by katzgrau on 5/28/22, 4:49 PM
Well, as an entrepreneur who is 10 years into a venture where most of my mentors thought my time was better spent on whatever was hot at the time (big data?) I can say that the perception of rationality is, like all things really, very subjective.
I see something and they don't. I think I'm right and they think they're right. But I see what I see, and I want to go for it. I might end up being wrong, but ultimately the journey to that particular place is one of the sincerest forms of self expression I've found, and I can't do that as easily if I too heavily depend on the eyes of others.
by colechristensen on 5/28/22, 5:06 PM
What? This seems to be biased towards success, you're only a rational entrepreneur if you end up being successful, and undertaking a venture without a positive expected value is irrational.
Something like telling a person that went to Las Vegas, did some gambling, had a good time, and lost money that they're irrational and enjoyed their vacation wrong.
by kodah on 5/28/22, 5:25 PM
Personally, in my thirties, I don't believe most people are rational in any consistent way. I think people that are perceived as rational tend to have good filtering and pushback mechanisms available to them, which also entails cultivating a friend-group that will provide those things without judgement and elevate you for the outcomes rather than the minutiae in between.
by nicholast on 5/28/22, 8:25 PM
You can't evaluate rationality in context of small number of samples of a fat tailed distribution with wide uncertainty bands. Besides, startups can be a kind of success even in failure based on opportunities that arise as a result.
by md224 on 5/28/22, 6:11 PM
I really dislike the concept of "rationality", or at the very least the way it gets used. I'm sure there are cases where everyone would agree that someone is behaving irrationally, but a lot of the time the label of "irrational" hides assumptions about value and tolerance for risk.
If an entrepreneur decides to prioritize certain factors over others, who's to say that's "irrational"? Is there an objectively correct way to run a business? I just find the whole idea so tiresome.
by spamizbad on 5/28/22, 5:23 PM
Surprised entrepreneurs prize this so much. I feel like being irrational is a necessary ingredient to starting a successful business. The rational don’t bother trying or give up too quickly.
by cato_the_elder on 5/28/22, 5:20 PM
Descartes put it well: "Good sense is, of all things among men, the most equally distributed; for every one thinks himself so abundantly provided with it, that those even who are the most difficult to satisfy in everything else, do not usually desire a larger measure of this quality than they already possess." [1]
Entrepreneurs are no exception.
However, I don't think entrepreneurs have a reputation of being infallibly rational. Scientists are much closer to having that kind of status, so I think studying their irrationality would be more interesting.
[1]: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/1013067-good-sense-is-of-al...
by robonerd on 5/28/22, 4:49 PM
The best anybody can aspire to is being rational some of the time; no human is rational all of the time. Anybody who thinks they're rational all the time is only demonstrating just how irrational they are, by believing something so irrational about themselves.
by MaysonL on 5/28/22, 8:47 PM
by dang on 5/28/22, 9:04 PM
URL changed from
https://oa.mg/blog/persist-or-give-up/, which points to this.
I've also changed the title in an attempt to avoid the shallow-generic style of comment which this thread has unfortunately filled up with. (Submitted title was "Study shows entrepreneurs who see themselves as rational, aren’t always rational".) The paper's own title isn't likely to lead to any better discussion, since we all know the answer already, or assume we do.
by wardedVibe on 5/28/22, 6:09 PM
I mean, the whole point of entrepreneurship is to focus on the upside and have protection from the personal risk of ruin, so it's not surprising that it would distort their thinking generally.
> entrepreneurs create a decision rule comprising a limited set of factors (e.g., the potential for growth) and selectively focus on these factors while paying less attention to and/or ignoring others (e.g., risk of going into default, period of underperformance).
by Geee on 5/28/22, 7:02 PM
It's quite interesting that economy and economic progress doesn't require rationality, i.e intelligence. Just like in evolution, randomness, copying of successful strategies and survival of the fittest are needed for economic progress. Whatever ends up happening is always post-rational, because everything that is rational survives.
by rilezg on 5/28/22, 6:36 PM
Everyone is rational based on their understanding of the world, but no one has perfect understanding of everything.
by friedman23 on 5/28/22, 4:58 PM
Paradoxically, you can't be a human and be rational and consider yourself to be rational. You need to work within the limits of the human mind and body. Depending on the circumstances of your body your bias, impulses, and ability to rationalize things changes completely.
by Jensson on 5/28/22, 4:44 PM
> Contrary to expectations, we find that self-proclaimed highly rational entrepreneurs do not (always) behave rationally
Not sure what they thought, did they expect that every entrepreneur who says they are highly rational actually are highly rational?
by otikik on 5/28/22, 5:51 PM
I would bet that applies to most humans (who see themselves as rational)
by lkrubner on 5/28/22, 5:17 PM
I apologize if this counts as a shameless plug, but entrepreneurs who are self-destructive has been my main theme for several years now. I wrote a fairly popular book about one particular case, which I think illustrates the overall problem. "How To Destroy A Tech Startup In Three Easy Steps" is a detailed look at how a particular entrepreneur, with a great idea, managed to sabotage themselves:
https://www.amazon.com/Destroy-Tech-Startup-Easy-Steps/dp/09...
by giantg2 on 5/28/22, 7:41 PM
Are there any studies showing any group of professionals is rational?
We even end up labeling the most rational people as having some sort of disorder...
by nanidin on 5/28/22, 5:29 PM
I captured this on my whiteboard as “Be open minded to the fact that you’re not always open minded.”
by jokoon on 5/28/22, 5:25 PM
I did a six months entrepreneurship training, it's all delusional marketing and advertising.
https://i.redd.it/zh9yzqmdehc31.jpg
Turning customers into fanatics, the marketing funnel, a brand into religion, this is entrepreneur 101.
by n_time on 5/28/22, 6:45 PM
Rationality is a tool not a state of being.
by readme on 5/28/22, 6:23 PM
in some notable cases entrepreneurs who seem themselves as rational are almost never rational
by photochemsyn on 5/28/22, 7:24 PM
Rational actor theory is one of those 'fundamentals of modern neoclassical economics' things that makes the whole discipline look patently ridiculous. Here's a good discussion of the issue, and some remedies:
https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/158361
> "Historians can remedy this. They can enrich economic analyses by tracing the rise and fall of particular emotions and emotional norms, for many feelings have prompted capitalist behavior and should be studied historically. We need a social history of selfishness—the feeling presumed to be central to market behavior. The word selfish entered the English language only in the 1640; self-interest joined it in 1649. That new words were created suggests that new behaviors—as well as concerns about them—developed as markets expanded."
by kosyblysk666 on 5/28/22, 6:27 PM
humans are irrational beings by default.
by marcodiego on 5/28/22, 8:00 PM
Dunning Krugger effect?
by kadenwolff on 5/28/22, 6:24 PM
Water is wet
by mistercheph on 5/28/22, 5:31 PM
Group B believes it has evidence that Group A might be irrational, publishes findings in magazine.
by imwillofficial on 5/28/22, 5:23 PM
Study also shows grass is green and the sky is blue, news at 11
by LoveGracePeace on 5/28/22, 4:04 PM
What aren't always rational, studies or entreprenenurs?
by togaen on 5/28/22, 4:42 PM
That seems… obvious.
by dgfitz on 5/28/22, 5:02 PM
This just in: studies show that people who see themselves as rational, aren’t always rational.
by jeffchuber on 5/28/22, 4:49 PM
now do humanity
by FredPret on 5/28/22, 6:34 PM
Water wet, more at 7
