komponisto comments on Negative and Positive Selection - Less Wrong

71 Post author: alyssavance 06 July 2012 01:34AM

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Comment author: komponisto 07 July 2012 10:46:18PM *  1 point [-]

Conscientiousness is what you need in order to finish what you start, when what you started is something that somebody else told you to do. When it's your own thing, you need a lot less of it.

As for political savvy -- that isn't required at all. Unless by "research" you mean "political success in the human occupation customarily but misleadingly labeled 'research'." (The "as such" qualifier a few comments above was intended to rule that out.)

Comment author: wedrifid 08 July 2012 12:37:38AM *  1 point [-]

Conscientiousness is what you need in order to finish what you start, when what you started is something that somebody else told you to do.

I really, really wish this were true. At some point in the process of doing your own things you are going to have to do work. Mundane details, repetition, parts of the process you don't like. For example, you have to write up findings, crunch numbers, prepare details of any experiments you may be doing, double check stuff for reliability and proofread.

As for political savvy -- that isn't required at all. Unless by "research" you mean "political success in the human occupation customarily but misleadingly labeled 'research'."

Not true. Political savvy makes a huge difference to your actual ability to produce research output.

  • Without political savvy, for example, I would never have been able to make use of the supercomputer that I needed for my research, or to get the grant money to keep me funded while doing it. (Most of that savvy was, of course, possessed by my Professor, mine was limited to building the connection needed to make him give me the role.)
  • From what I understand the material requirements are even more difficult to handle in other fields such as experimental physics or anything requiring actual human (or animal) test subjects.
  • It is also needed to keep others from outright interfering with what you are trying to do (I've run into problems there).
  • Without political support you aren't able to do the research that you want to do. You are more likely to need to adapt and research the interests of others. This interferes with the conscientiousness bonus for working on personal projects.
  • If you can't get others to support what you are doing you need to support yourself doing other things that others want you to do (ie. get a job.) That slows down your research.
  • Minions. Having those means you can be doing a lot more of the core research while others handle mundane tasks.

I don't like it, but politics really does improve your ability to do research---and just about anything else.

Comment author: komponisto 08 July 2012 12:55:59AM 0 points [-]

At some point in the process of doing your own things you are going to have to do work. Mundane details, repetition, parts of the process you don't like

I said less of this personality trait was required; I didn't say zero.

Are you really disputing the notion that it takes less conscientiousness (other terms: "self-discipline", "willpower") to work on projects of one's own choosing? That's actually almost the definition of "one's own choosing": what one does by default.

Political savvy makes a huge difference to your actual ability to produce research output.

Like I suspected, we're talking past each other. Everything you say either pertains to the human occupation (and not just the act of coming up with good ideas, and maybe -- with minimal Conscientiousness -- writing them up in articles), or else is only the case because the system is set up in the suboptimal way it is.

Comment author: wedrifid 08 July 2012 02:12:27AM 3 points [-]

Are you really disputing the notion that it takes less conscientiousness (other terms: "self-discipline", "willpower") to work on projects of one's own choosing? That's actually almost the definition of "one's own choosing": what one does by default.

Less conscientiousness, certainly. I believe we do have a factual disagreement regarding how much is still required.

Like I suspected, we're talking past each other. Everything you say either pertains to the human occupation (and not just the act of coming up with good ideas, and maybe -- with minimal Conscientiousness -- writing them up in articles), or else is only the case because the system is set up in the suboptimal way it is.

I do wish the system (aka the universe) was set up a different way to what it is. For example if I had a team of catgirls with a 'research assistant skills and motivational inspiration' upgrade and a versatile fully stocked volcano-lair laboratory I'd be able to get heaps of research done. Well, after a few weeks when I got bored with the alternatives.

Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 08 July 2012 07:43:32AM 3 points [-]

I am not sure your alternative is immediately practical.

Comment author: wedrifid 08 July 2012 08:36:49AM 6 points [-]

I am not sure your alternative is immediately practical.

But you guys are working on it, right?

Comment author: gwern 08 July 2012 12:54:46AM 0 points [-]

http://www.pgbovine.net/PhD-memoir/pguo-PhD-grind.pdf demonstrates, I think, both the use of Conscientiousness and the politicking.

Comment author: Swimmer963 07 July 2012 11:06:58PM 0 points [-]

When it's your own thing, you need a lot less of it.

This strikes me as untrue for most people. Can you give me examples of people who were not conscientious and were nonetheless able to complete large, multi-step projects?

Comment author: Nornagest 07 July 2012 11:41:05PM 1 point [-]

I actually find myself much more capable of finishing large, multi-step projects when they've got social implications riding on them. I enjoy my private projects more when I'm doing them, but have trouble finishing them if they take more than a few hours of serious work.

The first category does include things that others didn't directly tell me to do, though: there's also things I'm doing as favors to others, public-facing projects I came up with independently, and so on.

Comment author: komponisto 08 July 2012 01:02:43AM 0 points [-]

most people

Not really the issue in this discussion, which is about the negative effects of a filtering system that excludes a certain small but highly valuable population.

Can you give me examples of people who were not conscientious and were nonetheless able to complete large, multi-step projects?

As I've suggested earlier, EY is a pretty good example of the type of personality I have in mind.

Comment author: Swimmer963 08 July 2012 01:28:28AM 1 point [-]

most people

Not really the issue in this discussion, which is about the negative effects of a filtering system that excludes a certain small but highly valuable population.

Fair enough. The highly valuable 'outliers' are likely going to be different enough from me that I'll have trouble mapping and comparing my traits onto theirs, which makes that kind of comparison not very useful.

EY is a pretty good example of the type of personality I have in mind.

You may know better than me, but as far as I can tell, EY does have the ability to coax himself into working productively on projects that aren't necessarily a lot of fun all the time. He just won't do it for any goal that that he doesn't consider important. He strikes me more as someone who dislikes authority figures and cares less about the typical social reinforcement that comes of achieving more "conventional" goals, like going to university.

Comment author: komponisto 08 July 2012 01:44:09AM 2 points [-]

He just won't do it for any goal that that he doesn't consider important.

Yes, exactly. This is exactly the kind of story that such folks will tell about themselves.

Whereas, by contrast, the "conscientious" have enough willpower resources to spare for tasks that others consider "important" for them to do, as well.

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