
How to act less stupid, according to psychologists - nkurz
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/19/how-to-act-less-stupid-according-to-psychologists/
======
ak39
After a moribund launch of my well-intentioned startup in 2012, I know
understand what others meant by "you have a lot of courage" (to leave your job
and take the risks). What they mostly meant really is that I had the courage
to look stupid. Except I didn't know that or care much for what "bravery"
meant.

~~~
visakanv
What was your startup about, and what happened?

~~~
ak39
You mean, what was the name of the game? You can still call it Riding the
Gravy Train [1].

Summary of Failure: Failed to close enterprise sales leads. (Started with the
erroneous assumption that being technically able to develop an MVP will prove
sufficient to "sell" to enterprises.)

    
    
      Reasons:  
      1.  Small team (enterprises no like small teams [sic] ... unless ... but we learned the "unlesses" only recently)
      2.  Small team part II - fewer initial leads to grow from consultancy domain experience
      3.  Sales pitches always too technical.
      4.  Solution offering too monolithic (modules preferred by enterprises)
      5.  High overheads during sales periods (enterprise sales lead times went on for 24 months!)
      6.  Couldn't adequately manage emotional temperament during dry spell (spending on overheads - salaries esp didn't help) - resulting in poor major and minor knock-on decisions.
      7.  Emotional Temperament Part II - weak emotional resolve affected creative aspect of job (building the MVP).  Health suffered too with stress.  Spiralled.
      

However, and the irony is amazing - we closed our first sale after 2 years.
This after letting go two staffers and an office, right before switching the
lights off.

We build from here. Making new mistakes. And looking stupid for an analysis of
decisions later on.

\---------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] "Have A Cigar" by Pink Floyd

Come in here, dear boy, have a cigar. You're gonna go far, you're gonna fly
high, You're never gonna die, you're gonna make it if you try; they're gonna
love you.

Well, I've always had a deep respect, and I mean that most sincerely. The band
is just fantastic, that is really what I think. Oh by the way, which one's
Pink?

And did we tell you the name of the game, boy? We call it Riding the Gravy
Train.

We're just knocked out. We heard about the sell out. You gotta get an album
out, You owe it to the people. We're so happy we can hardly count.

Everybody else is just green, have you seen the chart? It's a helluva start,
it could be made into a monster If we all pull together as a team.

And did we tell you the name of the game, boy? We call it Riding the Gravy
Train.

~~~
garrettgrimsley
>You mean, what was the name of the game?

The parent poster was wondering what product or service your startup offered.

~~~
visakanv
Yep!

------
avmich
> Acting in a way that isn't considered stupid is a goal shared by most
> reasonable people, but many of them likely overlook one key attribute that
> might allow them to better achieve it: modesty.

Unfortunately that doesn't pay. We're somehow encouraged to take risks here.

~~~
tertius
Not an American, but living in the U.S.

That quote is fairly eye opening. My culture is quite a bit more modest than
the general American culture, to a degree that "confident" Americans are
fairly annoying for not being modest.

That's a very good way to put it, and yes, you're right, it's ingrained in
this (HN/Tech) and the more general American culture.

~~~
saiya-jin
to be honest, to most cultures out here/there general average American is by
far the loudest person around, beyond any modesty. Usually not really
appreciated, and the more traditional (ie didn't change that much in last 500
years) the culture is, the worse the effect.

Personally I like it, a very different approach to self-presentation, that in
some situations is more effective than usual shy polite careful... whatever,.

But if you go backpacking in remote places somewhere in south asia for
example, it can cause a bit of friction with locals sometimes.

~~~
sixbrx
I can assure you that there's a whole culture of Americans that aren't loud,
but they don't tend to travel the world or congregate in big cities, and
aren't much represented on TV except as gross caricatures.

------
__sarcasm
1\. Didn't see that coming. (had information, chose to ignore, possibly by way
of narcissism or hubris)

2\. Couldn't help themselves. (lack of impulse control, compulsive behavior)

3\. Space cadets. (lack of full circumstantial awareness)

The reverse of all of these being, of course, overly cautious, prudent
behavior. A coward.

The brave and the stupid.

Maybe some of us are just lucky.

~~~
RobertoG
In my humble and cautious opinion, somebody prudent and cautious is not a
coward. That's the reason because we have different words.

Prudent is to know that your chances are not good and then refrain yourself
despise the pressure you could feel to act.

To be brave is to be scared but to realize that is the moment to act and do
it. To be coward is the same but not acting.

You have to be scared to be brave.

To be stupid is not to be scared when you should be.

Knowing how to balance all that would be being wise.

------
chejazi
_" If you don't want to do something stupid, you probably don't want to have
higher expectations of your abilities than you should..."_ I disagree with
this statement. I believe that enlightenment, not stupidity, results from
pushing our expectations. I think modesty is more important when it comes to
understanding the factors that contributed to an outcome, "stupid" or not.

~~~
wycx
I would agree. I would suggest that people who are skilled, and good at what
they do did not get to that state without making mistakes that could fall into
the categories described in the article as stupid. The trick is, as you say,
to determine why said mistakes occured, and importantly to avoid making the
same stupid mistakes in the future.

The best practitioners of "insert discipline here" are those that have made
all the (survivable) mistakes.

------
TheAceOfHearts
I'm a bit disappointed by the lack of source. Is anyone aware if the findings
were published somewhere? There's a lot of hand waving and voodoo magic in
psychology, so I try to take this type of article with a grain of salt.

~~~
artifaxx
This appears to be the source of the main study in the article.
[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289615...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289615001233)

------
donatj
> When given a math problem, for instance, an intelligent person might assume
> they aren't capable of the same thinking errors that their peers are, which,
> in turn, makes them more prone to commit them.

This is the big truth of this article. So many of the worst people I know make
the assumption they can never be wrong because of schooling / general
overconfidence.

~~~
a3n
I also know a number of people (myself included) who are prone to this
problem. Most of them are not the worst people I know. :)

~~~
donatj
The ones I know become huge jerks if you cast doubt on their answers.

~~~
a3n
I've seen those too. I don't know if this field attracts those types, or if
they're everywhere.

------
sjclemmy
Number 1 is the Dunning Kruger effect
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect)

(A favourite of mine and a regular on HN I bet)

~~~
riskneural
The following contradiction is pasted from the British actuarial notes:
(hopefully within the terms of fair use)

"Overconfidence

People tend to overestimate their own abilities, knowledge and skills. For
example, if you ask 100 people if they are better than average drivers, then
you might not be surprised if more than 50% of them reply “yes”!

Moreover, studies show that the discrepancy between accuracy and
overconfidence increases (in all but the simplest tasks) as the respondent is
more knowledgeable! (Accuracy increases to a modest degree but confidence
increases to a much larger degree. ) If this is true then it may not be wise
to pass the Subject ST5 exam!

Overconfidence could therefore be a potentially serious problem in fields such
as investment where most of the participants are likely to be highly
knowledgeable.

Moreover, the available evidence suggests that even when people are aware that
they are overconfident they remain so."

~~~
krkoch
> if you ask 100 people if they are better than average drivers, then you
> might not be surprised if more than 50% of them reply “yes”!

Isn't it fully possible that most people are better than the average? Most
people e.g. have more arms than average.

~~~
riskneural
The arms distribution is an unusual example of a left skewed distribution.
Mostly we are thinking of right skewed distributions, where there are lots of
observations humped up towards zero, and then they spread out towards
infinity, or symmetrical distributions. In the latter two cases the average
would be above or equal to the median, so most people would be worse than or
equal to the average.

------
dschiptsov
There is a book about that - Thinking Fast And Slow.)

------
debacle
There are certain advantages to looking stupid.

------
cfarre
Be stupid is cool

------
LibrlSurfr4War
Well, that's 7.2 minutes I'll never get back. Who's stupid now, brah?

------
flashman
> "The stupidest thing someone can do is overestimate themselves,"

I wonder if this is part of the reason people self-sabotage with comments
like, "It's just a beta, I was rushed, I haven't implemented X yet...",
because they don't want to appear confident and then fall short?

> For example, ingested substances or excessive social support can promote
> confidence disproportionate to competence.

I would sum this up with the phrase, "Hold my beer..."

~~~
pbhjpbhj
> "The stupidest thing someone can do is overestimate themselves," [from the
> OP] //

That's a worrying conclusion - there's a thin line between not trying for fear
of failure and considering that it's only rational that something is beyond
you so you should not try.

My young son has many times told me he is unable and will always be incapable
of doing certain things. Many of those things he can now do because we didn't
accept his considered limitations. To his mind we were overestimating his
ability to do and to learn to do.

IMO sometimes it's right to try even when we [feel we] know we will fail -
drink driving isn't one of those times [except in very limited circumstances
where it could be made relatively safe (cf Mythbusters)].

The researchers seem to call a lot of things stupidity; ignorance IMO is not
always through stupidity, equating lack of self-control and stupidity again
seems strange to me. There's some overlap for sure.

Lastly, isn't part of the point of the movie Forrest Gump that the eponymous
hero does things that are out of ignorance or apparent low-intelligence but
that are nevertheless revealed to be acts of heroism, inner-strength, love,
longstanding fortitude. Lieutenant Dan doesn't hold back in showing how
foolish he sees Gump but "Stupid is as stupid does" and it turns out what
Forrest does - courage under fire, friendship with the friendless, gumption
beyond normal endurance, and willingness to just do [ignorant, or perhaps
wilfully dismissive, of those who see or call him as stupid] - isn't stupid
after all.

