6 ms·

Rarely-Asked Questions (2006)

75 points by vinnyglennon 9y ago

johan_larson 9y ago
PG says a lot of interesting things, but he sure is invested in the idea that the solution is a startup, for darn near every problem. He seems to think it's something virtually anyone can do with some hope of success. I don't think that squares with how hard people report having to work to make a serious try of it, and the high rate of failure.
- codingdave 9y ago
  I think you misunderstand his intended audience. He is talking mostly to people who already want to do a startup, and more specifically to people who agree with his definition of what a startup is. Within that group, his writings help refine ways to work. But it is definitely targeted to a very specific type of business and entrepreneur.
  - snowwrestler 9y ago
    This is true when he's writing about ideas like "do things that don't scale" or "every transformative startup looks bad at first." It's less true when he's writing about broader topics like "how to be a good teacher" or "how can we solve economic inequality across all of society."
- the_watcher 9y ago
  A huge number of his essays directly reference how hard running a startup actually is. While he may imply that anyone can have a startup, I've always interpreted it as similar to saying that anyone can run a half-marathon (or 5K or whatever the right distance is for this analogy) - yes, anyone has the capacity to do it, but not everyone is willing to put in the work required. To be clear, I don't think this is a bad thing - everyone is free to have their own priorities.
mjburgess 9y ago
PG's anti-philosophy agit-prop is always very juvenile. The "philosophy is proto-versions of everything else" schtick is such a confused, petulant view. Research academic analytic philosophy as practiced in contemporary universities at post-grad level, as published in journals, has nothing to do with the "philosophy" of history which meant any "thinking systematically". (Imagine "physics" being held to account for artistotle's Physics!) Research philosophy is metacogition, ie., the application of concepts-about-concepts to whichever concepts are of interest to a given philosopher: everything from programming to physics to art. This isnt a proto-version or a degraded version or anyhting. Its an enitrely different discipline. Physicists do not regard cycling has some "proto" version of classical physics. The employing of domain concepts is different to employing metacognative concepts to that domain. The latter is a whole field of independent research with its own goals, criteria, method.
- lmm 9y ago
  I think you demonstrate PG's point that words are unclear and this is a source of much confusion. Even today, different people use "philosophy" to mean radically different things. > Research academic analytic philosophy as practiced in contemporary universities at post-grad level, as published in journals, has nothing to do with the "philosophy" of history which meant any "thinking systematically". If post-grad philosophy is so thoroughly different from what is taught as "philosophy" in undergrad, it would behove them to use a different name.
  - typon 9y ago
    I think the rest of the world is just fine with understanding concepts or words that have overloaded meaning. I don't see how this is some showstopper idea.
    - astine 9y ago
      I notice that there is a lot of conflict these days about what should be called 'racism' or 'sexism' and a lot of it stems from words with overloaded meanings. People actually come to blows over this.
__s 9y ago
> I'm about to become a teacher. How can I be a good one? I think his point #1 is what was good for Paul Graham, rather than what makes a good teacher. Some teachers would try single me out for my lack of work ethic, & it would further disengage me. I learnt better from who would expose us to ideas, & then leave us to our own devices, play makes for good learning, & play must be voluntary. The teacher I respected most taught both Physics & Programming in my senior years ( https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/michael-harwood/579411-t https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/michael-harwood/579411-t ). He didn't have high standards. Which meant I was free to explore whatever I felt like, building pyramids out of rulers, playing chess, reading about random programming languages. Still keep in touch with him. I liked teachers who would go off on tangents during a lecture. Whereas I had to drop Data Management & Probability when the teacher wouldn't allow me to read in class As for #2, there was a biology teacher who was a good teacher, very passionate, very much meets #1 & #3, but he broke a ruler while smacking it on a desk in rage, & he would tell us we all needed to be beaten like the Chinese: https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/bela-nagy/452449-t https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/bela-nagy/452449-t
Jun8 9y ago
I really miss pg. I have given away many copies of Hackers and Painters and have forwarded many more pdf copies of it (pirated, sorry, but for a good cause) due to exactly the same reason that Gideons place their book in hotel rooms or YW's give away their "literature": I was trying to convert people to his way of objective, no holds barred, minimalist way of thinking/writing. Unfortunately, his approach has been equated by many to the "SV hacker types have an answer to all world's great problems and they're all wrong and naive" school of thought, the belittlement and maligning of which is very much in vogue nowadays. But these people miss the point. pg is interesting precisely because he was (is?) so different from mainstream SV thinking (compare&contrast sama's writings and his essays, not saying one is better but they are quite different). Read his essay "What You cannot Say" (http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html) as an antidote to current hysterical state of thought, "What You'll Wish You'd Known" (http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html) should be required for all high school students around the world trying to shape their lives. Hero worship from a founder-wannabe? Perhaps. Read the essays yourself and find out.
- mpfundstein 9y ago
  Did he stop writing/publishing/being active? pg so fundamentally changed my way of looking at things like not a lot of authors before. It also made me very depressed because I began to realize how fucked up life as an SE can be if you work in the wrong environments. But it also enlightened me and now I know precisely where I want to be.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - mysterypie 9y ago
    He used to be a prolific commenter here on HN, but he hasn't posted for 2.5 years[1] though he did write three short essays in 2017[2]. I assume that middle age, wife, child, and running a startup incubator/accelerator are major impediments to anyone continuing with comments, essays, and programming. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=pg https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=pg [2] http://www.paulgraham.com/articles.html http://www.paulgraham.com/articles.html
sotojuan 9y ago
I'm not huge into YC, SV culture, etc. but the section with history book recommendations was what started my passion for history and art history about five years ago.
cimmanom 9y ago
That list of history reading appears depressingly Euro-centric. At the very least, China and India have significant written history too.
andrewstellman 9y ago
> How can I avoid turning into a pointy-haired boss? > The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. Staying a programmer is a good way to avoid becoming a pointy-haired boss, but I’ve seen many programmers become pointy-haired bosses even as they continue to write code. The most common way good people become bad bosses is to blame people for their mistakes, because they’re nervous about the commitments they make and don’t know how to leave themselves enough options. The closer you are to the code, the less likely you are to suffer from this prolem (but it still happens). Jenny Greene and I wrote about this in Learning Agile: https://twitter.com/AndrewStellman/status/971810876830502912 https://twitter.com/AndrewStellman/status/971810876830502912
WalterGR 9y ago
How can I become really good at Lisp programming? Write an application big enough that you can make the lower levels into a language layer. Embedded languages (or as they now seem to be called, DSLs) are the essence of Lisp hacking. When I think about Clojure, the "layers of languages" metaphor doesn't spring to mind. Can anyone familiar with the language describe how well the metaphor holds for it? Also, is there a difference in how well it holds for how Clojure is presented and used in practice, vs. what's technically possible in the language?
- eigenhombre 9y ago
  Clojure is an opinionated Lisp whose focus on simplicity, and orientation around data, may draw people away from the nested language approach. You certainly can use macros to build DSLs in Clojure (the Midje and Korma libraries make heavy use for them, for example). But over-heavy use of macros is discouraged when common library functions operating on simple data structures will do. For a very different approach which feels much more aligned w/ PG's comment, have a look at Norvig's "Paradigms of AI Programming: Case Studies in Common Lisp." Reading it changed my notion of what Lisp is / can be; you can write Clojure programs that look similar, but it seems to be rare to do so.

75 points by vinnyglennon 9y ago

PG says a lot of interesting things, but he sure is invested in the idea that the solution is a startup, for darn near every problem. He seems to think it's something virtually anyone can do with some hope of success. I don't think that squares with how hard people report having to work to make a serious try of it, and the high rate of failure.

codingdave 9y ago
I think you misunderstand his intended audience. He is talking mostly to people who already want to do a startup, and more specifically to people who agree with his definition of what a startup is. Within that group, his writings help refine ways to work. But it is definitely targeted to a very specific type of business and entrepreneur.
- snowwrestler 9y ago
  This is true when he's writing about ideas like "do things that don't scale" or "every transformative startup looks bad at first." It's less true when he's writing about broader topics like "how to be a good teacher" or "how can we solve economic inequality across all of society."
the_watcher 9y ago
A huge number of his essays directly reference how hard running a startup actually is. While he may imply that anyone can have a startup, I've always interpreted it as similar to saying that anyone can run a half-marathon (or 5K or whatever the right distance is for this analogy) - yes, anyone has the capacity to do it, but not everyone is willing to put in the work required. To be clear, I don't think this is a bad thing - everyone is free to have their own priorities.

mjburgess 9y ago

PG's anti-philosophy agit-prop is always very juvenile. The "philosophy is proto-versions of everything else" schtick is such a confused, petulant view. Research academic analytic philosophy as practiced in contemporary universities at post-grad level, as published in journals, has nothing to do with the "philosophy" of history which meant any "thinking systematically". (Imagine "physics" being held to account for artistotle's Physics!) Research philosophy is metacogition, ie., the application of concepts-about-concepts to whichever concepts are of interest to a given philosopher: everything from programming to physics to art. This isnt a proto-version or a degraded version or anyhting. Its an enitrely different discipline. Physicists do not regard cycling has some "proto" version of classical physics. The employing of domain concepts is different to employing metacognative concepts to that domain. The latter is a whole field of independent research with its own goals, criteria, method.

lmm 9y ago
I think you demonstrate PG's point that words are unclear and this is a source of much confusion. Even today, different people use "philosophy" to mean radically different things. > Research academic analytic philosophy as practiced in contemporary universities at post-grad level, as published in journals, has nothing to do with the "philosophy" of history which meant any "thinking systematically". If post-grad philosophy is so thoroughly different from what is taught as "philosophy" in undergrad, it would behove them to use a different name.
- typon 9y ago
  I think the rest of the world is just fine with understanding concepts or words that have overloaded meaning. I don't see how this is some showstopper idea.
  - astine 9y ago
    I notice that there is a lot of conflict these days about what should be called 'racism' or 'sexism' and a lot of it stems from words with overloaded meanings. People actually come to blows over this.

__s 9y ago

> I'm about to become a teacher. How can I be a good one? I think his point #1 is what was good for Paul Graham, rather than what makes a good teacher. Some teachers would try single me out for my lack of work ethic, & it would further disengage me. I learnt better from who would expose us to ideas, & then leave us to our own devices, play makes for good learning, & play must be voluntary. The teacher I respected most taught both Physics & Programming in my senior years ( https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/michael-harwood/579411-t https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/michael-harwood/579411-t ). He didn't have high standards. Which meant I was free to explore whatever I felt like, building pyramids out of rulers, playing chess, reading about random programming languages. Still keep in touch with him. I liked teachers who would go off on tangents during a lecture. Whereas I had to drop Data Management & Probability when the teacher wouldn't allow me to read in class As for #2, there was a biology teacher who was a good teacher, very passionate, very much meets #1 & #3, but he broke a ruler while smacking it on a desk in rage, & he would tell us we all needed to be beaten like the Chinese: https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/bela-nagy/452449-t https://ca.ratemyteachers.com/bela-nagy/452449-t

Jun8 9y ago

I really miss pg. I have given away many copies of Hackers and Painters and have forwarded many more pdf copies of it (pirated, sorry, but for a good cause) due to exactly the same reason that Gideons place their book in hotel rooms or YW's give away their "literature": I was trying to convert people to his way of objective, no holds barred, minimalist way of thinking/writing. Unfortunately, his approach has been equated by many to the "SV hacker types have an answer to all world's great problems and they're all wrong and naive" school of thought, the belittlement and maligning of which is very much in vogue nowadays. But these people miss the point. pg is interesting precisely because he was (is?) so different from mainstream SV thinking (compare&contrast sama's writings and his essays, not saying one is better but they are quite different). Read his essay "What You cannot Say" (http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html http://www.paulgraham.com/say.html) as an antidote to current hysterical state of thought, "What You'll Wish You'd Known" (http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html) should be required for all high school students around the world trying to shape their lives. Hero worship from a founder-wannabe? Perhaps. Read the essays yourself and find out.

mpfundstein 9y ago
Did he stop writing/publishing/being active? pg so fundamentally changed my way of looking at things like not a lot of authors before. It also made me very depressed because I began to realize how fucked up life as an SE can be if you work in the wrong environments. But it also enlightened me and now I know precisely where I want to be.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- mysterypie 9y ago
  He used to be a prolific commenter here on HN, but he hasn't posted for 2.5 years[1] though he did write three short essays in 2017[2]. I assume that middle age, wife, child, and running a startup incubator/accelerator are major impediments to anyone continuing with comments, essays, and programming. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=pg https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=pg [2] http://www.paulgraham.com/articles.html http://www.paulgraham.com/articles.html

sotojuan 9y ago

I'm not huge into YC, SV culture, etc. but the section with history book recommendations was what started my passion for history and art history about five years ago.

cimmanom 9y ago

That list of history reading appears depressingly Euro-centric. At the very least, China and India have significant written history too.

andrewstellman 9y ago

> How can I avoid turning into a pointy-haired boss? > The pointy-haired boss is a manager who doesn't program. So the surest way to avoid becoming him is to stay a programmer. Staying a programmer is a good way to avoid becoming a pointy-haired boss, but I’ve seen many programmers become pointy-haired bosses even as they continue to write code. The most common way good people become bad bosses is to blame people for their mistakes, because they’re nervous about the commitments they make and don’t know how to leave themselves enough options. The closer you are to the code, the less likely you are to suffer from this prolem (but it still happens). Jenny Greene and I wrote about this in Learning Agile: https://twitter.com/AndrewStellman/status/971810876830502912 https://twitter.com/AndrewStellman/status/971810876830502912

WalterGR 9y ago

How can I become really good at Lisp programming? Write an application big enough that you can make the lower levels into a language layer. Embedded languages (or as they now seem to be called, DSLs) are the essence of Lisp hacking. When I think about Clojure, the "layers of languages" metaphor doesn't spring to mind. Can anyone familiar with the language describe how well the metaphor holds for it? Also, is there a difference in how well it holds for how Clojure is presented and used in practice, vs. what's technically possible in the language?

eigenhombre 9y ago
Clojure is an opinionated Lisp whose focus on simplicity, and orientation around data, may draw people away from the nested language approach. You certainly can use macros to build DSLs in Clojure (the Midje and Korma libraries make heavy use for them, for example). But over-heavy use of macros is discouraged when common library functions operating on simple data structures will do. For a very different approach which feels much more aligned w/ PG's comment, have a look at Norvig's "Paradigms of AI Programming: Case Studies in Common Lisp." Reading it changed my notion of what Lisp is / can be; you can write Clojure programs that look similar, but it seems to be rare to do so.