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The converse view is that problem solvers emerge because we keep making dire predictions. The best way to motivate people (especially bright people) is to conv
by jogjayr 8y ago
The converse view is that problem solvers emerge because we keep making dire predictions.
The best way to motivate people (especially bright people) is to convince them their work has higher meaning.
If a problem being solved isn't high-stakes, you won't have the best and brightest working on it. They are going to go work on something that is actually high-stakes, high-impact. The post-WW2 nuclear threat was real. It attracted intellectual giants such as John Forbes Nash and John von Neumann whose work probably helped avert a crisis.
> More recently, the end of, I think, the Mayan calendar was supposed to be the end.
That's nowhere near the same thing as a nuclear threat.
The point is that problems don't get solved by magical fairies or elves. They're solved by real people. And smart people are attracted to hard, important problems. All the bellyaching and agonizing serve the purpose of signaling which problems matter.
- DoreenMichele 8y agoGeniuses don't need the masses to advise them what matters. They can figure it out for themselves and are frequently ignored for long periods. Einstein worked in a patent office for years, unable to get the university job he longed for. It took two tries of photographing a solar eclipse to finally get proof of his theory and once proof existed, he was world famous overnight. He didn't stick with it because the masses were haranguing him about how very, very, very important this was.
- jogjayr 8y agoGood point about Einstein. It's true that bright minds also go after problems they think are important, regardless of what everyone else thinks. Haranguing masses can decide what gets funded. Einstein's research didn't need much money, which worked out well for him. What if his genius had been in something that required more capital?
- DoreenMichele 8y agoI think the short answer is "If he's a real genius, he either finds the capital or finds a cheaper way to do it." The long answer is probably a screed that I would probably regret posting. It's 1am here. Please, excuse me, but I think I'm done here for now.