
Ask HN: Name for people who study without getting around to doing - billswift
We need a snappy name like "analysis paralysis" that is focused on people who spend all their time studying rather than doing. They (we) intend to do, but never fell like they know enough to start.
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mechanical_fish
This activity you describe -- which I know a whole lot about -- does not
really deserve the bad reputation that it has in American culture, let alone
the terrible reputation that it has on a website full of entrepreneurs. ;)

I believe it was J. Michael Straczynski -- author of, among other things, a
pretty good book on screenwriting -- who said:

 _Do not confuse a love of reading with a desire to write._

There are lots of names for people who study things without doing them:
Anthropologist, writer, scholar, historian, critic, fan, audience member. If
you're constantly shying back from taking the leap into _doing_... listen to
yourself! Perhaps your stomach is trying to tell you that you'll have more fun
as an observer.

If, on the other hand, your stomach is telling you to jump, perhaps you should
listen to that as well.

~~~
billswift
The problem isn't learning things, I love that. The problem is when you want
to do something, and you keep thinking that learning a little more will help
you get it done, then you never get to "getting it done" because there is
always more you can learn.

~~~
tlb
How do you know what else you need to learn? The best way I know is to try
doing whatever it is, and see what's hard. Sometimes you can fill in the gaps
in real-time, sometimes you need to go back and study.

~~~
billswift
Learning is itself addicting; for me it's almost as addicting, and a lot more
fun than TV. Apparently, I'm not the first to feel this way; Heinlein's
protagonist in "Have Space Suit, Will Travel" made a similar observation.

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lkozma
As an interesting counter-point, here's Tesla's opinion on Edison:

" _His method was inefficient in the extreme, for an immense ground had to be
covered to get anything at all unless blind chance intervened and, at first, I
was almost a sorry witness of his doings, knowing that just a little theory
and calculation would have saved him 90 percent of the labor. But he had a
veritable contempt for book learning and mathematical knowledge, trusting
himself entirely to his inventor's instinct and practical American sense._ "

~~~
lucifer
Tesla was practically a demigod and quite dear, but "worst is better" was the
governing principle even in the heydays of the industrial revolution.

That said, your post doesn't make sense. Tesla _applied_ his book learning
consistently. I don't see how Tesla is a "counterpoint" to the OP's post.

~~~
lkozma
The title and post implied that we probably often overthink/plan things, and
we should jump in and start implementing (earlier). According to the quote (if
Tesla was right), even such an immensely successful person as Edison tended to
plan/learn too little. Which means that probably we plan too little as well,
not too much, assuming that we<=Edison. It's a counterpoint in this sense.

Also I think it is only a typo, but "WorsT is better" made me smile ...

~~~
lucifer
:) It was a typo.

We can agree to disagree re. Tesla. We have no authoritative insight regarding
his "over thinking", but my gut feeling is that the wheels were _constantly_
spinning in his brain.

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sage_joch
I don't have ambitions of starting a business, but I consider it a problem
that I don't have any recent side projects either. Just throwaway code (from
trying to learn a language), and/or notes (from trying to learn a concept).
For me, the main issue has always been the thought that I'm not quite ready;
that if I just brushed up on X, it would go a long way. Which of course is
placing the project on a pedestal. I think the key is to work on small,
approachable projects, and see which ones start to grow into something more.

Last night I discovered the _You and Your Research_ speech, and found this
interesting quote on why Nobel Prize winners often fail to make breakthroughs
after they win: "When you are famous it is hard to work on small problems...
The great scientists often make this error. They fail to continue to plant the
little acorns from which the mighty oak trees grow. They try to get the big
thing right off. And that isn't the way things go." The quote also reminded me
of Feynman's story about the flying plate, and how analyzing something
unimportant just for fun (and to escape his "real" responsibilities)
ultimately started a path to the Nobel Prize.

------
yannis
At first I thought you were defining a philosopher when you wrote "but never
feel like they know enough to start" then I thought it is just the opposite
they alway know enough to start but have a never ending story.

I also understood your question to exclude the person who can just afford to
study perpetually, just for the love of learning similar to 18-19th century
aristocracy.

So we are looking for a name for 'fear to start'. Excluding procrastination we
replace fear->phobia, since phobia is Greek we will replace 'start' with
'archi' which results in:

    
    
      - archiphobia : fear to start
    
    

To be honest I am envious of people who can just afford to do that:)

------
diiq
Planning fanatics: planatics.

As for overcoming the syndrome, try taking a workshop in improv comedy; most
cities have a troupe that offers community courses now and again. By placing
yourself in situations where you cannot help but work faster than your
conscious mind can plan, you might break the cycle of preparation. Or try
National Novel Writing Month this November. Do something that forces you to
actively not-plan, and with luck some of those dynamic-balance tricks will
carry over into the rest of your life.

------
pavlov
Fisheye visionaries. Their angle of view is so wide that they get motion
sickness from the slightest movement. Thus they'll rather remain stationary
for as long as possible.

~~~
billswift
That actually fits me pretty good, since I also read and study extremely
broadly.

------
shorbaji
nontrepeneurs?

~~~
nostrademons
I've also heard "wantrepreneurs".

------
xy
Academics?

------
clavalle
I know this is for a name but I have a cure: Have a friend or close colleague
that always starts without reading -- an eager beaver. You can piggy back on
that person's momentum and they can pick your brain when they inevitably get
stuck or do something non-optimally because they simply don't know of a better
technique.

~~~
callahad
That's the situation I'm in right now. The co-founder is of the "Let's get it
working _now_ " mentality, while all I want to do is slow down, take out a
notepad, and really think through how everything will eventually fit together.

And it causes some friction, especially when working remotely. I'll wake up,
look at a checkin, and think to myself "this isn't going to work in the long
term."

But you know what? It _does_ work today. And without my co-founder, I'd still
be stuck theorizing on how to make things work.

So we've adopted a routine where he forges ahead, and I look at his checkins
and do cleanup. It works really well. Instead of trying to conjure a perfect
design out of thin air, he delivers a rough approximation, and I steer it
towards a "better" or "more maintainable" place when it needs it.

It helps him work, since I'm no longer trying to slow the process, and it
helps me work, since I'm now dealing with concrete items.

------
kyro
'Me'

~~~
guitarjunkie
You and 'me' both man.

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saurabh
Potentials

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spokey
Dilettante? But that's not quite the sense you're going for.

Evidently there's a neologism "professional student" that's quite close to
what you're looking for:
<http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/professional+student>

------
manico
This unfortunately describes me too much. Any ideas on overcoming it (please
don't say "just do it")?

~~~
patio11
Rescale your expectations/plans/schedule such that shipping is easier than not
shipping.

My business started with an 8 day deadline, largely because I thought if it
was longer it would end like all of my other private projects, with several
months spent on research, filling out notebooks, and grand plans followed by a
failure to follow through. I figured if it was just 8 days that it would be
easier to finish rather than telling Dad et al "Yep, that ended up not going
anywhere".

Three years later...

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sidsavara
I call it metawork. Perhaps "metaworkers" ?

[http://sidsavara.com/personal-productivity/are-you-really-
wo...](http://sidsavara.com/personal-productivity/are-you-really-working-or-
just-using-metawork-as-an-excuse-to-avoid-real-work)

------
zacharyvoase
Perpetual students?

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joshuarr
Students.

~~~
huhtenberg
Technically, the term is _forever students_ and it dates back to 17-18th
century, when Peter the Great was sending lots of young Russians to European
universities to study everything there was to study. Some ended up studying ..
well .. forever, merely accumulating knowledge. Hence the name.

------
brazzy
People who should get into research rather than development.

~~~
pgbovine
(flamebait warning from someone who is in research) ... research in
engineering fields is hardly just about studying and not doing. quite the
opposite ... research is all about building prototypes to test out new
concepts, and iterating on prototypes. when they were in school, the guys who
later went on to found companies like VMWare, Google, and more recently
Ksplice were hacking hardcore on prototyping and testing their ideas, not
sitting in an ivory tower reading scholarly papers all day ;)

~~~
brazzy
_Academic_ research is about publishing papers and little else. Prototypes are
rarely iterated beyond proof-of-concept. The people you mention probably left
academia exactly because they had to in order to realize their ideas.

------
rokhayakebe
Consumers.

"At any giving time you are either a consumer or a producer."

------
jlees
The road to hell is paved with good intentions?

------
cjoh
"Baby Boomer"

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flybrand
VCs

 _rimshot_

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larrykubin
\- all talk

\- wantrepreneur

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biznerd
Intellectual Masturbation

------
undees
Dilettantes?

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briguy
Atychiphobia

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MikeMacMan
Posers

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adamcrowe
Particular

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mattculbreth
Architect

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gigl
University Professor

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shalmanese
scholar

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ahoyhere
I don't have a suggestion for a new word, since many of the others are so
good. But it's just procrastination, when you come down to it, and it probably
has different root causes in everyone who exhibits it.

But, as somebody who procrastinated for 6 years and then in the past year has
shipped 4 new products, I can tell you... whatever you call it, whatever the
reason you do it, it's a symptom, not the disease.

Find the root of the disease, work to fix it, and you will get rid of the
symptoms.

------
lucifer
slahacker.

