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Even if your essays win you a Nobel price (Paul Grahams certainly didn't) the writer isn't protected from becoming a bullshit-dispenser. This is why I respect
by atoav 2y ago
Even if your essays win you a Nobel price (Paul Grahams certainly didn't) the writer isn't protected from becoming a bullshit-dispenser.
This is why I respect authors that publish a consistent level of quality more than those who hit and miss as if they were throwing darts at a map. And the stuff I have read from Paul Graham is definitly not in the former category.
I don't feel he is intellectually honest, either with himself (bad) or with his readers (worse). But if the past decade of the Internet has shown anything, it is that honesty and consistency isn't required to get insecure people to follow you blindly.
- ryanjamurphy 2y agoWould love to hear a few of the consistently-high-quality writers you're thinking about. I have a pet theory that volume is required for quality, but would love to be wrong so that I can feel less bad about how much I publish!
- atoav 2y agoYou are not wrong that volume is required for quality. But it does not necessarily mean all of that volume has to be published. E.g. in music there are bands where every single recording on every single release they did is good and not just a slight variation of another thing that worked. Mow on the other side you have musicians who have two releases a year and every other of them has a track on it that is really cool. I am not saying the latter is wrong, I just say the former has more of my respect, because you know that even the rejected stuff of the first band is probably stellar. Keeping a thought to oneself that isn't fully fleshed out is a virtue.
- theGnuMe 2y agoThe Eagles and the Beatles basically took that approach.
- gedpeck 2y agoit is that honesty and consistency isn't required to get insecure people to follow you blindly. I’m going to use this. Well stated.