Resources for definite optimism
Creating and maintaining positive and specific visions of the future of humanity. This essay by Dan Wang is a great place to start. As far as I know, the term originates from Peter Thiel’s CS183 class (see here in particular) and the subsequent book, Zero to One, based on it (some notes here). Why should I care about being definitely optimistic? You’ll be more cheerful – optimism is always more fun than the alternative. You’ll generate better ideas, in larger quantities. I can’t prove this, I don’t even have any evidence. But it’s worth at least considering – if you can approximate a source of independent, identically-distributed ideas, your chances of producing no good ideas decrease exponentially over time. The demand for definiteness acts as an excellent BS filter (talk is cheap) A definite attitude is a prerequisite for executing ambitious, multi-step projects, which are often very cool Zero to one Dan Wang: On definite optimism > To have a positive vision, people must first expand
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