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It's technically possible for most people to "be" anything, i.e. to succeed in an unusual way, but I don't think that's the right way to look at it. Why is our

It's technically possible for most people to "be" anything, i.e. to succeed in an unusual way, but I don't think that's the right way to look at it. Why is our current economic environment not optimized for this behavior? Why is our economy set up to disproportionately reward ruthless behaviors and predatory personalities?

BLKNSLVR 5y ago
It's not necessarily the economy that's setup this way, it's more basic than that, it's human behaviour. The psychological reaction to the power of hierarchy and the difficulty in questioning that power and the inherent internal-monologue questioning of 'what could I have done better?' to satisfy those to whom I report. Sometimes it's you, sometimes it's them, but like with domestic violence, the victims sometimes / often will, confusingly, go back to their aggressors, further enabling the toxic, and sometimes criminal, behaviour. There's a fine line between being a 'snowflake' and allowing yourself to be repeatedly victimised, and it's entirely dependent on each individuals "transaction value". Where the economy comes into it is in the lifestyle impact of changing jobs: in an employers market, ruthless behaviour probably has fewer repercussions.
megameter 5y ago
The economy nominally runs on money and productivity, but human beings run on emotions, credit and blame. So everywhere you look, if there is an opportunity to gain credit for something (even if financial incentive isn't there, like most of the arts) there is some cutthroat competition to have that credit reassigned to you, by fair means or foul. The ticket out of this - in an individual sense - mostly comes through following well-worn ancient wisdom around virtue - humility, integrity, diligence, etc. That gives you an edge over the long run because the virtuous stuff enables sharing and therefore access to a trusted network studying the most interesting problems available(and from there, higher-profile life opportunities), while someone who is out to "make a name for themselves" is spending all their time looking over their shoulder trying to push down the competition and toot the horn on their own work(which is tailored to min/max credibility, not to study anything in particular). Our economy is perpetually in a state of having the two outlooks overlap each other which accounts for the mixed messages - as soon as a good idea gets popular it gets gamed and gatekept. Keep in mind that we have only grudgingly managed to accept - within the last few centuries - that good economies are not premised on simple conquest and exploitation. We still have a long way to go.

BLKNSLVR 5y ago

It's not necessarily the economy that's setup this way, it's more basic than that, it's human behaviour. The psychological reaction to the power of hierarchy and the difficulty in questioning that power and the inherent internal-monologue questioning of 'what could I have done better?' to satisfy those to whom I report. Sometimes it's you, sometimes it's them, but like with domestic violence, the victims sometimes / often will, confusingly, go back to their aggressors, further enabling the toxic, and sometimes criminal, behaviour. There's a fine line between being a 'snowflake' and allowing yourself to be repeatedly victimised, and it's entirely dependent on each individuals "transaction value". Where the economy comes into it is in the lifestyle impact of changing jobs: in an employers market, ruthless behaviour probably has fewer repercussions.

megameter 5y ago

The economy nominally runs on money and productivity, but human beings run on emotions, credit and blame. So everywhere you look, if there is an opportunity to gain credit for something (even if financial incentive isn't there, like most of the arts) there is some cutthroat competition to have that credit reassigned to you, by fair means or foul. The ticket out of this - in an individual sense - mostly comes through following well-worn ancient wisdom around virtue - humility, integrity, diligence, etc. That gives you an edge over the long run because the virtuous stuff enables sharing and therefore access to a trusted network studying the most interesting problems available(and from there, higher-profile life opportunities), while someone who is out to "make a name for themselves" is spending all their time looking over their shoulder trying to push down the competition and toot the horn on their own work(which is tailored to min/max credibility, not to study anything in particular). Our economy is perpetually in a state of having the two outlooks overlap each other which accounts for the mixed messages - as soon as a good idea gets popular it gets gamed and gatekept. Keep in mind that we have only grudgingly managed to accept - within the last few centuries - that good economies are not premised on simple conquest and exploitation. We still have a long way to go.