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Maybe it’s selection bias but: The saddest thing about Iran I’ve noticed is the stark contrast between the current state of the country and the intelligence of

by baxtr 10mo ago

Maybe it’s selection bias but: The saddest thing about Iran I’ve noticed is the stark contrast between the current state of the country and the intelligence of the people I’ve met from this country.

fooqux 10mo ago
Greed is emotion-based. Intelligence isn't necessarily the best counter against emotion.
dredmorbius 10mo ago
This is often the case. Consider too the selection bias in those you've met from Iran, presumably outside that country. Both on ideological and socioeconomic / aptitude bases. I'd first encountered a similar observation in the 1970s or 1980s, then directed largely at those from Soviet Bloc countries encountered in the West. Typically these were academics, engineers, or similarly highly-skilled professionals, who presumably found greener pastures outside their homeland. Presuming that these were necessarily representative of the larger population ignores sampling dynamics.
- Earw0rm 10mo ago
  It underlines much anti-immigrant sentiment today, in that immigrants are a self-selected sample of the hardest working and most motivated people from their country of origin, whichever country that might be. There's a lot of Americans here in London, from all over the US, and virtually none of them are anything at all like the stereotypical flyover-state USian - and yet in the US itself, there's plenty of those. Heck, go to any of the countries where smart, hard-working immigrants are said to come from and you'll find plenty of dumb, lazy or just not-that-capable people So it's almost inevitable that e.g. a Somali who ends up in Leeds is going to be smarter, more motivated and harder working than both the average Leeds native and the average Somali.
dartharva 10mo ago
This can apply to almost every country on earth.
- margalabargala 10mo ago
  Not to the same extent. Iran is somewhat special in that a culture of highly valuing education and producing high quality scientists has persisted among the populace, despite a half century of despotic religious rule. There are no other countries that come to mind that manage to do this despite such a large, long period if government-populace mismatch. Other countries that produce large quantites of scientists generally have a government that actively supports the pursuit of science. Those countries aren't immune to flareups of anti-intellectualism but they are generally short-lived.
- rayiner 10mo ago
  No. I'm from Bangladesh, and when you meet Bangladeshis you can easily understand why the country is the way it is. Same thing for Denmark. But Iran baffles me.
immibis 10mo ago
Iran used to be a very prosperous country only a century ago, and then it democratically elected a totalitarian theocratic party. Don't think that it can't happen here too.
- YC3498749387 10mo ago
  That doesn't sound correct. My understanding of the history is that Iran democratically elected a socialist who wanted to nationalize Iran's oil fields so they could keep the oil revenue inside their country instead of giving it away to BP and Exxon. The British orchestrated a coup to install the old monarchy (the Shah), who brought back the British extraction companies and harshly repressed Shia Muslims. Then in 1979 the Shia hardliners toppled the government in the Islamic Revolution which is where the current government originates from. The last real democratically elected president of Iran was the socialist one, Mohammad Mosaddegh.
  - corimaith 10mo ago
    No. Mossadegh was appointed by the Shah (who was still head of state), but his own autocratic actions such as dissolving parliament and giving himself autocratic powers pushed most political forces against him that a confrontation was inevitable. There is a reason the military stood back as he was disposed. Furthermore, the Shah did actually have the legal right to fire Mossadegh, when je ignored that the situation was already extra legal. I don't know where you are reading history from but listening to random factoids rather than a comprehensive understanding is the worst way to do so.
    - smugma 10mo ago
      From my understanding your retelling of history is a minority view. For instance, it is in conflict with Wikipedia. It’s commonly accepted that Mossadegh was thrown out by a coup and that Khomenei seized power through a revolution.
      - ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago
deleted 10mo ago
[deleted]
rayiner 10mo ago
Yes! Iran baffles me. Iran has a tremendous intellectual tradition. It has quite advanced technology. And Iranians are quite orderly. Tehren is clean, well organized, etc. They even have relatively functioning democratic systems at some levels of government. Candidates are screened for conformity with theocratic dictates, but at the local government level--where the focus is on roads and bridges and stuff like that--there is functioning multi-party democracy. In Tehran, the city council is directly elected, and then appoints the mayor of Tehran. In the early 2000s, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, then mayor of Tehren, made a list of the world's 10 best mayors, alongside Atlanta's Shirley Franklin.
feb012025 10mo ago
It's genuinely hard to parse reality from propaganda when it comes to Iran. There are plenty of travel vloggers on youtube who visited over the past few years (before the June war obviously). The state of the country seemed quite beautiful to be honest. I have a hard time thinking it's a total disaster right now
- literalAardvark 10mo ago
  "water has run out" is a binary event
  - feb012025 10mo ago
    Nobody would be alive if it the "water ran out" in that case...
owenversteeg 10mo ago
This discussion comes up from time to time on HN. I actually think the country _has_ accomplished a lot given their geopolitical situation. Just to list a few things in the 21st century: 1) they had years of (at times fairly successful) proxy wars with three of the most militarily powerful US allies until the recent collapse, 2) a nuclear program, 3) the largest ballistic missile attack in history against the US, and 4) the most significant development in modern warfare (the Shahed drone.) Imagine any other relatively poor country, sanctioned and hated by the West, with substantial brain drain, ruled by an anti-Western theocracy for nearly fifty years; they wouldn’t manage a tenth of that. Imagine what they could do if they set down their weapons…
- breppp 10mo ago
  probably less, your examples are related to weapons and an arms industry innovation is accelerated by sanctions and boycott. This has happened to the Israeli weapons industry due to lack of access to weapons especially in the 1960s and 1970s
- tguvot 10mo ago
  actually Israel is the one who came up with with "shahed drones" more than 20 years ago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAI_Harop https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAI_Harop
davidjytang 10mo ago
Visited Iran twice. They had a huge billboard that says “Down with USA”. However that sentiment is nowhere to be found in the individual-level interactions during my stay there.

by baxtr 10mo ago

fooqux 10mo ago

Greed is emotion-based. Intelligence isn't necessarily the best counter against emotion.

dredmorbius 10mo ago

This is often the case. Consider too the selection bias in those you've met from Iran, presumably outside that country. Both on ideological and socioeconomic / aptitude bases. I'd first encountered a similar observation in the 1970s or 1980s, then directed largely at those from Soviet Bloc countries encountered in the West. Typically these were academics, engineers, or similarly highly-skilled professionals, who presumably found greener pastures outside their homeland. Presuming that these were necessarily representative of the larger population ignores sampling dynamics.

Earw0rm 10mo ago
It underlines much anti-immigrant sentiment today, in that immigrants are a self-selected sample of the hardest working and most motivated people from their country of origin, whichever country that might be. There's a lot of Americans here in London, from all over the US, and virtually none of them are anything at all like the stereotypical flyover-state USian - and yet in the US itself, there's plenty of those. Heck, go to any of the countries where smart, hard-working immigrants are said to come from and you'll find plenty of dumb, lazy or just not-that-capable people So it's almost inevitable that e.g. a Somali who ends up in Leeds is going to be smarter, more motivated and harder working than both the average Leeds native and the average Somali.

dartharva 10mo ago

This can apply to almost every country on earth.

margalabargala 10mo ago
Not to the same extent. Iran is somewhat special in that a culture of highly valuing education and producing high quality scientists has persisted among the populace, despite a half century of despotic religious rule. There are no other countries that come to mind that manage to do this despite such a large, long period if government-populace mismatch. Other countries that produce large quantites of scientists generally have a government that actively supports the pursuit of science. Those countries aren't immune to flareups of anti-intellectualism but they are generally short-lived.
rayiner 10mo ago
No. I'm from Bangladesh, and when you meet Bangladeshis you can easily understand why the country is the way it is. Same thing for Denmark. But Iran baffles me.

immibis 10mo ago

Iran used to be a very prosperous country only a century ago, and then it democratically elected a totalitarian theocratic party. Don't think that it can't happen here too.

YC3498749387 10mo ago
That doesn't sound correct. My understanding of the history is that Iran democratically elected a socialist who wanted to nationalize Iran's oil fields so they could keep the oil revenue inside their country instead of giving it away to BP and Exxon. The British orchestrated a coup to install the old monarchy (the Shah), who brought back the British extraction companies and harshly repressed Shia Muslims. Then in 1979 the Shia hardliners toppled the government in the Islamic Revolution which is where the current government originates from. The last real democratically elected president of Iran was the socialist one, Mohammad Mosaddegh.
- corimaith 10mo ago
  No. Mossadegh was appointed by the Shah (who was still head of state), but his own autocratic actions such as dissolving parliament and giving himself autocratic powers pushed most political forces against him that a confrontation was inevitable. There is a reason the military stood back as he was disposed. Furthermore, the Shah did actually have the legal right to fire Mossadegh, when je ignored that the situation was already extra legal. I don't know where you are reading history from but listening to random factoids rather than a comprehensive understanding is the worst way to do so.
  - smugma 10mo ago
    From my understanding your retelling of history is a minority view. For instance, it is in conflict with Wikipedia. It’s commonly accepted that Mossadegh was thrown out by a coup and that Khomenei seized power through a revolution.
    - ahmeneeroe-v2 10mo ago

deleted 10mo ago

[deleted]

rayiner 10mo ago

Yes! Iran baffles me. Iran has a tremendous intellectual tradition. It has quite advanced technology. And Iranians are quite orderly. Tehren is clean, well organized, etc. They even have relatively functioning democratic systems at some levels of government. Candidates are screened for conformity with theocratic dictates, but at the local government level--where the focus is on roads and bridges and stuff like that--there is functioning multi-party democracy. In Tehran, the city council is directly elected, and then appoints the mayor of Tehran. In the early 2000s, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, then mayor of Tehren, made a list of the world's 10 best mayors, alongside Atlanta's Shirley Franklin.

feb012025 10mo ago

It's genuinely hard to parse reality from propaganda when it comes to Iran. There are plenty of travel vloggers on youtube who visited over the past few years (before the June war obviously). The state of the country seemed quite beautiful to be honest. I have a hard time thinking it's a total disaster right now

literalAardvark 10mo ago
"water has run out" is a binary event
- feb012025 10mo ago
  Nobody would be alive if it the "water ran out" in that case...

owenversteeg 10mo ago

This discussion comes up from time to time on HN. I actually think the country _has_ accomplished a lot given their geopolitical situation. Just to list a few things in the 21st century: 1) they had years of (at times fairly successful) proxy wars with three of the most militarily powerful US allies until the recent collapse, 2) a nuclear program, 3) the largest ballistic missile attack in history against the US, and 4) the most significant development in modern warfare (the Shahed drone.) Imagine any other relatively poor country, sanctioned and hated by the West, with substantial brain drain, ruled by an anti-Western theocracy for nearly fifty years; they wouldn’t manage a tenth of that. Imagine what they could do if they set down their weapons…

breppp 10mo ago
probably less, your examples are related to weapons and an arms industry innovation is accelerated by sanctions and boycott. This has happened to the Israeli weapons industry due to lack of access to weapons especially in the 1960s and 1970s
tguvot 10mo ago
actually Israel is the one who came up with with "shahed drones" more than 20 years ago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAI_Harop https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAI_Harop

davidjytang 10mo ago

Visited Iran twice. They had a huge billboard that says “Down with USA”. However that sentiment is nowhere to be found in the individual-level interactions during my stay there.