Paul Graham: Trustworthy people cannot reliably evaluate trustworthiness in others
Paul Graham · A Conversation with Paul Graham - Moderated by Geoff Ralston · Y Combinator · Sep 1, 2018 · at 20:17
Paul Graham discusses talent evaluation heuristics with Geoff Ralston at Y Combinator's Startup School, contrasting how recommendation networks assess intelligence versus character.
0:00 / 0:09exact quote · 9.8s
▶ Watch the full episode on YouTube → 720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“Intelligent people can judge other intelligent people, But trustworthy people cannot judge other trustworthy people. In fact, trustworthy people are often fooled by untrustworthy people.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Paul Graham
Graham: Non-Valley investors assume local startups are second-rate
“Investors outside Silicon Valley implicitly assume that any local startup is second rate.”
Paul Graham: Working 20 years at big companies indicates poor founder fit
“I think if you have worked for a large company for 20 years, you might not be a founder, unless you were forced to for visa reasons, because if you were the kind of person that would make a good founder, you wouldn't be able to stand working for a large compan…”
Graham: YC startups returning home are half as likely to become unicorns
“YC now has a lot of data about this, and the startups that go home after YC don't do as well as the ones that stay. Startups that go home back, startups that go back home after YC are only about half as likely to become unicorns”
Paul Graham: Startup Outcomes Are Fundamentally Indeterminate and Luck-Driven
“The outcomes of startups are hard to predict.
I think to some degree they're actually indeterminate.
There's a huge amount of luck involved, you know and so I think even if Y Combinator were as good at picking startups as you could possibly get.”