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I don't understand the popular obsession with recreating the Valley: can't we do something better?

• tobylane 11y ago
  We can and possibly have, it's just banal. We have comfortable lives with nationalised healthcare and cheap or free education. We aren't striving to earn money for our own health, or to prove ourselves because we can't afford a degree. Without that there's just making something because you want it made. Governments and private organisations in Europe are decent at finding those people and giving reasonable funding.
  • solve 11y ago
    FYI - to highly ambitious people, just "living a comfortable life" sounds like hell. They wish to strive for far more, even if doing so is uncomfortable. Decent, reasonable, comfortable - hardly the sales pitch you'll want to use if you want to attract or retain highly ambitious people. Do you? Not trying to offend anyone, just consider that some people have much different desires than others.
    • _delirium 11y ago
      Eh, there's different kinds of ambition. Most of the highly ambitious people I know take living a comfortable life as a necessary starting point for real ambition, because their goals are to make things such as scientific advances, not to spend all their time just trying to make money. I wouldn't call Larry Ellison ambitious, for example. He is just a hard-headed, no-holds-barred businessman who wants to maximize his income. Copenhagen Suborbitals are much more ambitious than Oracle, in my view of ambition. Now a culture in which the likes of Oracle thrive: there is something that sounds like hell to ambitious people.