There are people alive today who were studying calculus before they reached the age of eleven. There are people alive today who were programming by the age of eight. There are people alive today who were publishing papers by the time they were fifteen. There are people alive today who completed their PhD's at the age of twenty-one.
What were you doing at the age of eight, Veeky Forums? More importantly, what are you doing right now to make up for all that wasted time? How are you planning to compete? You do intend to compete, right?
>What were you doing at the age of eight having a life, fucking nerd
Michael Wilson
Every time you mention that all I can think about is: I published my first paper at the age that Paul Erdos published his first paper. So I'm A-Okay.
Matthew Green
>There are people alive today who were programming by the age of eight. Yeah that was me. Wasn't any money in it without a fucking math degree tho so I'm doing accounting now instead.
Camden Jackson
Why do these keep popping up? Are you people so insecure? Are you a virgin or something?
It doesn't matter which arbitrary thing you pick to focus on, the world will always be filled with people and in every single thing you know how to do, there will be someone who's better. Even if you're the next fucking Einstein or Von Neumann or whatever (which you're not, none of us are, and we all know that), you'll still be shit in the other million things compared to the top of their respective fields. And even then, you'll die some day, be forgotten a little later, and your entire species will die in less than the blink of an eye in the cosmic scale.
There is no scenario in which that attitude will net you a win. Not ever, not in a billion lifetimes, in a trillion different realities. So do whatever the fuck you want, anything you enjoy and gets you by. I my case it's CS, I'm better at it than most, which nets me money, which nets me security and independence and provides the luxury and time for myself and my hobbies that I appreciate most in life. That right there is the only way to play.
William Cooper
Planning to compete for the achievements of our generation is the intellectual equivalent of a child risking everything on a a single playground game because he think it matters. All it does is tell everyone else how little you understand, how tiny your comprehension of the true scope of reality, the infinite span of time and existence, and the below insignificant part of humanity in all of it is.
Grayson Flores
so life sucks and i'm stuck in a thirdworld shithole
Nathan Martinez
when i was 8 i was chillin, doin kid shit now i'm advancing the limit of human knowledge
if all these little assholes were doing such cool shit before 20 why are we not living in a technological utopia??
oh just cuz you can learn a particular facet of knowledge doesn't mean you have the experience skill or knowledge to innovate, which literally defines the growth of our civilization now
Joshua Martinez
Do you think Tao is so satisfied with himself for being a brilliant guy who was a child prodigy? If you look at his blog and his published work, he has tackled with a number of unsolved problems (Riemann hypothesis, abc conjecture, Collatz, Navier-Stokes, etc), yet has been unable to solve them or make significant progress on them. He got a huge breakthrough on the Erdos discrepancy problem and primes in arithmetic progressions, but I assure you he probably stays awake at night thinking whether he has peaked and will never produce a significant breakthrough again and merely stay an 'average genius'. Investing all our self-esteem into a race that by definition only a handful of humans in a given generation can win is futile. You can work on being the best intellect possible while still having a life outside it. After all, accumulating knowledge is a marathon not a sprint.
Jordan Brooks
This was always my favorite "alter ego" of Filthy Frank. I love how he pranked the people who give out the Fields Medal by doing all that work on primes. Best part is when he left the stage and then Pink Guy busted in five minutes later, breakdancing and screaming at them to feed him hamburgers.
Owen Edwards
OP here. Well, fuck. I'll sit down then, Veeky Forums.
Colton Walker
From Meditations by Marcus Aurelius: >He who has a vehement desire for posthumous fame does not consider that every one of those who remember him will himself also die very soon; then again also they who have succeeded them, until the whole remembrance shall have been extinguished as it is transmitted through men who foolishly admire and perish. But suppose that those who will remember are even immortal, and that the remembrance will be immortal, what then is this to thee? And I say not what is it to the dead, but what is it to the living? What is praise except indeed so far as it has a certain utility? For thou now rejectest unseasonably the gift of nature, clinging to something else...
Asher Anderson
I don't intend to compete. Im just gonna do math.
Daniel Ortiz
Take out the competition and rule with an iron fist. Just like how we got here.
Wyatt Morales
>More importantly, what are you doing right now Masturbating to traps
Luke Richardson
Playing Pokemon and reading Hairy Penis. Little to nothing, by studying and praying.
Jayden White
Ed Witten dropped out of grad school for a while and couldn't decide what to do, and Vladimir Voevodsky was kicked out of high school and flunked out of Moscow State University before eventually getting accepted to Harvard and eventually revolutionizing algebraic geometry and winning a Fields Medal. This stuff isn't all that linear, at least not for everybody.
Asher Bennett
Why does it have to be a competition.
Mason Watson
Thanks for sharing
Cameron Reed
Riding my bike, playing outside, Pokemon on the old school Gameboy, going to my friend's house to play with Legos. Basically having a fucking life and not being a grown up and missing it all.
Aaron Sanders
I squandered my talents and opportunities and lives in mediocrity as madness consumes me
Blake Torres
OP doesn't know the difference between healthy competition and all-consuming obsessions used to fill the void in the human heart.
Connor Peterson
/thread
Adam Lopez
Fields Medalist Stephen Smale is another example: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Smale >Smale entered the University of Michigan in 1948.[3][4] Initially, he was a good student, placing into an honors calculus sequence taught by Bob Thrall and earning himself A's. However, his sophomore and junior years were marred with mediocre grades, mostly Bs, Cs and even an F in nuclear physics. However, with some luck, Smale was accepted as a graduate student at the University of Michigan's mathematics department. Yet again, Smale performed poorly in his first years, earning a C average as a graduate student. It was only when the department chair, Hildebrandt, threatened to kick Smale out that he began to work hard.[5] Smale finally earned his Ph.D. in 1957, under Raoul Bott.
Adrian Reyes
most of them burn by 20 op, it's fine
Lucas Young
I've accepted the fact that I'm not particularly smart in the broad scheme of things. Not everyone can be a Feynman or a Gauss. I'll do what I can for my field and then I'll die
Jose Gonzalez
>if all these little assholes were doing such cool shit before 20 why are we not living in a technological utopia?? >oh just cuz you can learn a particular facet of knowledge doesn't mean you have the experience skill or knowledge to innovate, which literally defines the growth of our civilization now This.
