Re:The programming talent myth
by vinceguidry on Monday May 04, 2015 @11:40AM
(#9486848)
It's not that simple.
So, one of the best illustrations of how talent works is in football placekickers. To make it in the NFL, you have to be able to reliably kick a field goal at X yards. X goes up every so often. Some athletes can do it, some can't. I read a story once about a guy trying to level up his skills to NFL-level. He spent weeks out on the field practicing his kick. He could hit the goal, but not reliably. One yard closer, and every kick sailed right in.
One of his buddies, a minor league baseball pitcher, went out with him one day, asked to give it a shot. On his very first try, he kicked it right in. A pitcher.
To be great, it requires getting out on the frontier of human ability. That frontier often looks very, very weird. One seemingly small additional challenge turns you into a puddle of mush. Getting there requires hard hard work.
But excelling over everyone else who also put in that hard work requires talent, and it's generally a binary proposition. Until it isn't. Once Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute mile, floods of athletes started doing it.
Then the frontier goes somewhere else, the talent required to get there is increased. But one can only put so many hours of their day into an activity. So when you're talking about greatness, talent ultimately matters more than hard work. One should ideally find out as quickly as possible whether one has the talent to make it out to the frontier of human ability. So they don't waste lots of time doing something they can never find greatness doing. The aforementioned aspiring placekicker? Gave it up. Now he's a successful author, real estate investor and football coach.
So, one of the best illustrations of how talent works is in football placekickers. To make it in the NFL, you have to be able to reliably kick a field goal at X yards. X goes up every so often. Some athletes can do it, some can't. I read a story once about a guy trying to level up his skills to NFL-level. He spent weeks out on the field practicing his kick. He could hit the goal, but not reliably. One yard closer, and every kick sailed right in.
One of his buddies, a minor league baseball pitcher, went out with him one day, asked to give it a shot. On his very first try, he kicked it right in. A pitcher.
To be great, it requires getting out on the frontier of human ability. That frontier often looks very, very weird. One seemingly small additional challenge turns you into a puddle of mush. Getting there requires hard hard work.
But excelling over everyone else who also put in that hard work requires talent, and it's generally a binary proposition. Until it isn't. Once Roger Bannister broke the 4 minute mile, floods of athletes started doing it.
Then the frontier goes somewhere else, the talent required to get there is increased. But one can only put so many hours of their day into an activity. So when you're talking about greatness, talent ultimately matters more than hard work. One should ideally find out as quickly as possible whether one has the talent to make it out to the frontier of human ability. So they don't waste lots of time doing something they can never find greatness doing. The aforementioned aspiring placekicker? Gave it up. Now he's a successful author, real estate investor and football coach.