It's necessary but not sufficient. What if you work hard all through your 20s, not a day off, and it doesn't work out (which it doesn't, in the billionaire sense, for most people)? How do you get back the first flush of youth?
This essay from Paul reminded me once again how relatively blinkered he is. He has his mental model of a good life - for obvious reasons, it's one which is somewhat similar to his own - and he doesn't question his assumptions. What is his utility function? Is it a universal utility function, or is it actually just his preferred, locally, personally optimal way of increasing its value?
Dismissing whole departments at college is part of that. You might not see value in the philosophy - PG is on record as dismissing it - but philosophy has changed the world more than almost anything else. It's at the foundation of science, law, government and politics, and most of the wars of the 20th century were fought, ultimately, over philosophy. PG knows this, maybe he views it differently - he studied it in college after all - but in his shoes, I wouldn't be so dismissive.
This essay from Paul reminded me once again how relatively blinkered he is. He has his mental model of a good life - for obvious reasons, it's one which is somewhat similar to his own - and he doesn't question his assumptions. What is his utility function? Is it a universal utility function, or is it actually just his preferred, locally, personally optimal way of increasing its value?
Dismissing whole departments at college is part of that. You might not see value in the philosophy - PG is on record as dismissing it - but philosophy has changed the world more than almost anything else. It's at the foundation of science, law, government and politics, and most of the wars of the 20th century were fought, ultimately, over philosophy. PG knows this, maybe he views it differently - he studied it in college after all - but in his shoes, I wouldn't be so dismissive.