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infotropism comments on Incremental Progress and the Valley - Less Wrong
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It's important to realize that this is another myth perpetuated by the media and our ignorance of the statistics. Most startups fail; I think the statistics are that 80% die in the first 5 years. But the ones that get written up in glowing articles are the ones that succeeded. Of course all those founders who struck it rich believed strongly in their ideas, but so did many of those that failed. That irrational belief may be a crucial ingredient for success, but it doesn't supply a guarantee. Most of the people who held that irrational belief worked for businesses that failed--but they didn't get their name in the paper, so they're relatively invisible.
Agreed. History is written by the victors; just as evolution's path is paved with the untold number of those which died for lack of fitness or simply luck.
That which is successful and remains eventually isn't representative of all that has been attempted. Especially when those attempts have been made with little planning, knowledge, method, or even, when they've simply been made at random or based on beliefs that weren't entangled with reality. Holds true of any optimization process.
The less intelligent and "rational" the process, the more trashed byproducts to be quickly forgotten.