Nobody Cares (2011)
a16z.comEvery month the disciple faithfully sent his Master an account of his progress.
In the first month he wrote: “I feel an expansion of consciousness and experience my oneness with the universe.” The Master glanced at the note and threw it away.
The following month, this is what he had to say: “I have finally discovered that the Divine is present in all things.” The Master seemed disappointed.
The third month the disciple’s words enthusiastically exclaimed: “The mystery of the One and the many have been revealed to my wondering gaze.” The Master shook his head and again threw the letter away.
The next letter said: “No one is born, no one lives, and no one dies, for the ego-self is not.” The Master threw his hands up in utter despair.
After that month passed by, then two, then five months - and finally a whole year without another letter. The Master thought it was time to remind his disciple of his duty to keep him informed of his spiritual progress.
Then the disciple wrote back: “Who cares?”
When the Master read those words a look of great satisfaction spread over his face.
Wasn't expecting a Zen Koan here but very welcome.
The student approached the VC Master and said:
"Master, I am troubled and have journeyed far to seek your legendary wisdom. My business has [specific problem X]. What should I do?"
The VC Master replied:
"Ah, I see your confusion. All the mental energy that you use to elaborate your misery has clouded your mind. The wise man spends zero time on what he could have done and all of his time on what he might do."
In that moment, the student was enlightened.
A monk approached the master and said, “Every koan by a software developer I’ve read would be better if plainly stated.” The master replied, “What is the plain statement?”He is asking about what he might do, and not on what he did. Confusing, but I've decided to all my mental energy into reading the next comment and not spend any more time on this koan.
An aside, I always love some of the more vague koans.
Usually something like. A student is brushing his teeth. The teacher walks in and explodes. And then student was enlightened.
Another good way of phrasing this: Play the cards you have, not the cards you wish you had.
Try reading it again carefully?
There’s no shattering moment here. If you have something meaningful to share, state it plainly. Otherwise take your koans to koans r us.
The master is clearly giving useless advice, but it's phrased as a koan so people are assuming that they're just misunderstanding it and that there's deeper meaning they're missing. The student is reasonably stating their problem for context, and then asking the master what to do about it. The master is responding with a lecture to not waste time "elaborating your misery" (which they didn't do) and telling the student to figure out what to do about it (which is exactly what the student asked in the first place).
It's poking fun.
"the student was enlightened" = the student thought "master is worse than useless when it comes to giving advice, I shall not bother him with further questions"
Great story, except I would argue that "VC Master" is generally an oxymoron.
Maybe it's the actual koan.
(2011) big in 2020 (120 points, 74 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22036515
I find this ironic because there was a lot of media reporting about the author and his business partner deciding to start making big political donations in a transparently self-serving move nobody with any semblance of integrity would make. So, obviously, people do care, especially all the ones who stand to lose if rich guys like Andreessen and Horowitz get their money's worth from their political donations (and I don't mean the politicians here, I mean the actual real people who stand to lose a lot).
Clearly they wish that nobody cares about the fact that they are deeply corrupt and morally bankrupt.
We often forget that ambivalence to others is the default human state. This is not an evil because if it were not so than every individual would be overwhelmed by empathizing with even a fraction of the suffering going on at any moment, and go mad. Yet this is also not good, as suffering is amplified by callous indifference of others. Who can read this riddle?
> Nobody Cares
That's all an absurd and detached way of simply saying "keep your nose to the grindstone."
> How could I have figured out that there would be 221 IPOs in 2000 and 19 in 2001? Could anybody expect me to achieve a reasonable outcome given those circumstances?
What planet is this person from?
One where he was trying to raise more money after the early 2000 bubble exits; as a CEO working with a $900million valuation (source: random google hit from the book about loudcloud) he was probably also facing very little sympathy (nor did he particularly deserve any.)
Oh, when you really screw up, as with Crowdstrike, they care.
I think it's not about the extend of the screw up. It's more like people don't care what led to the screw up, whether it was your mistake or not, etc, you just have to fix it. People do undoubtedly care about results.
That's seems quite following existential nihilism