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Is that true about hackers not really having close friends? I don't know as many hackers as I would like - but two of my very closest friends are hackers (and

Is that true about hackers not really having close friends? I don't know as many hackers as I would like - but two of my very closest friends are hackers (and how I came to be exposed to the culture). Besides that - I've always assumed that hacker culture is very closely related to nerd culture - wherein I find the greatest propensity for intimacy.

endlessvoid94 16y ago
It's probably all relative. I know that the friends I have from high school are much more intimate (again, in certain ways) than any other friends I've made since. It might have to do with the amount of shared adversity or something like that, and tons of people don't ever experience that. But who knows. I'm only a single data point, so it's certainly dangerous for me to make assumptions like that.
- grovulent 16y ago
  I'd be surprised if the phenomena of the difficulty of establishing intimate relations later on in life isn't actually universal. The obvious reason why this would be the case is that people have less time when they are older. And intimacy requires lots of time.
anonimouse 16y ago
I can't really speak for hackers at large, but in general the hacker community is seen as semi-autistic, and I've been diagnosed with an autistic-spectrum disorder (Aspergers). I think perhaps the article (quite excellent otherwise) underplays and maybe misunderstands slightly the way that kind of autistic outlook can alter intimacy. That sort of situation he describes, where you find someone you think you're intimate with and it turns out it's all a lie -- that happens a lot if you're unable to correctly interpret the way people behave. So early "close friends" aren't friends at all, and you never let later friends get close because you can't trust them. At least that's how it is with me, and a lot of people with Aspergers have it much worse. Then again, a lot of people in the hacker community have it much better. But if the hacker community is correctly characterized as autistic... a lack of close friends relative to "normal" people wouldn't surprise me, both early and later in life.

endlessvoid94 16y ago

It's probably all relative. I know that the friends I have from high school are much more intimate (again, in certain ways) than any other friends I've made since. It might have to do with the amount of shared adversity or something like that, and tons of people don't ever experience that. But who knows. I'm only a single data point, so it's certainly dangerous for me to make assumptions like that.

grovulent 16y ago
I'd be surprised if the phenomena of the difficulty of establishing intimate relations later on in life isn't actually universal. The obvious reason why this would be the case is that people have less time when they are older. And intimacy requires lots of time.

anonimouse 16y ago

I can't really speak for hackers at large, but in general the hacker community is seen as semi-autistic, and I've been diagnosed with an autistic-spectrum disorder (Aspergers). I think perhaps the article (quite excellent otherwise) underplays and maybe misunderstands slightly the way that kind of autistic outlook can alter intimacy. That sort of situation he describes, where you find someone you think you're intimate with and it turns out it's all a lie -- that happens a lot if you're unable to correctly interpret the way people behave. So early "close friends" aren't friends at all, and you never let later friends get close because you can't trust them. At least that's how it is with me, and a lot of people with Aspergers have it much worse. Then again, a lot of people in the hacker community have it much better. But if the hacker community is correctly characterized as autistic... a lack of close friends relative to "normal" people wouldn't surprise me, both early and later in life.