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Comment by Joel_Mckay | Hacker News Reader

“My grandfather once told me that there are two kinds of people: those who do the work and those who take the credit. He told me to try to be in the first group; there was much less competition there.” (Indira Gandhi)

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There are unfortunately a lot of hard workers who think credit magically appears when you are smart enough, valuable enough, etc., and that seeking appropriate credit is beneath their dignity. This attitude often nicely coincides with their complete lack of skill at sticking up for themselves.

There is no shame in shining a bit of light on your own value. Just don’t make it blazing sun pointing at a small accomplishment.

Sometimes the inability to stick up for themselves is less due to lack of skill than lack of a sense of value in themselves apart from their achievements.

Or a refusal to play the social credit game.

Sure! But be intentional about the cost/benefit of opting out, rather than being pissed that the game-players are getting something you want.

Or find somewhere that operates differently. Some people hope that academia will be different and better than business. From what I can see it is often worse, but ymmv.

Sure. But I’ve seen a lot of resentment from people that they weren’t being treated well, resentment that was directed at others who should have done this, should have said that, etc. Sometimes that’s correct. But the armchair psychologist in me sees a lot of blame applied to others when it shouldn’t be.

There also shouldn’t be any shame in focusing on the work, if that’s what you want.

It follows that shining light on value should be a shared responsibility. It’s not just the creator that’s negatively impacted when we fail to do so. We all are.

I think I actually disagree with Gandhi here. Lol. There are a lot of people that do the work. The numbers of those who take the credit are much less. However, there is usually a power imbalance that yields to their ability to do so. So it's not about numbers. It's about power.

I think that's still consistent though. Lots of people try to take credit, only a few succeed. There is no shortage of work to be done, so there is enough room for everyone to do work.

For every Elon Musk there are hundreds or even thousands of engineers with actual degrees and experience relevant to the thing that was built.

"For every Elon Musk" Finally confirming he is a clone and or a robot...

Sure this is shocking news, but hardly surprising given the shift in behavior of late. =)

And yet Elon outcompeted them all… ;)

Ghandi did not say half the people do the work and half the people take the credit, which is what it sounds like your disagreement is with.

And of course, many binary segmentations work well for most cases and fail in unusual cases that can generally ignored.

You failed to understand the hilarious facets of Indira Gandhi's quote.

I'd explain why your informal fallacy is off-topic, but am rather focused on goldfish crackers and jellybeans at the moment.

Have a Gloriously wonderful day =)

Why on Earth would you go to such an effort to tell someone they're wrong without even bothering to share your own knowledge?

Its funnier to people that get the ironic context, and I only answer questions from abusive people if paid.

Also, goldfish crackers... nom... nom... nom...

Have a great day, and no more hints. =P

People who do the work aren't necessarily competing with each other.

People who take the credit are, almost by definition, competing with each other.

It's amazing how impressive your achievements can be if you don't mind who gets the credit. https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/12/21/doing-good-selfless...

True, unless you were a child hunted by cannibals during the Soviet era famines.

My observation is simply that giving credit to community-minded scientists costs nothing, but giving credit to psychopaths with the Kings ear can cost everyone their lives. There are always problems with a Meritocracy, as someone eventually has to define what has merit.

I am thankful to have goldfish crackers and jellybeans. Have a wonderful day =)

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