Fierce Nerds

May 2021

Most people think of nerds as quiet, diffident people. In ordinary
social situations they are — as quiet and diffident as the star
quarterback would be if he found himself in the middle of a physics
symposium. And for the same reason: they are fish out of water.
But the apparent diffidence of nerds is an illusion due to the fact
that when non-nerds observe them, it's usually in ordinary social
situations. In fact some nerds are quite fierce.

The fierce nerds are a small but interesting group. They are as a
rule extremely competitive — more competitive, I'd say, than highly
competitive non-nerds. Competition is more personal for them. Partly
perhaps because they're not emotionally mature enough to distance
themselves from it, but also because there's less randomness in the
kinds of competition they engage in, and they are thus more justified
in taking the results personally.

Fierce nerds also tend to be somewhat overconfident, especially
when young. It might seem like it would be a disadvantage to be
mistaken about one's abilities, but empirically it isn't. Up to a
point, confidence is a self-fullfilling prophecy.

Another quality you find in most fierce nerds is intelligence. Not
all nerds are smart, but the fierce ones are always at least
moderately so. If they weren't, they wouldn't have the confidence
to be fierce.
[1