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I’ve seen this analogy repeatedly many times and it’s becoming a meme. I think this is wrong and that it trivializes people’s accomplishments and hard work as

• ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  And for every one of those, there are 10 who did not. Random chance is a dominant factor in life, in some walks of like it's The Dominant Factor. Look at Olympic champions, they all work hard but for every athlete that succeeds, there are 100 that worked just as hard and did not. If you were not randomly allocated the right genes, your chance of winning the Olympics is 0% no matter how hard you work. Or look at traders, they work 100 hours a week, consume cocaine, some die of overwork, some die of overdose. And we have research to prove that random chance is the dominant factor in their work. Working hard for them is a necessity to stay in the game, but it does not assure success.
  • anonymouskimmer 4y ago
    > If you were not randomly allocated the right genes, your chance of winning the Olympics is 0% no matter how hard you work Tonya Harding would like a word with you. More seriously, luck beyond can help beyond genetics. Such as having local access to a world-class trainer. Or changes to the rules of a competition (I have heard that Simone Biles' 10s are partly possible because of changes in scoring which value her skillset more than they did previously).