6 ms·

Peter Thiel: Silicon Valley 'brainwashed' by higher education

52 points by ilamont 8y ago

chris_mc 8y ago
That site is toxic on mobile.
avmich 8y ago
How engineering education implies not thinking that much about politics?
- natmaka 8y ago
  Efficient brainwashing disables "its subject’s ability to think critically or independently". It changes the quality (of the thinking process), and brainwashed people (subjected to framing or other techniques) may acquire information and think all day long without being able to take into consideration some pertinent facts/arguments, to consider them as what they are.
- repolfx 8y ago
  Most SV employees don't have an engineering education, they have a computer science education - not quite the same thing.
neilk 8y ago
> “it’s super hard to know whether people really believe this, whether they're just going along" If only there was some way for people to demonstrate their political preferences in a way which was costly, but not something that was generally talked about or publicized. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nearly-all-of-silicon-valleys-political-dollars-are-going-to-hillary-clinton/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nearly-all-of-silicon-v... Or if there were some way for them to express their collective political preferences in a quantifiable way, with secrecy ensuring there was no possibility of virtue-signaling. https://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/map/president/california/ https://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/map/president... I guess we’ll never know.
- paulddraper 8y ago
  > voting That's the "they're just going along with it" argument voiced by both sides of the aisle. > campaign contributions > not something that generally talked about it publicized There's gotta be some reason Eich made it less weeks as Mozilla's CEO. I guess we'll never know.
repolfx 8y ago
It's interesting to see such a high profile person refer to higher education this way. I've been thinking the same myself for a while and I recall a few comments on HN expressing the same sentiment ... do universities make people somehow educated but stupid simultaneously? I've personally concluded that they do, and that society would be better off if all government money was removed from the higher-ed system entirely (which would presumably shrink it a lot, at least outside of the USA). The problem is that academic culture imbues students with the notion that educated people = smarter people = better people, that the worth of people can be measured very precisely via grades, and that with education comes the ability to solve any problem. But the problem solving value add of a degree is actually not that high even in very STEM oriented fields, and is virtually non-existent in many other fields like economics or the social sciences. So society is suffering from this huge river of people entering it who have little experience, little understanding of the real world in which success and self-worth is not entirely a function of grades dispensed by your betters, and yet who believe more than anything that they are vastly superior in almost every way (intellectual, ethical, etc) to people much older than them. Meanwhile Silicon Valley companies drowning in money and with a culture of never returning funds to investors via dividends or buybacks struggle to find experienced employees to hire, so gorge themselves on this stream of new graduates, bloating up to enormous levels with people who believe intellectuals can and should do anything they believe will "make the world a better place". These students quickly come to dominate, and yet nothing causes their world-views to self correct. In the artificial womb of SV where going bankrupt because you don't make money is virtually unheard of, success and self-worth is still being determined by arbitrary scores dispensed by your intellectual betters via promo committees and bonus schemes which are largely closed-loop and unconnected to real world goals like happy users. See the discussion of Googler incentives in the Inbox discussion elsewhere. To older people who have had a much wider range of experiences, these Silicon Valley types come to seem impossibly naive in their utopian beliefs that any and all dissatisfactions can yield to their skills, if only 'experts' like themselves were permanently in charge. And the SV types see in the Republican party a bunch of uneducated angry old white men who don't value expertise and question intellectual authority all the time; and who are obsessed with the concept of markets - a concept that most of them have never really been exposed to outside the lecture hall. It is therefore inevitable that a liberal/conservative divide springs up, oriented around the Valley. It doesn't have to be this way. If SV tech firms were culturally capable of admitting when they've run out of ideas and are generating too much money, re-allocating funds via to other firms using dividend payouts and buybacks, they'd hire fewer graduates and have a more experienced workforce overall. This in turn would reduce their "computers can build utopia" mentality, and make it easier for them to fit in with the rest of society.
kennywinker 8y ago
So... learning things brainwashes you to be liberal? Makes sense to me.
- lithos 8y ago
  Not quite the most telling statement is something close to: engineers are intellectually invested in their work that most don't have time for caring about politics, so they just follow what people around them are doing.
  - datboitom 8y ago
    Having lived here for the past few years, originally from the Midwest in an area much different than SF, my best take on the younger generation working in tech is that most do not hold strong views in terms of fiscal policies and generally equate politics to social issues. There is a fear of not being "politically correct" and offending someone. Most do not actually care and just lean with the side of least resistance.
  - kennywinker 8y ago
    Or maybe they have strong political views, but choose to leave them at home - rather than have conflict with their coworkers? I know I personally have very strong opinions that I largely put aside at work.
    - throwaway080383 8y ago
      Bingo. I'm left-leaning in a left-leaning environment, but I avoid talking about politics, especially in writing, because it can only hurt me.
- programmarchy 8y ago
  It’s about worldview and which things are taught. Curriculums are biased. Think back: How many right-of-center professors did you have? How many were open Marxists?
  - 8y ago
mmmmpancakes 8y ago
>"This perhaps is not so true of the founders [of Silicon Valley], but certainly for many of the rank and file people," he said. "If you're a really good engineer or really good at some specific thing, your education typically does not involve you thinking that much about politics, so [being liberal] is not necessarily from deep ideological conviction, it's often more of a fashion statement than a question of power." Peter Thiel thinks that only CEOs are capable of holding authentic political views. Everyone should find this offensive.
- mitochondrion 8y ago
  The quote suggests that Silicon Valley CEOs spend a significant amount of time thinking about politics, and their engineers do not.
- tonyjstark 8y ago
  The questions is also, why should anyone listen to what Peter Thiel thinks? Because he made money with Paypal and is now a VC? As if that somehow means he is more qualified than your post man in terms of political views. If people get really brainwashed by having higher education or spending more time in college maybe there is something wrong with the education system, but maybe (just maybe) being brainwashed is just a try to smear everyone with a different opinion.
  - fit2rule 8y ago
    Maybe the brainwashing that is doing the most damage, is the ideation around, and elevation of, idols and figureheads. We can't seem to do anything in society unless an authority tells us its okay - or worse, not okay - to do it. This is both a blessing and a curse - sometimes we need figures to rally around. Other times, not so much. So mostly I think the most damaging brainwashing going on is that of cult figureheads being elevated beyond their station. We see this everywhere - not just Silicon Valley. Literally, everywhere. Upvote me if you agree! /s
- throwaway080383 8y ago
  Nit: he said founders, not CEOs.
bediger4000 8y ago
Is "Higher Education is not a good thing" a new trope among the financial elite? Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle had something along the same lines a month ago: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/imagine-a-world-without-mandatory-college-diplomas/2018/08/24/6ac9bcac-a726-11e8-8fac-12e98c13528d_story.html?utm_term=.f50cbcfd05a3 https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/imagine-a-world-with...
- lloyd-christmas 8y ago
  It's part of the Trump Effect: https://i.imgur.com/17PHH1d.png https://i.imgur.com/17PHH1d.png
sidcool 8y ago
So is an MS in Computer science worth it?

52 points by ilamont 8y ago

chris_mc 8y ago

That site is toxic on mobile.

avmich 8y ago

How engineering education implies not thinking that much about politics?

natmaka 8y ago
Efficient brainwashing disables "its subject’s ability to think critically or independently". It changes the quality (of the thinking process), and brainwashed people (subjected to framing or other techniques) may acquire information and think all day long without being able to take into consideration some pertinent facts/arguments, to consider them as what they are.
repolfx 8y ago
Most SV employees don't have an engineering education, they have a computer science education - not quite the same thing.

neilk 8y ago

> “it’s super hard to know whether people really believe this, whether they're just going along" If only there was some way for people to demonstrate their political preferences in a way which was costly, but not something that was generally talked about or publicized. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nearly-all-of-silicon-valleys-political-dollars-are-going-to-hillary-clinton/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/nearly-all-of-silicon-v... Or if there were some way for them to express their collective political preferences in a quantifiable way, with secrecy ensuring there was no possibility of virtue-signaling. https://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/map/president/california/ https://www.politico.com/2016-election/results/map/president... I guess we’ll never know.

paulddraper 8y ago
> voting That's the "they're just going along with it" argument voiced by both sides of the aisle. > campaign contributions > not something that generally talked about it publicized There's gotta be some reason Eich made it less weeks as Mozilla's CEO. I guess we'll never know.

repolfx 8y ago

It's interesting to see such a high profile person refer to higher education this way. I've been thinking the same myself for a while and I recall a few comments on HN expressing the same sentiment ... do universities make people somehow educated but stupid simultaneously? I've personally concluded that they do, and that society would be better off if all government money was removed from the higher-ed system entirely (which would presumably shrink it a lot, at least outside of the USA). The problem is that academic culture imbues students with the notion that educated people = smarter people = better people, that the worth of people can be measured very precisely via grades, and that with education comes the ability to solve any problem. But the problem solving value add of a degree is actually not that high even in very STEM oriented fields, and is virtually non-existent in many other fields like economics or the social sciences. So society is suffering from this huge river of people entering it who have little experience, little understanding of the real world in which success and self-worth is not entirely a function of grades dispensed by your betters, and yet who believe more than anything that they are vastly superior in almost every way (intellectual, ethical, etc) to people much older than them. Meanwhile Silicon Valley companies drowning in money and with a culture of never returning funds to investors via dividends or buybacks struggle to find experienced employees to hire, so gorge themselves on this stream of new graduates, bloating up to enormous levels with people who believe intellectuals can and should do anything they believe will "make the world a better place". These students quickly come to dominate, and yet nothing causes their world-views to self correct. In the artificial womb of SV where going bankrupt because you don't make money is virtually unheard of, success and self-worth is still being determined by arbitrary scores dispensed by your intellectual betters via promo committees and bonus schemes which are largely closed-loop and unconnected to real world goals like happy users. See the discussion of Googler incentives in the Inbox discussion elsewhere. To older people who have had a much wider range of experiences, these Silicon Valley types come to seem impossibly naive in their utopian beliefs that any and all dissatisfactions can yield to their skills, if only 'experts' like themselves were permanently in charge. And the SV types see in the Republican party a bunch of uneducated angry old white men who don't value expertise and question intellectual authority all the time; and who are obsessed with the concept of markets - a concept that most of them have never really been exposed to outside the lecture hall. It is therefore inevitable that a liberal/conservative divide springs up, oriented around the Valley. It doesn't have to be this way. If SV tech firms were culturally capable of admitting when they've run out of ideas and are generating too much money, re-allocating funds via to other firms using dividend payouts and buybacks, they'd hire fewer graduates and have a more experienced workforce overall. This in turn would reduce their "computers can build utopia" mentality, and make it easier for them to fit in with the rest of society.

kennywinker 8y ago

So... learning things brainwashes you to be liberal? Makes sense to me.

lithos 8y ago
Not quite the most telling statement is something close to: engineers are intellectually invested in their work that most don't have time for caring about politics, so they just follow what people around them are doing.
- datboitom 8y ago
  Having lived here for the past few years, originally from the Midwest in an area much different than SF, my best take on the younger generation working in tech is that most do not hold strong views in terms of fiscal policies and generally equate politics to social issues. There is a fear of not being "politically correct" and offending someone. Most do not actually care and just lean with the side of least resistance.
- kennywinker 8y ago
  Or maybe they have strong political views, but choose to leave them at home - rather than have conflict with their coworkers? I know I personally have very strong opinions that I largely put aside at work.
  - throwaway080383 8y ago
    Bingo. I'm left-leaning in a left-leaning environment, but I avoid talking about politics, especially in writing, because it can only hurt me.
programmarchy 8y ago
It’s about worldview and which things are taught. Curriculums are biased. Think back: How many right-of-center professors did you have? How many were open Marxists?
- 8y ago

mmmmpancakes 8y ago

>"This perhaps is not so true of the founders [of Silicon Valley], but certainly for many of the rank and file people," he said. "If you're a really good engineer or really good at some specific thing, your education typically does not involve you thinking that much about politics, so [being liberal] is not necessarily from deep ideological conviction, it's often more of a fashion statement than a question of power." Peter Thiel thinks that only CEOs are capable of holding authentic political views. Everyone should find this offensive.

mitochondrion 8y ago
The quote suggests that Silicon Valley CEOs spend a significant amount of time thinking about politics, and their engineers do not.
tonyjstark 8y ago
The questions is also, why should anyone listen to what Peter Thiel thinks? Because he made money with Paypal and is now a VC? As if that somehow means he is more qualified than your post man in terms of political views. If people get really brainwashed by having higher education or spending more time in college maybe there is something wrong with the education system, but maybe (just maybe) being brainwashed is just a try to smear everyone with a different opinion.
- fit2rule 8y ago
  Maybe the brainwashing that is doing the most damage, is the ideation around, and elevation of, idols and figureheads. We can't seem to do anything in society unless an authority tells us its okay - or worse, not okay - to do it. This is both a blessing and a curse - sometimes we need figures to rally around. Other times, not so much. So mostly I think the most damaging brainwashing going on is that of cult figureheads being elevated beyond their station. We see this everywhere - not just Silicon Valley. Literally, everywhere. Upvote me if you agree! /s
throwaway080383 8y ago
Nit: he said founders, not CEOs.

bediger4000 8y ago

Is "Higher Education is not a good thing" a new trope among the financial elite? Washington Post columnist Megan McArdle had something along the same lines a month ago: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/imagine-a-world-without-mandatory-college-diplomas/2018/08/24/6ac9bcac-a726-11e8-8fac-12e98c13528d_story.html?utm_term=.f50cbcfd05a3 https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/imagine-a-world-with...

lloyd-christmas 8y ago
It's part of the Trump Effect: https://i.imgur.com/17PHH1d.png https://i.imgur.com/17PHH1d.png

sidcool 8y ago

So is an MS in Computer science worth it?