Re: Syllabus for Seed Developer Qualifications [WAS Re: Some considerations about AGI]

From: Russell Wallace (russell.wallace@gmail.com)
Date: Sun Jan 29 2006 - 15:27:33 MST


On 1/29/06, Marieke Willis <luuknam@yahoo.com> wrote:Having majored in

> Biomedical Science & Engineering, AI, EE, and Neuroscience at different
> universities for smaller and larger amounts of time makes it real
> obvious to me that in all of the areas you might find people from there
> are tons of people who are severely lacking in people skills (which
> doesn't mean that I wasn't/am not one of them).

Well yes. The best of the best technical people are normally severely
lacking in people skills (or at least don't develop them until much later in
life than average). If you can find counterexamples, great! (I'm certainly
not one of them.) But if you're relying on counterexamples, well, you may be
waiting some time.

I'd rather teach a brilliant person math/programming than teach them
> how to communicate, self-control, emotional stability, etc.

That only works if the person is willing to do what it takes to learn
math/programming. If you find someone who has communication ability,
self-control, emotional stability etc, that usually implies they've had more
common sense than to spend years of their lives sitting in a basement
staring at a computer screen; and if they weren't willing to do that before,
they're probably not willing to do it now.

- Russell



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