This was completely predicted by Peter Thiel in Zero to One. There&#x27;s a common set of personality traits, a little related to Asperger&#x27;s, where one works from first principles, is less influenced by what other people think, has less groupthink, and is more comfortable being outside of social norms.<p>This is a trait shared by entrepreneurs, engineers, and extremists. There&#x27;s a high overlap between the three.<p>Social norms are powerful. People outside of them often see better ways to do things (or what they believe to be such). Constructively, they might start a business to fix the world. Destructively, they might blow up what they don&#x27;t like.<p>That&#x27;s a kind of short summary, but the book explains this much more convincingly and eloquently.