What? I mean, of course, if you define "nerds" to be "people without social intelligence" you're gonna see that nerds are unpopular. The premise beneath PG's essay (and this one, I think) is that if you instead define "nerds" to be "people with a lot of interest in some academic subject, and/or people who are quantifiably 'smart'" you still (seem to) find that nerds are unpopular.
So are you saying that that's not actually the case, that smart people aren't disproportionately unpopular? Interesting if true. Definitely needs some kind of justification, since it flies in the face of most people's intuition.
I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm leaning more towards the position that intelligence is negatively correlated with popularity. Smart people aren't necessarily outcasts, but IMX you'll tend to see fewer of them at the top of the popularity curve and more at the bottom than you'd expect from a random distribution. And I imagine that there are a lot of reasons for why this is.
PG's argument in particular is closer to the truth than it seems at face value, I think. He says that smart people's problem is that they don't spend enough time on socializing; I'm not sure if this is really the prime cause of smart people's ostensible unpopularity, but it applies to my experience in middle and high school. My parents were rich enough to send me to good private schools that valued intellectualism (which probably more closely parallel schools outside the US) so I was never really unpopular, but I was definitely less popular than I wanted to be. In retrospect it's pretty clear that I could've been way more popular if I'd doubled or tripled the amount of time I spent on it; instead, I spent my free time programming and doing math.
The only place that I disagree is with PG's rationalization of why nerds don't socialize more. In my case, it wasn't that I wanted to build great things (although to some extent I did). I'm pretty sure it was just that solving math problems was a much more reliable and straightforward endorphin trigger than socializing.
Anyway, all this is to say that a) I disagree with you and b) you should be less pithy and more explanatory.
> So are you saying that that's not actually the case, that smart people aren't disproportionately unpopular?
I think they aren't. As an example, we could hypothesize that people have a few simple attributes - say IQ (math), physical skills (sports), looks (hot or not), empathy (good at getting along with others) and political skills (good at influencing others).
I imagine that looks and physical skills are the most important factors for popularity, with empathy and political skill next, while IQ is basically irrelevant - unlike good looks, high IQ in and of itself does not cause popularity.
So let's say that popularity is a function of a weighted average score of looks, physical skills, empathy and political skills.
When we say that someone is "popular" or "smart", we don't mean "average" but more something like "top 10%".
Obviously 10% of the population will be among the 10% most popular, and 10% among the 10% smartest. But if popularity and IQ is statistically independent, only 1% will be among the top 10% in both.
So people that are both smart and popular can indeed be rare even when IQ and popularity are independent, we don't need more than a random distribution to explain that.
If we add the fact that people tend to focus on (and thereby improving) things they are good at and ignore (and thereby fall behind in) areas where they suck, it will only strengthen the trend.
I think nerds and jocks both follow the path of least resistance by putting most of their efforts into areas where they have a natural advantage. But doing so is rational behavior, it's hard to argue against it.
>So are you saying that that's not actually the case, that smart people aren't disproportionately unpopular?
That's been my experience.
Not to say there were no unpopular smart kids, but I never noticed a higher percentage than dumb kids. Though even then most of the smart people I knew who were unpopular globally were popular locally (that is within what ever group they ran with).
The terminology is secondary; the important point is that it seems like smart people are unpopular, but it's not clear whether that's true and if it is true it's not clear why.
They lack social skills because they lack emotional intelligence.
To take it further: nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have learnt to ignore the relevant emotions. That is why bullies are able to bait nerds; they both feel that the nerds' denial of group emotions makes them culpable.
But honestly, all of this pointing at other people is kind of annoying. We are just as culpable in our social ostracism as everyone else.
Nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have categorized it as pointless - at least seemed to have convinced themselves of that point. I disagree that they've learned to ignore the relevant emotions, it's more like they've convinced themselves that fitting in and being part of society is unimportant, and that the world is simply out to get them with their dumb social expectations.
Of course, many nerds never truly believe this deep inside, which causes all kinds of angst for them, but that's another topic entirely.
IMHO nerds on the whole have developed this giant victim complex. It's not us refusing to fit in with the group that causes our ostracism - it's clearly because we're smart and they fear our intelligence. Yeah, that's it.
People don't like us because a large portion of our community are quite simply arrogant jackasses. They pride themselves in being nerds, see themselves as smarter than the rest, and generally just lord their intelligence over everyone else. No wonder people hit us at our weak point: our lack of social skills.
This isn't meant to be a complete diatribe against nerds - I love being one, but honestly, a lot of the responsibility for the anti-nerd thing is our fault.
In terms of "fitting in": many nerds conclude that paying attention to pop culture, sports, and fashion (Brad and Angelina, Eminem, Kobe Bryant) is pointless. We could learn about them if we wanted to "fit in", but we often find them just plain boring. Why would we do something boring just to get the attention of a bunch of kids who like boring stuff? Why not do stuff we find interesting, like math or reading, and be popular with the minority who also find those things interesting?
(Disclaimer: I'm actually quite the sports nut, as well as a huge nerd.)
Because, surprise, that's what people do. Do you really think all those "normals" really like Brangelina, Eminem, and Kobe Bryant? Hell no. In the "real" world everyone learns about things, and talks about things that do not interest them for the sake of socialization. Nerds seem to think they're the only ones who find these things dull and pointless - but here's the trick: so does everyone else! The difference is that normal people are willing to suck it up for the sake of staying in the social graph, while nerds don't. "Normals" acknowledge that in order to participate in this society, there will be a mix of shit that interests them vs. shit that doesn't.
The extension of that...
> "just to get the attention of a bunch of kids who like boring stuff?"
... which proves my point. Nerds lord their intelligence over other people, while being generally clueless as to how "normals" operate. They're not people, they're kids who like boring stuff. I'm such a unique snowflake, only I can see how boring all this celeb gossip is - clearly those dim-witted normal people actually like this shit. If you actually took the time and participated in society at large you'll know as well as everyone else that socialization is a great deal of give and take, and that what people object to isn't your boring interests, it's your complete unwillingness to participate in their boring interests.
I've had the opportunity to talk about things other people are interested in - the general rule is, if you show interest in what they're doing, they will reciprocate. A lot of the hostility that nerds get from the world at large is simply a direct reflection of the hostility they show the rest of the world.
> "Why not do stuff we find interesting, like math or reading,"
Surprise: the rest of the world does these things too. Especially reading. Like I've said above: their acceptance of your weird/boring interests is positively correlated with your acceptance of their weird/boring interests.
If nerds in general would just stop behaving as if they're kings of the universe, better than everyone else, they would ostracized a lot less. In fact, there are a large number of nerds who have figured this out - I know more than a few hackers who fit into society just peachy.
> "normal people are willing to suck it up for the sake of staying in the social graph, while nerds don't."
I think much of the problem for nerd kids in particular is that they're both unwilling to learn truly boring stuff (like celeb gossip), and not socially adept enough to steer conversation to interesting common ground with others (that's hard work for introverts.) This leads to the social ostracism you noted previously.
Given the tradeoff between "pretend to care about truly boring stuff" and "have a small social graph", I'd take the small social graph ten times out of ten. I would not recommend "suck it up and learn boring stuff" as a solution. A better solution is learning to find true common interests, maintaining a large social graph because everyone has some interests that are worth learning about.
As a moderately extroverted nerd, I didn't have that hard a time growing up, nor do I have a hard time now. I've always participated in people's interests, it's just that I've known how to participate in their cool, real interests instead of their boring, fake ones. But for those few people who I couldn't find common ground with (for whatever reason), I made the choice not to invent boring common ground. Yeah, that means "not fitting in" with them is my fault -- but that doesn't make it a bad thing.
Your last line is the crux of the whole argument. There is nothing inherently wrong with not fitting in. There is something wrong with making no effort to fit in and then blaming the world that you feel left out, refusing to accept any responsibility yourself..
It is in the nature of denial that one is unaware both of what is denied and of the denial itself. Only when denial is relinquished does one realise that the it was both real and voluntary.
Just because a person in denial wouldn't know it doesn't prove that I was in denial, it just means that you have a theory that's unprovable because you've set yourself up so that any evidence at all, both positive and negative, makes you believe that you're right.
You're right, the theory is unfalsifiable (for now at least).
However, I have argued for it, and I believe if offers the best explanation for the nerd-bully phenomenon. Bullies can't really pick on people who are simply mistaken, they can only pick on people who are (at some level) ashamed of themselves. [See my reply to zackattack for more.]
I'd like to stress that all this doesn't make bullying any less wrong or less damaging for all concerned.
Bullies can't pick on people who are simply mistaken?
Bullies can pick on anyone they choose. In my school they picked on everyone - including each other. The ones they continues to pick on were the ones that didn't fight back.
If you study bullies carefully you will notice that they are continually probing potential victims for the right kind of emotional response (prior to any further verbal or physical abuse). If they don't elicit one they move on to new targets,
Whereas there are people who aren't picked on by bullies, despite having never fought back. And I don't think they are necessarily the most popular individuals (although such people do fit into that category).
"They lack social skills because they lack emotional intelligence." --> I agree
"nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have learnt to ignore the relevant emotions." --> Maybe.
"That is why bullies are able to bait nerds; they both feel that the nerds' denial of group emotions makes them culpable." --> I would love to hear you expand on this, and I loved that you invoked a concept of "group emotions", which I had never before heard formulated as such.
Part of my explanation would be that you can only insult a person with their compliance. If they become offended or defensive then they are implicitly conceding that you have a point.
So, although nerds are consciously unaware of their denial, it lurks beneath the surface and effects their emotional response in ways that other people can detect.
If they become offended or defensive then they are implicitly conceding that you have a point.
Not at all true. Especially with children. Shouting rude words at kids, threats of physical violence, and implication of things they don't understand make kids feel awful very easily.
Comments
Lots of bizarre rationalizing. "Nerds" tend to be unpopular because they lack emotional and social intelligence.
What? I mean, of course, if you define "nerds" to be "people without social intelligence" you're gonna see that nerds are unpopular. The premise beneath PG's essay (and this one, I think) is that if you instead define "nerds" to be "people with a lot of interest in some academic subject, and/or people who are quantifiably 'smart'" you still (seem to) find that nerds are unpopular.
So are you saying that that's not actually the case, that smart people aren't disproportionately unpopular? Interesting if true. Definitely needs some kind of justification, since it flies in the face of most people's intuition.
I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm leaning more towards the position that intelligence is negatively correlated with popularity. Smart people aren't necessarily outcasts, but IMX you'll tend to see fewer of them at the top of the popularity curve and more at the bottom than you'd expect from a random distribution. And I imagine that there are a lot of reasons for why this is.
PG's argument in particular is closer to the truth than it seems at face value, I think. He says that smart people's problem is that they don't spend enough time on socializing; I'm not sure if this is really the prime cause of smart people's ostensible unpopularity, but it applies to my experience in middle and high school. My parents were rich enough to send me to good private schools that valued intellectualism (which probably more closely parallel schools outside the US) so I was never really unpopular, but I was definitely less popular than I wanted to be. In retrospect it's pretty clear that I could've been way more popular if I'd doubled or tripled the amount of time I spent on it; instead, I spent my free time programming and doing math.
The only place that I disagree is with PG's rationalization of why nerds don't socialize more. In my case, it wasn't that I wanted to build great things (although to some extent I did). I'm pretty sure it was just that solving math problems was a much more reliable and straightforward endorphin trigger than socializing.
Anyway, all this is to say that a) I disagree with you and b) you should be less pithy and more explanatory.
> So are you saying that that's not actually the case, that smart people aren't disproportionately unpopular?
I think they aren't. As an example, we could hypothesize that people have a few simple attributes - say IQ (math), physical skills (sports), looks (hot or not), empathy (good at getting along with others) and political skills (good at influencing others).
I imagine that looks and physical skills are the most important factors for popularity, with empathy and political skill next, while IQ is basically irrelevant - unlike good looks, high IQ in and of itself does not cause popularity.
So let's say that popularity is a function of a weighted average score of looks, physical skills, empathy and political skills.
When we say that someone is "popular" or "smart", we don't mean "average" but more something like "top 10%".
Obviously 10% of the population will be among the 10% most popular, and 10% among the 10% smartest. But if popularity and IQ is statistically independent, only 1% will be among the top 10% in both.
So people that are both smart and popular can indeed be rare even when IQ and popularity are independent, we don't need more than a random distribution to explain that.
If we add the fact that people tend to focus on (and thereby improving) things they are good at and ignore (and thereby fall behind in) areas where they suck, it will only strengthen the trend.
I think nerds and jocks both follow the path of least resistance by putting most of their efforts into areas where they have a natural advantage. But doing so is rational behavior, it's hard to argue against it.
>So are you saying that that's not actually the case, that smart people aren't disproportionately unpopular?
That's been my experience.
Not to say there were no unpopular smart kids, but I never noticed a higher percentage than dumb kids. Though even then most of the smart people I knew who were unpopular globally were popular locally (that is within what ever group they ran with).
> if you instead define "nerds" to be "people with a lot of interest in some academic subject, and/or people who are quantifiably 'smart'"
So, the Comic Book Guy is not a nerd? Even Wikipedia calls him that.
This is drifting offtopic, but CBG was a member of MENSA[1] and therefore falls under the "quantifiably 'smart'" category.
[1] http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_Comic_Book_Guy_a_member_of_MENS...
You win this round, The Simpsons Cartoon Guy.
The terminology is secondary; the important point is that it seems like smart people are unpopular, but it's not clear whether that's true and if it is true it's not clear why.
They lack social skills because they lack emotional intelligence.
To take it further: nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have learnt to ignore the relevant emotions. That is why bullies are able to bait nerds; they both feel that the nerds' denial of group emotions makes them culpable.
Note: I consider myself a nerd.
But honestly, all of this pointing at other people is kind of annoying. We are just as culpable in our social ostracism as everyone else.
Nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have categorized it as pointless - at least seemed to have convinced themselves of that point. I disagree that they've learned to ignore the relevant emotions, it's more like they've convinced themselves that fitting in and being part of society is unimportant, and that the world is simply out to get them with their dumb social expectations.
Of course, many nerds never truly believe this deep inside, which causes all kinds of angst for them, but that's another topic entirely.
IMHO nerds on the whole have developed this giant victim complex. It's not us refusing to fit in with the group that causes our ostracism - it's clearly because we're smart and they fear our intelligence. Yeah, that's it.
People don't like us because a large portion of our community are quite simply arrogant jackasses. They pride themselves in being nerds, see themselves as smarter than the rest, and generally just lord their intelligence over everyone else. No wonder people hit us at our weak point: our lack of social skills.
This isn't meant to be a complete diatribe against nerds - I love being one, but honestly, a lot of the responsibility for the anti-nerd thing is our fault.
In terms of "fitting in": many nerds conclude that paying attention to pop culture, sports, and fashion (Brad and Angelina, Eminem, Kobe Bryant) is pointless. We could learn about them if we wanted to "fit in", but we often find them just plain boring. Why would we do something boring just to get the attention of a bunch of kids who like boring stuff? Why not do stuff we find interesting, like math or reading, and be popular with the minority who also find those things interesting?
(Disclaimer: I'm actually quite the sports nut, as well as a huge nerd.)
> " Why would we do something boring"
Because, surprise, that's what people do. Do you really think all those "normals" really like Brangelina, Eminem, and Kobe Bryant? Hell no. In the "real" world everyone learns about things, and talks about things that do not interest them for the sake of socialization. Nerds seem to think they're the only ones who find these things dull and pointless - but here's the trick: so does everyone else! The difference is that normal people are willing to suck it up for the sake of staying in the social graph, while nerds don't. "Normals" acknowledge that in order to participate in this society, there will be a mix of shit that interests them vs. shit that doesn't.
The extension of that...
> "just to get the attention of a bunch of kids who like boring stuff?"
... which proves my point. Nerds lord their intelligence over other people, while being generally clueless as to how "normals" operate. They're not people, they're kids who like boring stuff. I'm such a unique snowflake, only I can see how boring all this celeb gossip is - clearly those dim-witted normal people actually like this shit. If you actually took the time and participated in society at large you'll know as well as everyone else that socialization is a great deal of give and take, and that what people object to isn't your boring interests, it's your complete unwillingness to participate in their boring interests.
I've had the opportunity to talk about things other people are interested in - the general rule is, if you show interest in what they're doing, they will reciprocate. A lot of the hostility that nerds get from the world at large is simply a direct reflection of the hostility they show the rest of the world.
> "Why not do stuff we find interesting, like math or reading,"
Surprise: the rest of the world does these things too. Especially reading. Like I've said above: their acceptance of your weird/boring interests is positively correlated with your acceptance of their weird/boring interests.
If nerds in general would just stop behaving as if they're kings of the universe, better than everyone else, they would ostracized a lot less. In fact, there are a large number of nerds who have figured this out - I know more than a few hackers who fit into society just peachy.
> "normal people are willing to suck it up for the sake of staying in the social graph, while nerds don't."
I think much of the problem for nerd kids in particular is that they're both unwilling to learn truly boring stuff (like celeb gossip), and not socially adept enough to steer conversation to interesting common ground with others (that's hard work for introverts.) This leads to the social ostracism you noted previously.
Given the tradeoff between "pretend to care about truly boring stuff" and "have a small social graph", I'd take the small social graph ten times out of ten. I would not recommend "suck it up and learn boring stuff" as a solution. A better solution is learning to find true common interests, maintaining a large social graph because everyone has some interests that are worth learning about.
As a moderately extroverted nerd, I didn't have that hard a time growing up, nor do I have a hard time now. I've always participated in people's interests, it's just that I've known how to participate in their cool, real interests instead of their boring, fake ones. But for those few people who I couldn't find common ground with (for whatever reason), I made the choice not to invent boring common ground. Yeah, that means "not fitting in" with them is my fault -- but that doesn't make it a bad thing.
Your last line is the crux of the whole argument. There is nothing inherently wrong with not fitting in. There is something wrong with making no effort to fit in and then blaming the world that you feel left out, refusing to accept any responsibility yourself..
nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have learnt to ignore the relevant emotions.
I disagree. I never learned to ignore specific emotions - I was simply unaware of them. It took me a long time to learn to understand emotions.
It is in the nature of denial that one is unaware both of what is denied and of the denial itself. Only when denial is relinquished does one realise that the it was both real and voluntary.
And?
Just because a person in denial wouldn't know it doesn't prove that I was in denial, it just means that you have a theory that's unprovable because you've set yourself up so that any evidence at all, both positive and negative, makes you believe that you're right.
You're right, the theory is unfalsifiable (for now at least).
However, I have argued for it, and I believe if offers the best explanation for the nerd-bully phenomenon. Bullies can't really pick on people who are simply mistaken, they can only pick on people who are (at some level) ashamed of themselves. [See my reply to zackattack for more.]
I'd like to stress that all this doesn't make bullying any less wrong or less damaging for all concerned.
Bullies can't pick on people who are simply mistaken?
Bullies can pick on anyone they choose. In my school they picked on everyone - including each other. The ones they continues to pick on were the ones that didn't fight back.
If you study bullies carefully you will notice that they are continually probing potential victims for the right kind of emotional response (prior to any further verbal or physical abuse). If they don't elicit one they move on to new targets,
Whereas there are people who aren't picked on by bullies, despite having never fought back. And I don't think they are necessarily the most popular individuals (although such people do fit into that category).
"They lack social skills because they lack emotional intelligence." --> I agree
"nerds lack emotional intelligence because they have learnt to ignore the relevant emotions." --> Maybe.
"That is why bullies are able to bait nerds; they both feel that the nerds' denial of group emotions makes them culpable." --> I would love to hear you expand on this, and I loved that you invoked a concept of "group emotions", which I had never before heard formulated as such.
Part of my explanation would be that you can only insult a person with their compliance. If they become offended or defensive then they are implicitly conceding that you have a point.
So, although nerds are consciously unaware of their denial, it lurks beneath the surface and effects their emotional response in ways that other people can detect.
If they become offended or defensive then they are implicitly conceding that you have a point.
Not at all true. Especially with children. Shouting rude words at kids, threats of physical violence, and implication of things they don't understand make kids feel awful very easily.
Reading TFA might be useful.