Today's Link is...
The Nerd Handbook (thank you Wil)
(...related: The Cave and N.A.D.D....)
Here's my personal take on it - more specifically, how I, personally, differ:
Note: This post will not be translated into Umerikan.
Day job
My day job, while not being my project, is useful because it keeps me up-to-date on the wide range of technology changes that relate, either directly or indirectly, to my project.
The World Is Completely Knowable
I believe this firmly, to the extent that it is knowable enough to be useful. I'm big on weighted statistics, because while you can't know everything, you can know stats that give you a handle on how to expect things to turn out, and give guidance on how to stack things so they generally come out how you want them to. They also remind you that it won't always turn out that way, or at least not exactly, so they're a kick in the pants reminding you to plan for "what happens if..." Stats also give you a handle on information reliability. Whenever I'm being told something, or am researching something, I'm rating the estimated reliability of the information at the same time that I'm absorbing and cataloging it. Phrasing helps in rating, as does the past confirmed reliability of the source. Fatalist or absolutist words like "always", "never", "can't", etc. raise immediate red flags, as do certain ways of saying things, such as "This person discovered that this...", instead of "This person came to the conclusion that this because of this...". It's especially suspicious when they don't even provide qualifiers or technical reference material.
Monospaced Typeface World
At one point in the past, yes. I prefer things to be simpler. However, when they refuse to be simple, I create systems to help me simplify and index into them in a way that is simple enough to hold in my mind all at once, hiding the not-immediately-relevant detail clutter from the top levels of consciousness, with drill-down available on an as-needed basis. So I have a system for dealing with system-redefining events. There is still, however, a higher level of stress involved, so don't push me too hard when I'm creating a new system and am not excited about it. (:
Irrelevance Flag
I've more built up a "semi-relevant-because-the-person-is-relevant-enough-to-be-talking-to-in-the-first-place-and-they-obviously-care-about-this-enough-to-be-talking-about-it" stream that I can side-line and still track while only requiring minimal mental resources. This frees my mind to do other things, while still letting me answer coherently. Sometimes I even remember things from it for more than 15 minutes (the standard human short-term memory limit). So I don't have a "Cool", but I am thinking about other things at the same time, because your conversation is only requiring 1% of my brain, the other 99% is clamoring for attention because it thinks it might atrophy in the next 15 seconds otherwise. Or it's threatening to do a Shut Down, which causes me to yawn and pass out. Two brain gears: Stop and Fast-Forward (aka "Firehose").
Small Talk
Small talk and human interaction was an ongoing project for much of my life, slowing about 5-10 years ago. I've built up a repertoire of workable, neutral phrases, and have practiced literally hundreds of thousands of conversation fragments over the years. As such, I believe I'm a bit better at it than the typical nerd. Self-understanding (aka introspection) helps, because you know where you stand, and why, and can figure out the stats on where other people might stand, and how they might react to various stimulus. Another key to conversation is slowing down your words, and pausing while you contemplate your next phrase. This is hard to do, because you instinctively want to fill the space, but slowing down and pausing makes you look wise and contemplative to the other person. Many people I'm only casually acquainted with may not even know I'm a nerd. (:
Presenting to crowds
That was a big one for me to get over. I discovered, through forced on-the-spot presentations (example: one time I was running a developer convention; a presenter didn't show, and I had to cover for him; then in the next session I had to sit on a panel and talk to cameras) and through watching others present, that I can present just fine if I'm doing a loosely-structured talk on something I'm so thoroughly, intimately familiar with that can discuss it in my sleep. Anything else and I shouldn't be up there speaking; I won't even bother to try, because I know the outcome in advance and it's not one I'm interested in. If I'm forced to anyway, I liberally sprinkle in phrases like "I have absolutely no clue about this" when I draw a blank. Oddly, people think you smarter for it. Mostly, I think, because they subconsciously are upping your reliability.
Food and Exercise
I've got a "side-track" running that keeps me eating well and exercising decently (with monitoring), but doesn't use much in the way of brain power (i.e., I can pretty much ignore it and it mostly runs itself).
Relationships
I have had to make a big, ongoing side-track for relationships. Even then, it's not always up to my wife's standards, though I think some of that may be boredom on her part during a particularly dull segment of time for her. (:
Otherwise, yeah. Pretty much.
(...related: The Cave and N.A.D.D....)
Here's my personal take on it - more specifically, how I, personally, differ:
Note: This post will not be translated into Umerikan.
Day job
My day job, while not being my project, is useful because it keeps me up-to-date on the wide range of technology changes that relate, either directly or indirectly, to my project.
The World Is Completely Knowable
I believe this firmly, to the extent that it is knowable enough to be useful. I'm big on weighted statistics, because while you can't know everything, you can know stats that give you a handle on how to expect things to turn out, and give guidance on how to stack things so they generally come out how you want them to. They also remind you that it won't always turn out that way, or at least not exactly, so they're a kick in the pants reminding you to plan for "what happens if..." Stats also give you a handle on information reliability. Whenever I'm being told something, or am researching something, I'm rating the estimated reliability of the information at the same time that I'm absorbing and cataloging it. Phrasing helps in rating, as does the past confirmed reliability of the source. Fatalist or absolutist words like "always", "never", "can't", etc. raise immediate red flags, as do certain ways of saying things, such as "This person discovered that this...", instead of "This person came to the conclusion that this because of this...". It's especially suspicious when they don't even provide qualifiers or technical reference material.
Monospaced Typeface World
At one point in the past, yes. I prefer things to be simpler. However, when they refuse to be simple, I create systems to help me simplify and index into them in a way that is simple enough to hold in my mind all at once, hiding the not-immediately-relevant detail clutter from the top levels of consciousness, with drill-down available on an as-needed basis. So I have a system for dealing with system-redefining events. There is still, however, a higher level of stress involved, so don't push me too hard when I'm creating a new system and am not excited about it. (:
Irrelevance Flag
I've more built up a "semi-relevant-because-the-person-is-relevant-enough-to-be-talking-to-in-the-first-place-and-they-obviously-care-about-this-enough-to-be-talking-about-it" stream that I can side-line and still track while only requiring minimal mental resources. This frees my mind to do other things, while still letting me answer coherently. Sometimes I even remember things from it for more than 15 minutes (the standard human short-term memory limit). So I don't have a "Cool", but I am thinking about other things at the same time, because your conversation is only requiring 1% of my brain, the other 99% is clamoring for attention because it thinks it might atrophy in the next 15 seconds otherwise. Or it's threatening to do a Shut Down, which causes me to yawn and pass out. Two brain gears: Stop and Fast-Forward (aka "Firehose").
Small Talk
Small talk and human interaction was an ongoing project for much of my life, slowing about 5-10 years ago. I've built up a repertoire of workable, neutral phrases, and have practiced literally hundreds of thousands of conversation fragments over the years. As such, I believe I'm a bit better at it than the typical nerd. Self-understanding (aka introspection) helps, because you know where you stand, and why, and can figure out the stats on where other people might stand, and how they might react to various stimulus. Another key to conversation is slowing down your words, and pausing while you contemplate your next phrase. This is hard to do, because you instinctively want to fill the space, but slowing down and pausing makes you look wise and contemplative to the other person. Many people I'm only casually acquainted with may not even know I'm a nerd. (:
Presenting to crowds
That was a big one for me to get over. I discovered, through forced on-the-spot presentations (example: one time I was running a developer convention; a presenter didn't show, and I had to cover for him; then in the next session I had to sit on a panel and talk to cameras) and through watching others present, that I can present just fine if I'm doing a loosely-structured talk on something I'm so thoroughly, intimately familiar with that can discuss it in my sleep. Anything else and I shouldn't be up there speaking; I won't even bother to try, because I know the outcome in advance and it's not one I'm interested in. If I'm forced to anyway, I liberally sprinkle in phrases like "I have absolutely no clue about this" when I draw a blank. Oddly, people think you smarter for it. Mostly, I think, because they subconsciously are upping your reliability.
Food and Exercise
I've got a "side-track" running that keeps me eating well and exercising decently (with monitoring), but doesn't use much in the way of brain power (i.e., I can pretty much ignore it and it mostly runs itself).
Relationships
I have had to make a big, ongoing side-track for relationships. Even then, it's not always up to my wife's standards, though I think some of that may be boredom on her part during a particularly dull segment of time for her. (:
Otherwise, yeah. Pretty much.