If PG is right, then sociopath's will be fairly indistinguishable from nice people.
True sociopath's don't care about your feelings, either positively or negatively, they just care about advancing their own agenda.
If the best way to advance their own agenda is by being nice to people, then that's what they'll do. That's what vegabook got mercilessly downvoted for saying.
And as PG said, lies are really expensive, so smart sociopaths won't use them.
So maybe Ron Conway is a sociopath. But who cares why he's doing so much good? What matters are the results, not the inner reasons.
So it matters whether or not Conway or anyone is a sociopath, because IMO the only useful definition of 'nice' is an inclusive one. The more inclusive, the better.
Being a charming marketer while benefiting yourself, your network, and primarily yourself and your network, doesn't make you nice, it makes you an exemplary professional.
There is a difference, and it's not a trivial one.
That Ron Conway SF housing debate clip is so mellow, I mean, only a west coast millenial could call that an eruption. ;-)
But seriously, I am all for challenging the notion that anyone who defends torture is "nice." However, if that is an example of Ron Conway angry, he really is one of the nicest dudes I've ever seen. They are discussing a topic that matters, and where ideas matter. Regardless of who is right, it is much more "not nice" to allow flawed thinking to propagate in matters of public policy, and shouting from the back of the room may be the "nicest" thing a person could do. An asshole would just snicker to himself and count his money.
> What does 'nice' actually mean? It's famous for being a low-entropy word.
Brooke Allen got a bit of attention on HN recently with a post he wrote (incidentally called "How my life was changed when I began caring about the people I did not hire"), but that's not the one I mean to point to here. Instead I mean to point to an earlier one in which he touches on the fickleness of "nice". < http://qz.com/88168/how-to-hire-good-people-instead-of-nice-... >
While sociopaths can plan ruthlessly they're not necessarily more longterm oriented than non-sociopaths (since they bore more easily I would even expect them to tend to be less longterm oriented). So I consider it highly unlikely that a sociopath would play nice to everyone for years and years.
True sociopath's don't care about your feelings, either positively or negatively, they just care about advancing their own agenda.
If the best way to advance their own agenda is by being nice to people, then that's what they'll do. That's what vegabook got mercilessly downvoted for saying.
And as PG said, lies are really expensive, so smart sociopaths won't use them.
So maybe Ron Conway is a sociopath. But who cares why he's doing so much good? What matters are the results, not the inner reasons.