Being a Noob

January 2020 When I was young, I thought old people had everything figured out.

2020 年 1 月 当我年轻的时候，我以为老年人已经把一切都弄清楚了。

Now that I'm old, I know this isn't true.

现在我老了，我知道这不是真的。

I constantly feel like a noob.

我总是感觉自己像个菜鸟。

It seems like I'm always talking to some startup working in a new field I know nothing about, or reading a book about a topic I don't understand well enough, or visiting some new country where I don't know how things work.

似乎我总是在与一些在我一无所知的新领域工作的初创公司交谈，或者阅读一本关于我不太理解的主题的书，或者访问一些我不知道事情如何运作的新国家。

It's not pleasant to feel like a noob.

感觉自己像个菜鸟并不令人愉快。

And the word "noob" is

“noob”这个词是

certainly not a compliment.

当然不是赞美。

And yet today I realized something encouraging about being a noob: the more of a noob you are locally, the less of a noob you are globally.

然而今天，我意识到作为菜鸟的一些令人鼓舞的事情：你在本地越是菜鸟，你在全球的菜鸟就越少。

For example, if you stay in your home country, you'll feel less of a noob than if you move to Farawavia, where everything works differently.

例如，如果你留在自己的祖国，你会觉得自己不像搬到法拉瓦维亚那样菜鸟，因为那里的一切都不同。

And yet you'll know more if you move.

然而，如果你搬家，你会知道更多。

So the feeling of being a noob is inversely correlated with actual

因此，作为菜鸟的感觉与实际情况成反比。

ignorance.

无知。

But if the feeling of being a noob is good for us, why do we dislike it?

但如果成为菜鸟的感觉对我们来说是件好事，为什么我们不喜欢它呢？

What evolutionary purpose could such an aversion serve?

这种厌恶能起到什么进化目的呢？

I think the answer is that there are two sources of feeling like a noob: being stupid, and doing something novel.

我认为答案是，感觉自己像个菜鸟有两个原因：愚蠢和做一些新奇的事情。

Our dislike of feeling like a noob is our brain telling us "Come on, come on, figure this out." Which was the right thing to be thinking for most of human

我们不喜欢像菜鸟一样的感觉，因为我们的大脑告诉我们“来吧，来吧，弄清楚这个”。对于大多数人来说，这是正确的想法

history.

历史。

The life of hunter-gatherers was complex, but it didn't change as much as life does now.

狩猎采集者的生活很复杂，但并没有像现在这样改变那么多。

They didn't suddenly have to figure out what to do about cryptocurrency.

他们并不需要突然弄清楚如何处理加密货币。

So it made sense to be biased toward competence at existing problems over the discovery of new ones.

因此，偏重解决现有问题的能力而不是发现新问题的能力是有道理的。

It made sense for humans to dislike the feeling of being a noob, just as, in a world where food was scarce, it made sense for them to dislike the feeling of being hungry.

人类不喜欢成为菜鸟的感觉是有道理的，就像在食物匮乏的世界里，他们不喜欢饥饿的感觉也是有道理的一样。

Now that too much food is more of a problem than too little, our dislike of feeling hungry leads us astray.

既然食物太多比太少更成问题，我们对饥饿感的厌恶会让我们误入歧途。

And I think our dislike of feeling like a noob does too.

我认为我们也不喜欢感觉自己像个菜鸟。

Though it feels unpleasant, and people will sometimes ridicule you for it, the more you feel like a noob, the better.

虽然这感觉不愉快，而且人们有时会因此嘲笑你，但你越觉得自己像个菜鸟就越好。