He keeps doubling down even though people who know what they're talking about keep explaining to him that, no, the J&J vaccine isn't like the already-approved ones and yes, three weeks is in fact already quite fast.
@pk if he viewed the world through science, I don't think he'd be this stupid. His approach is so completely "tell don't ask" - deeply incurious. I think the problem we're seeing here is that a certain kind of technician doesn't grok what actual science is, but they think they are "good at that stuff" because they can math and code. I saw that a lot when I lived in the SF Bay Area. (Now I work in a university.)
He used to come to my trivia night, 6-7 years ago now.
He was... he did not have his shit together, even though he was already successful. I hope he's gotten better. Stuff like this tells me maybe he's not completely there some days. I can relate.
There are really smart people, and I assume that he is not dumb, who really show their limitations by this habit of assuming that they are smarter than everyone else and that the first thing that comes into their head is OBVIOUS and why don't the so-called experts do this? Mediocre!
@caitlinburke true, maybe I should have left the "science" part off of it. I was thinking of people who are STEM-leaning, which @thelonius and @jessamyn have also summarized well. A certain type of person—and tech is littered with them. Sorry to hear you had to experience them in the belly of the tech beast, as it were. As a web developer, your pain is understood.
@caitlinburke working in a University I have met some scary smart faculty, like their CV starts with a 4.0 in Physics from Cal Tech, who were so much nicer and more humble than your typical "rock star" developer. I'm sure there are some not like that, too, but I have had mostly very good experiences working with faculty.
He was... he did not have his shit together, even though he was already successful. I hope he's gotten better. Stuff like this tells me maybe he's not completely there some days. I can relate.