Would this turn you off?

[Eternal Sunshine]

As you all know, I do research for work. It's a mix of maths and genetics so most people don't get it (not trying to be condescending, just it's a highly specialized area and not exactly a fun date conversation, unless the guy works in the same field).

 

I don't need a guy that understands/talks about it at all. I talk about it at work plenty so it's cool.

 

Imagine if your date kept insisting on talking about your research. I try to steer the topic to something else. but he goes: "I googled you and saw your publication on xyz, tell me more about it". I give a brief explanation and he stops me 'Oh I totally get it. You did such and such...'. Every single word he said was so completely off the mark that I couldn't even bother correcting him

 

Then he said "See! I bet you don't meet a guy every day that can talk to you about this stuff"

 

This lack of self-awareness makes me lose attraction completely. I guess I should be flattered that someone is taking interest in my work? I just wish....that he either got it close to right or said nothing at all.

 

Note: this is a past dating scenario

[Emilia]

Well this made me uncomfortable because I dated a Mathematician once and I liked talking about Maths even though I was c**p at it, he probably thought the same as you

 

Seriously though, I think as a one-off it wouldn't bother me but as a pattern it would. My mum's boyfriend is a know-it-all and he will sometimes say interesting things but at other times it will be complete rubbish yet none of us can debate it with him because he gets wound up and shuts down. Could not tolerate that in a relationship at all.

[TaraMaiden]

Just be glad it's a 'past dating scenario'.

 

FWIW, my 'respect' for people who try to 'know it all' plummets when no matter how hard they try, they obviously don't get it - and don't get it that they don't get it.....And refuse or deflect any explanation that "no, sorry, actually, you don't get it....."

 

[TaraMaiden]

.......Seriously though, I think as a one-off it wouldn't bother me but as a pattern it would. My mum's boyfriend is a know-it-all and he will sometimes say interesting things but at other times it will be complete rubbish yet none of us can debate it with him because he gets wound up and shuts down. Could not tolerate that in a relationship at all.

 

(My FiL. To a T.

Doesn't think he knows it all.

No......Is utterly and absolutely, completely CONVINCED he really DOES know it all.

 

 

He's a nightmare in 'Trivial Pursuit. Every question he gets wrong, he disputes. To the max. )

 

[Mint Sauce]

yes, total turn-off. Your partner should be at least bright enough to understand that he doesn't understand.

[Els]

Yep, huge turn-off. I'd rather someone admit that he doesn't know jack, than try to act like a know-it-all. My experience has been that many of the most brilliant guys are also the most humble and understated.

[Emilia]

I think this is the point usually when Hokie posts about the Dunning-Kruger effect Dunning?Kruger effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Els]

I think this is the point usually when Hokie posts about the Dunning-Kruger effect Dunning?Kruger effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Very interesting read, thanks.

[pcplod]

If he was just another bloke talking to another bloke about his work like that, I think I would be awfully tempted to be judgemental and think "What a twat"! In your case I might be a bit be bit more generous and think "A twat who is trying far too hard, far too obviously".

 

I was always led to believe that the way to engage would be to ask someone about work or interests, not give them a lecture on it. But then I am weird.

 

"Self-awareness" is as about as good a single phrase to sum it up, as any.

 

By the way, I think what you do work-wise actually might be interesting. I might even want to find out about it. Don't diss your job role on top of yourself as well. You'll have me bawling my eyes out next.

 

I do get it, though, if you don't want to talk shop when out and about being seductive and alluring and on the hunt. It's a bit of distraction after all, from the primary objective.

 

Is that not what you meant?

Edited June 25, 2013 by pcplod

[Eternal Sunshine]

haha pclod, yes I tend to diss my job role too much by constantly telling people that it's boring. In fact, I don't find it boring at all, but some may feel intimidated so I try to minimize it.

 

Interestingly, I have had some guys from all walks of life and education levels intuitively get the main concepts. I am always impressed when they are even sort of right. But this guy was just painful. Especially the fact that he kept bringing it up again and again.

 

For the most part though, I want to be sexy and flirt on a date, so work talk tends to bring the mood down. Teaching a date is not my idea of fun :/

[pcplod]

haha pclod, yes I tend to diss my job role too much by constantly telling people that it's boring. In fact, I don't find it boring at all, but some may feel intimidated so I try to minimize it.

 

Interestingly, I have had some guys from all walks of life and education levels intuitively get the main concepts. I am always impressed when they are even sort of right. But this guy was just painful. Especially the fact that he kept bringing it up again and again.

 

For the most part though, I want to be sexy and flirt on a date, so work talk tends to bring the mood down. Teaching a date is not my idea of fun :/

 

You mean to say that it isn't possible to work a bit of 'sexiness' into the subject of genetics, no matter how tenuous or tortuous? Even if it is just ridiculous innuendo, even if it just an absurd, unbelievable tease? I think I could do that and I don't know anything about the subject. Hey girl, I don't think you are prepared to try hard enough. You need to work on your stage-craft. Innocent lies and provocative teases are all part of the repertoire. If your occupation is obscure that is licence to take liberties. Folly and lies can be part of your armoury.

 

I, on the other hand, work in IT. Everybody knows everything about that after all, because they have a computer at home, don't they?

[Emilia]

I, on the other hand, work in IT. Everybody knows everything about that after all, because they have a computer at home, don't they?

well, it only needs to be switched off and then on again

[pcplod]

well, it only needs to be switched off and then on again

 

You see, everyone! Somebody with some sense.

 

Imagine the scenario. True IT 'expert'. Has system figuratively sitting in front of him (or her). And the 'bitch' doesn't wanna play properly. Sooo. Do you want to know:

 

1. What exactly has gone wrong.
   
2. What exactly to do to make it behave itself.
   
3. Or do you keep looking at the clock, watching your life drain away, and say, "Where is that effing software installation DVD"?
   

I mean, quite often we can be so obstinate and so fear self-humiliation over our own perceived ineptness and inadequacy that you just can't leave it alone. If you are lucky you stop for a moment and reflect; "If anyone else sees me doing this and knows the hours and days I have wasted on this they are going to say I am f***ing nuts". You ultimately know that you have reached the end of the line when the Microsoft support guy at the other end of the phone-line says "Just re-install the software, it's quicker".

 

On the other hand, you do what I did the other day, over my hand/stick blender that had failed due to the failure of a 2 cent/5p component that you can't buy as a separate part. You chuck it in the bin, with a casual but irritable disdain. But not before you have tried to 'fix' it with epoxy resin.

 

BTW, I have in all my years never fixed anything permanently with epoxy resin, apart from two pieces of paper together. Bah!

[TaraMaiden]

I think this is the point usually when Hokie posts about the Dunning-Kruger effect Dunning?Kruger effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Oh yes, I studied this on an A4 gate-fold pamphlet, once. Highly illuminating. of course, I knew all about it already. I taught Dunning and Kruger all they know, you know......

 

 

[TaraMaiden]

haha pclod, yes I tend to diss my job role too much by constantly telling people that it's boring. In fact, I don't find it boring at all, but some may feel intimidated so I try to minimize it.

 

Interestingly, I have had some guys from all walks of life and education levels intuitively get the main concepts. I am always impressed when they are even sort of right. But this guy was just painful. Especially the fact that he kept bringing it up again and again.

 

For the most part though, I want to be sexy and flirt on a date, so work talk tends to bring the mood down. Teaching a date is not my idea of fun :/

 

Tell them you study amphibian entrails for signs of life on other planets. And wink.

 

That'll keep them guessing....

[Eternal Sunshine]

You see, everyone! Somebody with some sense.

 

Imagine the scenario. True IT 'expert'. Has system figuratively sitting in front of him (or her). And the 'bitch' doesn't wanna play properly. Sooo. Do you want to know:

 

1. What exactly has gone wrong.
   
2. What exactly to do to make it behave itself.
   
3. Or do you keep looking at the clock, watching your life drain away, and say, "Where is that effing software installation DVD"?
   

I mean, quite often we can be so obstinate and so fear self-humiliation over our own perceived ineptness and inadequacy that you just can't leave it alone. If you are lucky you stop for a moment and reflect; "If anyone else sees me doing this and knows the hours and days I have wasted on this they are going to say I am f***ing nuts". You ultimately know that you have reached the end of the line when the Microsoft support guy at the other end of the phone-line says "Just re-install the software, it's quicker".

 

On the other hand, you do what I did the other day, over my hand/stick blender that had failed due to the failure of a 2 cent/5p component that you can't buy as a separate part. You chuck it in the bin, with a casual but irritable disdain. But not before you have tried to 'fix' it with epoxy resin.

 

BTW, I have in all my years never fixed anything permanently with epoxy resin, apart from two pieces of paper together. Bah!

 

You do have a way with words

 

I always found IT guys hot.

[AMusing]

Hmm, ES, I'm genuinely curious about your research now. I promise I would understand it better than anyone else here....

 

 

 

 

No, really, I actually should understand what you do, and I am curious, but I've never been accused of being arrogant in real life. Cockiness and science are an obnoxious blend.

 

Anyway, I agree, work is not the best fodder for conversation in the first few dates, and a guy who decided he knew my field as well I did after reading a few papers would be a major turn-off.

[Eternal Sunshine]

Hmm, ES, I'm genuinely curious about your research now. I promise I would understand it better than anyone else here....

 

 

 

 

No, really, I actually should understand what you do, and I am curious, but I've never been accused of being arrogant in real life. Cockiness and science are an obnoxious blend.

 

Anyway, I agree, work is not the best fodder for conversation in the first few dates, and a guy who decided he knew my field as well I did after reading a few papers would be a major turn-off.

 

I'm going to change the world one day. Men and dating are for entertainment only, it passes the time

[EasyHeart]

Imagine if your date kept insisting on talking about your research. I try to steer the topic to something else. but he goes: "I googled you and saw your publication on xyz, tell me more about it". I give a brief explanation and he stops me 'Oh I totally get it. You did such and such...'. Every single word he said was so completely off the mark that I couldn't even bother correcting him

 

Then he said "See! I bet you don't meet a guy every day that can talk to you about this stuff"

I think this falls under the category of "Trying Too Hard".

 

And yes, people who try too hard are generally a turnoff because it indicates a lack of confidence or some kind of insecurity.

[Eternal Sunshine]

You sound like hero. Do you fight world problems with a superpower of math?

 

Math theory won't do anything, but when applied to medicine for example, it can go a long way to understanding causes and even finding treatments to complex diseases. This is especially true for genetic disorders caused by multiple genetic mutations. Mathematical models are easily applied to human genome because of the long range correlation between different genotypes.

[blueskyday]

Oooo, I love I.T. guys, too! Hot! Smart guys do it for me!

 

I would probably be fairly forgiving of a guy like the one you're describing. I think he's just trying too hard to connect with you. What you need to do is lean over and say something sexy and flirty to him. If you were a geneticist, you could simply say that you look at the mating rituals of fruit flies!

 

I look at it as an opportunity to teach him that he doesn't need to talk about your actual work with you. He just isn't very skilled. He could ask you what you love most about your job. If he doesn't ask, then you can just steer the conversation to why you picked the field at you did. Take the conversation to a more emotional (feeling based) level. Or say "oh that's work, and I want to play now! Let's do a shot of tequila! I can compute with my mathematical genius the exact number shots it takes to get me to dance on this table!"

 

I agree, however, that if he's a general know it all, that's going to get boring pretty fast!

[TouchedByViolet]

Turn off. It's embarrassing when people try to fake knowing something or a subject matter, especially if you are knowledgeable about it. It would have been better for him to stay quiet and let you do most of the talking so he could learn.

[pcplod]

You do have a way with words

 

I always found IT guys hot.

 

Ah. I think if either you or me were to be subjected to a bit of artful persuasion, say a single water-boarding session, we would confess that in many respect words can come too easily. It's the prospect of action that finds us all dithering and procrastinating.

 

Do you ever feel that you are standing at the edge of a figurative abyss, the bottom of which you cannot see. You want to leap but you just can't do it? You feel that you just ought to be able to do it, because, rationally, it isn't that difficult, but, instinctively you just can't; those little thoughts banging around in your head, buzzing those feelings in the amygdala and hippocampus, that are just strapping you down, suffocating you and you just so much want to break free, to do what you want to do, rather than figuratively looking over your shoulder wondering what family, friends, acquaintances or even just some anonymous Joe Soap might think of you? Or even just yourself?

 

Swim or sink? Swim or swim? The art of the simple survivor. Nothing sophisticated about them. Nothing artful about them. Nothing classically intelligent about them. But, boy, can they survive. Not only that but they actually thrive! They are ecstatic, happy. Do you ever find yourself envying them? I do. As long as I think they are genuine and not just bluffing it. Too many of them around, a serious obstacle and hazard for everyone else.

 

IT guys. IT people. I used to cringe, a lot, in work, when I was introduced to others as "Our IT expert". Happens a lot less these days, simply because people really do appreciate that IT is more diverse and complex than they used to.

 

I have worked on occasions with programmers who couldn't string two words together to save themselves, never mind explain what they do for their clients. They truly are systems people, rather than people people. The joke is that System Analysts are programmers who got promoted because they proved they could actually communicate. It takes all sorts in IT and that is usually what you actually find.

 

I fancy myself, somewhat immodestly, not as an IT guy, but a guy who does IT. It isn't, seriously, a mere exercise in semantics, it really is that important. I'll bet you aren't ES, the Genetics Analyst, that's just what the pay check says. What about ES, the macramé talent. OR ES, the base jumper?

 

What would you like to do, that you dare not do? Apart from meet some plausibly tolerable guy, that is. That isn't that ambitious, to be honest. Impossible, yes, ambitious, no.

 

Meeting and dating guys may be just a hobby, a pass-time, when compared to career and whatever, but being a worn-out, time-served, cynical old fogie all I can tell you from my own experience that finding someone that you can just have fun with, laugh with, laugh at, share thoughts, cook for, care for, share a drink and even just touch one another, have sex together, is one of those things that has the potential to give you more satisfaction, much more pleasure than even the best job or career will ever give you.

 

And one day the job/career will be over and you will realise that it just enabled the rest of your life. And is that life now, what you really want, or did you flunk it or did you just screw it up? Most people either flunk it or screw it up. The lucky ones are those who don't. Honestly. It's got to be bloody continuously hard work, though, to be honest. But still worth it, I reckon.

 

What do you reckon?

[fortyninethousand322]

Well, I'm not a mathist, so I have no idea how it feels to have someone act like they understand math but don't at all.

 

On one date after I told her what I was getting my degree in, she asked me if the Ottoman Empire still existed. I thought it was kind of funny, especially considering she had a Masters degree from a very good school and I thought she would know something like that.

[Eternal Sunshine]

Ah. I think if either you or me were to be subjected to a bit of artful persuasion, say a single water-boarding session, we would confess that in many respect words can come too easily. It's the prospect of action that finds us all dithering and procrastinating.

 

Do you ever feel that you are standing at the edge of a figurative abyss, the bottom of which you cannot see. You want to leap but you just can't do it? You feel that you just ought to be able to do it, because, rationally, it isn't that difficult, but, instinctively you just can't; those little thoughts banging around in your head, buzzing those feelings in the amygdala and hippocampus, that are just strapping you down, suffocating you and you just so much want to break free, to do what you want to do, rather than figuratively looking over your shoulder wondering what family, friends, acquaintances or even just some anonymous Joe Soap might think of you? Or even just yourself?

 

 

I feel like that about every second of every hour of every day. I was just never able to put it into words so well.

 

Swim or sink? Swim or swim? The art of the simple survivor. Nothing sophisticated about them. Nothing artful about them. Nothing classically intelligent about them. But, boy, can they survive. Not only that but they actually thrive! They are ecstatic, happy. Do you ever find yourself envying them? I do. As long as I think they are genuine and not just bluffing it. Too many of them around, a serious obstacle and hazard for everyone else.

 

IT guys. IT people. I used to cringe, a lot, in work, when I was introduced to others as "Our IT expert". Happens a lot less these days, simply because people really do appreciate that IT is more diverse and complex than they used to.

 

I have worked on occasions with programmers who couldn't string two words together to save themselves, never mind explain what they do for their clients. They truly are systems people, rather than people people. The joke is that System Analysts are programmers who got promoted because they proved they could actually communicate. It takes all sorts in IT and that is usually what you actually find.

 

I fancy myself, somewhat immodestly, not as an IT guy, but a guy who does IT. It isn't, seriously, a mere exercise in semantics, it really is that important. I'll bet you aren't ES, the Genetics Analyst, that's just what the pay check says. What about ES, the macramé talent. OR ES, the base jumper?

 

What would you like to do, that you dare not do? Apart from meet some plausibly tolerable guy, that is. That isn't that ambitious, to be honest. Impossible, yes, ambitious, no.

 

Do you know how I see my life unfolding? Here it goes. I meet some guy that just...doesn't annoy me. He is your regular guy that doesn't get in my way too much. He is willing to commit, marry me and have kids. This makes my mother happy. I don't think I can bear not to make my mother happy. She has sacrificed a lot of her life for me. This is the least I can do for her. I will not feel much passion for my husband to be, but passion fades anyway right? So what does it matter anyway. I pretend to be happy for her. And I am OK, I am getting by. I get up and go to work every day. I still have big dreams and big goals of making some important scientific discovery. It never quite happens. Just out of reach. I ramp up few more publications in mediocre journals. I get a crush on that cute new geneticist. It never gets further than a fantasy because I have decent morals and I don't let myself. I obsess about it a bit, I post a thread or 2 on LS. I get over it. My H is largely irrelevant in my life. Hey, at least I had kids I tell myself. Kids are almost like an abstract idea now. I have no clue how important they would become if they actually came into existence. That's the only unknown, the potential for happiness, for meaning of life maybe?

 

This is how I realistically see my future. Or maybe I am describing my worst fear? It's hard to tell anymore. That's how I see most other people's lives too. They just dwell on it less than I do. It's also possible that I am in some kind of third life crisis.

 

Meeting and dating guys may be just a hobby, a pass-time, when compared to career and whatever, but being a worn-out, time-served, cynical old fogie all I can tell you from my own experience that finding someone that you can just have fun with, laugh with, laugh at, share thoughts, cook for, care for, share a drink and even just touch one another, have sex together, is one of those things that has the potential to give you more satisfaction, much more pleasure than even the best job or career will ever give you.

 

I do see what you mean. But how do I find such a guy? I have tried and failed. I dated a string of guys that meant very little to me. To be honest, I have lost hope of finding someone I will feel much for. So I would be OK with someone that I can tolerate. This may seem like a low goal. You would be surprised how few people I can even tolerate though.

 

I appreciate your thoughtful post. You show great understanding of life and human nature. Possibly one of the best posts that I have ever seen on LS.