better, but the difference would not be nearly enough to warrant the sacrifice. Even Elon Musk spends some (albeit limited) time with his family and talks about how he's had to tone it down recently (from getting 4 hours a night to 6 hours), and recently tweeted about having a fun night mixing wine and ambien. I have no doubt he works harder than me, but even he has a family and down time. Also, I work at a big traditional defense contractor. Large companies are hardly monolithic. Some programs suck and are staffed by lazy/ineffective engineers, but my program's customer is quite satisfied at the moment, as are other programs' customers. That's why we get business, we do have competition that will take it from us if we don't deliver. You can't paint 100,000+ employees with one brush, and trying to do so makes you sound unintelligent. Correspondingly your statement "What the issue is at traditional companies doesn't matter, the fact is that they suck and they cultivate lazy engineering." makes it clear that you're not interested in discussing the issue and more interested in validating your own beliefs, which you have no evidence for beyond having "read some interviews". Once again, that diminishes your credibility. And I don't give a damn what you think about my 3rd grade drawings (fyi you clearly rushed through reading my post and missed the phrasing, I don't have a 3rd grade kid). It was meant to support the statement that I actually am passionate about space tech and would love to work on what SpaceX works on, nothing more. And warm-fuzzies are clearly something you need more of in your life. Tesla will probably help save the world, but they're hardly the only force out there, or even the decisive force when it comes to combating climate change. Even if they fold I don't think you have too much to worry about. I've been polite up to this point, but I'll be blunt: You sound like a 14 year old who's sole knowledge of the world comes from blog posts. Which is fine, but don't expect anyone to take you seriously. You have to earn that when you're in a room of strangers (which is what this forum largely is), and you've only done the opposite.