Hacker News Reader

There is a distinction to be drawn between talking to someone about something you don't care about and stuff you both find interesting. Smart people should have no shortage of topics to talk about with 'normal people', in my opinion.

Conversations with multiple people will flow between things in which you’re interested and things in which you are not. It’s a learned skill to remain in the conversation, even if it is just as an active listener.

“If you’re bored, you’re not paying attention.” There is always something interesting going on, even if it is not the content of the conversation itself.

Development of these skills, and related conversational skills, can be an intellectual exercise more interesting than many books.

> Many of the smartest and most high IQ people are perfectly capable of relating to normal people without making it obvious how bored they are.

Why would they be bored? Normal people can be just as interesting or uninteresting as high IQ people.

> It's like normalising conversations about sport or TV. "But I'm not interested in sport or TV" becomes an unacceptable view because "most people" are.

as someone who only watches the "popular" sports from the sidelines, this one bites me quite often in social situations, actually.

same goes with popular Netflix shows or mind-numbing "reality" tv and which celebrity is dating which other celebrity.

> It's like normalising conversations about sport or TV. "But I'm not interested in sport or TV" becomes an unacceptable view because "most people" are. So you should definitely pretend to find the latest reality show as interesting as the most recent ball game because otherwise you "have no social skills."

I mean, it depends. I'm considered pretty socially adept (I can be an asshole, but usually it's due to other character flaws like selfishness and impatience rather than poor social skills), and I don't like sports or most TV shows. (I watched fewer than 5 TV shows or movies in 2021).

In my experience, with small talk it's about finding a common connection. People bring up stupid things (like the weather, TV, sportsballs) in order to find a point of connection. If you don't like the things the other person likes (sports/TV), then just saying "I don't like X" without offering a follow up shuts down the conversation. Socially it signals "I do not want to connect, leave me be."

I like to follow up with "Oh, X isn't my thing, but it sounds pretty cool, especially the INSERT THING THEY MENTIONED. That's kind of like Y (thing I like); have you seen that? Are they similar?" You can affirm people's interest in things without faking an interest yourself.

That being said, most chaos apes are not consciously aware of why they're doing things.

Where it gets difficult is that it really SHOULDN'T be one way, but when the majority of your interests are things that most people don't understand, they can't ask you questions and use your interests to connect to you like they would for most people.

The rhythm of a conversation doesn't dictate that you have the same interests, but it does dictate that you ask each other questions to find common ground. If one person doesn't understand the other well enough to ask the right questions, things get lopsided, which is where I think a lot of geeks struggle, especially as the experience differential compounds over time as we have fewer proper give-and-take conversations with peers growing up.

I think it's valuable to at least have some extremely basic knowledge of these topics, to allow you to barely follow along when someone brings up sportsball or TV shows. You don't need to know specifically whether or not the Eagles played basketball with the Phillies last night or what the score was, but you should know at the very least that the sentence doesn't make sense. Don't fight these topics, don't constantly try to change the conversation into something [likely only] you are interested in. And definitely don't disparage the topic, convey your irritation, or just sit there looking bored. Just kind of be a neutral observer when you're not into the topic. I used to be that insufferable "Area Man Constantly Mentioning He Doesn't Own A Television"[1]. It's cringe and it's not going to get you anywhere socially.

1: https://www.theonion.com/area-man-constantly-mentioning-he-d...

Agree with not disparaging, but disagree with having to know about the topics. Then again, that may be a sex based difference (assuming you're male): Women might be allowed more leeway about not knowing things, particularly when it comes to things like sports.

Admitting you don't know is fine, as long as you don't insinuate that you don't know because their interests are beneath you. There are lots of things I don't know, it doesn't mean those things are unimportant.

Yes, the problem with sports (in some circumstances) is that people will think less of you for not knowing some ground-level information. On most topics (the news, TV), people are more excited to explain the basics to you, at least in my experience. If people have to explain the rules of basketball to you, they're likely to think you're an idiot.

I hate sports, and don’t really follow them. I do research standings and stuff before going out because I want to know if someone brings it up, if they’re an “underdog” kinda person or just loyal to a team. Most sports people will quickly discover that I only have surface-level knowledge though, but I ask questions and people seem super happy to tell me how things work. In fact, most of what I know about pro-sports comes from what people tell me at parties.

> But it's a forced choice, and people who are not interested in sport or TV should be allowed to prefer something different.

And they aren't allowed to? I'm interested in neither sport nor TV and yet I have no problem being normal and being accepted as normal.

The dichotomy presented by the author and yourself[1] is a false one as there are many other explanations.

If the author has trouble relating to people he considers "beneath" him, that's purely a failing on his part. Other people, like me, are having no trouble even with a display of disinterest in sport or TV.

All the smart people I have ever met never had the trouble that the author had. Based on his two blog posts, it's hard to imagine that the author really is smarter than average.

[1] "If you don't like the things stupid people like you aren't comfortable with them" and "If you aren't comfortable with the things that stupid people like, then you must be smart")

Whether he is smart or not is almost irrelevant: we are all human and share the human experience, smart or not. If you can’t relate to other humans even though we all share the same experience, you’re not trying or you need training.

Books like “How To Win Friends and Influence People” might be for him. To some, the principles in that book are natural and obvious. Others, like this guy, might find it a learning experience.

The key message throughout that book is that you have to be sincere in your interest. You can fake interest in what someone wants to talk about, but it takes time away from perusing genuine interests. Sometimes you can fake it until a genuine interest takes hold, but I think people who don't gel with most pop culture would be there if they were going to.

> you have to be sincere in your interest

Yes, I agree. And it is possible to find shared interests with any other person because of our shared experience.

I think that one way to deal with uninteresting topics (in this case, shows / sports you don't find valuable to watch) is being able to shift topics. I find this a bit magical sometimes - shuffling through the topics until one of them fits the bill and results in a long discussion.

Of course, this is easier to do in one-on-one setting, and when the whole group wants to spend an hour unrelentingly chatting about shows (when you don't watch any) it's a bit daunting to shift their attention to something else. In such situations I tend to find anything I can relate to and introduce the topic. This could be how their description of a show brings another old one I actually had watched, or maybe chat about how many shows they go through daily, do they find their TV good, how many subscriptions do they have to maintain. Anything goes, in my opinion; heck, even throwing the "I don't watch shows" works (as long as you don't make it sound arrogant / condescending).

> But it's a forced choice, and people who are not interested in sport or TV should be allowed to prefer something different.

Exactly. Why not allow philosophy, or history, organic farming, game theory, theology, Austrian economics or other subjects as preferred party conversation topics? Why does society privilege TV shows and sports?

Have you been to a party? Of course they’re “allowed.” They’re just not popular. Most people dislike reading anything school-like but watch tons of TV.

They are allowed and used. They are just less frequent. Because even with your examples, someone interested in history of Nazi Germany does not have much to talk about with someone who just read about medieval monks lifestyle. And neither of them have common topic with someone who wants to discuss Austrian economics.

So, the three of them will discuss game of thrones.

> But there's a catch: the effort is all one way.

A conversation is a two-way street. Why do people initiate smalltalk about sports or TV? Because this is a common ground where the most people can contribute. So you start there and maybe together you steer towards more specific subjects where both parties have an interest. So if people initiate a conversation about these subjects with you, that should they are making an effort.

If you don't follow sports or tv, then you contribute another starting point for smalltalk.

People who want to skip smalltalk and jump directly to the "intellectually stimulating" subjects are typically the kind of people who just want to hear themselves talk about their favorite subject and don't care about other people except as an audience. In other words, bores.

But being a bore has nothing to do with IQ.

Of course there are also bores who are only able to talk about sports or tv. But if you think most people are only interested in these two subject, you probably confusing the starting point of smalltalk with the entire conversation.

> So you should definitely pretend to find the latest reality show as interesting as the most recent ball game because otherwise you "have no social skills."

This is not true. You are actually fine saying "I had not seen it" or "I did not liked it". People who are not interested in sport navigate these conversations without pretending. If you bluff, you will come across as weird, because you will say something clearly wrong.