3 ms·

> Anyone can probably reach the top 5% in most non-athletic areas given enough time. I seriously doubt that. People who have no aptitude in a field, even if th

• qznc 8y ago
  Depends on what you base the percentage on. If it is the global population, then 5% of 7 billion is 350 million. So to be in the top 5% there must be at most 350 million people better than you. Now consider a niche sport, say Ultimate Frisbee. I would guess that much less than 350 million people even know the rules. So invest an hour to learn the rules and play it a little with your friends. Voila, you are in the top 5%. And that is for an athletic sport. You are probably talking about 5% of the people actively doing it like being registered in an association. In this case, 50% sounds more realistic to me.
  • mcbits 8y ago
    Assuming the potential performance of actively engaged people is roughly normally distributed (even if, as a group, they come from the upper end of the general population on that axis), then I think 50% is too conservative. Nobody can perform above their potential by definition, but lots and lots of people will fail to live up to their potential, making room for their below-average colleagues to outperform them with enough work.
• curuinor 8y ago
  there's about 20 million people who know programming to the level that they can fizzbuzz, according to the rough idc estimates. if you know fizzbuzz, you know programming better than all the rest. (the rest don't know how to program at all)
• deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]