> sometimes it seems like on this site 80 percent of people fall in one of those categories for someone like elon musk. for trump it’s like 99 pct. it’s a shame people can’t just be objective and call out good/bad
I actually, uncharacteristically, disagree with a lot of what Paul Graham has said about fans and haters. His basic premise is that we should judge people/endeavors based on critical thinking and solid metrics, rather than how we "feel" about something.
There are two problems with this:
1. Who gets to define the metrics.
Any endeavor can be made to look great or horrible if different metrics are used. People who wish for "critical thinking" in public discourse are really wishing for their own critical thinking to be applied. e.g., building luxery high-rises is good because it raises a community's average home value... lets forget about the people who are being displaced.
2. There are no good metrics.
For most new endeavors, we have very little data about what they are doing. No one knows the details of SpaceX's starship and how it will turn out (probably including SpaceX employees). In politics, no one knows what Trump will do next, or what his strategy (if any) has been. No one has any good data if the next VC backed social media company will be a hit or not.
Generally, in all of these areas, all we have is a leader and sometimes a vision, but rarely a plan. A "fanboy" is someone who believes in the leadership, and a "hater" is someone who does not. It's true that neither looks at the hard details, however those details often don't exist. A fanboy/hater just trust/distrusts the leader and vision, rather than taking a close look at the individual steps that they've made.
This is actually a good thing. Someone offers up a vision and their own credibility, and you make a decision to support them based on them, rather than specific moves they've made. You trust the person first, rather than what they do.
Apple Fanboys are who they are because they believe in Apple's vision of good design to create better electronics. Startup haters are who they are because they see a lack of discipline in the space. It's entirely natural, and probably preferred, for people to make decisions this way rather than unknown data.
One thing I've noticed is confirmation bias causes people to look for any evidence to support their initial gut feeling. It gets worse the more this is tied to identity. I had gear head friends in the 1980's who loved carburetors, thought mechanical fuel injection was wonderful and exotic. And HATED electronic fuel injection. Same guys hated the Prius when it showed up. And now they hate electric cars. They make bargaining arguments why X is bad.
I think the best thing to do with someones vision is try and prove it instead of tear it down. In business the only real show stoppers are, doesn't work, doesn't pencil out[1], no customers/potential customers have no money.
[1] On the other hand see Uber. Maybe you can win with two out of three even.
I actually, uncharacteristically, disagree with a lot of what Paul Graham has said about fans and haters. His basic premise is that we should judge people/endeavors based on critical thinking and solid metrics, rather than how we "feel" about something.
There are two problems with this:
1. Who gets to define the metrics. Any endeavor can be made to look great or horrible if different metrics are used. People who wish for "critical thinking" in public discourse are really wishing for their own critical thinking to be applied. e.g., building luxery high-rises is good because it raises a community's average home value... lets forget about the people who are being displaced.
2. There are no good metrics. For most new endeavors, we have very little data about what they are doing. No one knows the details of SpaceX's starship and how it will turn out (probably including SpaceX employees). In politics, no one knows what Trump will do next, or what his strategy (if any) has been. No one has any good data if the next VC backed social media company will be a hit or not.
Generally, in all of these areas, all we have is a leader and sometimes a vision, but rarely a plan. A "fanboy" is someone who believes in the leadership, and a "hater" is someone who does not. It's true that neither looks at the hard details, however those details often don't exist. A fanboy/hater just trust/distrusts the leader and vision, rather than taking a close look at the individual steps that they've made.
This is actually a good thing. Someone offers up a vision and their own credibility, and you make a decision to support them based on them, rather than specific moves they've made. You trust the person first, rather than what they do.
Apple Fanboys are who they are because they believe in Apple's vision of good design to create better electronics. Startup haters are who they are because they see a lack of discipline in the space. It's entirely natural, and probably preferred, for people to make decisions this way rather than unknown data.