Nerds, Geeks and Dorks: A Primer
You often hear the terms nerd, geek and dork used interchangeably, as if they mean the same thing. Let me assure you that they don’t. Let’s take a moment to explain the differences.
A nerd is someone with a high aptitude for intellectual endeavors, usually in areas that useful and challenging, but has little to no social skills. They are often good at math, sciences or programming. They often go on to high status jobs and become successful because their skill sets are so unique. They can work for NASA as rocket scientists, do groundbreaking work in academia developing astounding original mathematical proofs or have a career in finance creating really complicated and innovative financial instruments or become high-level engineers. Bill Gates is a nerd. Not only are they scary smart, they’re often always trying to push the envelope conceptually. They’re also capable of producing astoundingly original and technically astounding works of art and music.
Geeks can range in intelligence to average to very bright, but they rarely hit the genius levels of nerds. On the bright side, they are usually nowhere near as socially inept as a nerd either. They are usually good at one or two things, but it’s rarely something useful. Their expertise is more likely to be along the lines of an encyclopedic knowledge of something like film, music, television, comic books, sports or history, but from the consumer’s side. A geek is more like a high level hobbyist than an expert genius. Since his area of expertise can often be of little real world use, it’s not uncommon to find geeks toiling away in obscurity or sometimes even mediocrity. However when the geek is lucky enough to combine his hobby with his career he can end up becoming quite successful, and even attain a level of minor celebrity. His level of knowledge comes more from a monomaniacal dedication to a subject more than high intellectual aptitude, even though geeks can often be fairly bright. Policy wonks, the pickup artist community and bloggers are geeks. Fantasy football addicts are geeks. They will dedicatedly digest every piece of knowledge out there about a topic, but aren’t likely to synthesize it into anything new, innovative and groundbreaking. They mostly tend to memorize and regurgitate, although the best of them are often capable of some very novel insights. Making this primer differentiating between nerds, geeks and dorks is something a geek would do. Analyzing the differences in physiology and brain structure and environment between them and coming up with a plausible hypothesis as to the source of those differences, however? That’s something a nerd would do.
Socially, geeks are much better than nerds. They can make friends, hold conversations, generally fit in, and usually just come off as just quirky or slightly off-beat rather than a total social disaster like a nerd. Some geeks are no visible social deficiencies at all and are actually closet, undercover geeks, but even these social skills they acquired the way they acquire everything else: by monomanical observation, dissection and memorization. They obsess over how to be social the same way they used to obsess over Star Wars, rock and roll or movies, and immerse themselves in it until they learn it inside out. That’s how the pickup artist community works. They take the monomaniacal drive they once had for other interests, that same mania that made them socially awkward to begin with, and now apply it to picking up women, using many of the same trappings as their former geek hobbies: clubs, newsletters, message boards, meetups, books and websites.
Many fields have a mix of nerds and geeks coexisting. In music, the nerd is 
composing complex masterpieces and the geek is a music critic or blogger. In computers the nerd is programming a new type of software that will have a huge impact on the world or coming up with brand new hacking and cracking techniques that can beat all existing security measures, while the geek is designing video games, works in the computer repair department of Best Buy, is selling PCs on the floor of Comp USA or is a consumer happy to buy cutting edge gadgets and new hardware. The math nerd publishes papers in academic journals, while the math geek is crunching numbers as an insurance actuary or accountant. Many of the very bright geeks in medicine become physicians, while the nerds are locked away in labs doing cutting edge research and publishing findings and winning grants. In writing, Stephen Hawking is a nerd while Malcolm Gladwell and Chuck Klosterman are geeks.
Now you may be reading this far and thinking that I’m disparaging geeks or implying them to be inferior. Not at all. Geeks serve a very valuable function in society. They bridge the intellectual gap between the nerds and the layman in the general populace. They write the pop psychology, pop physics and pop economic books that clarify the complex issues facing our lives for the everyman out there. They’re not as smart as the nerd, but they are smart enough to grasp what it is the nerd does, at least in broad strokes. And since they’re better socially than nerds, they do a better job of communicating it to the public in the form of consumers, investors and journalists.
Now what about the aforementioned dorks? They’re the worst of the worst: all the social awkwardness of geeks and nerds, minus any of the smarts. Napoleon Dynamite, for example, was a dork. But even they have a purpose. Without them who would nerds and geeks be able to make fun of?
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I found your site on technorati and read a few of your other posts. Keep up the good work. I just added your RSS feed to my Google News Reader. Looking forward to reading more from you.
Susan Kishner
thanks for adding me on myspace.
this was a great read!
Thank you. I was just recently having this discussion with my family. I generally agree with your distinctions.
I would also add that “Geek” is a condition accessible to anyone int he general population, given the right subject matter. I am a geek when it comes to comic books and science fiction. She can become a geek when it comes to General Hospital and its cast members. And someone else one about cars, engines, etc.
There’s no way to become a nerd however. You either are a nerd or your not. The high aptitude in a given area is hard wired in the nerd. he might derive joy from his pursuits, sure. But he is more a slave to his abilities than the geek. The geek doesn’t necessarily HAVE any abilities. His status is a function of a conscious decision to be a part of a certain community whereas the Nerd is fulfilling his destiny.
Smash’s last blog post..SWEET BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY!!!
this isn’t to say that all nerd will change the world…just that they can’t help but do whatever it is they do.
Smash’s last blog post..SWEET BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY!!!
[...] T wrote an interesting post today on Nerds, Geeks and Dorks: A PrimerHere’s a quick excerptThey write the pop psychology, pop physics and pop economic books that clarify the complex issues facing our lives for the everyman out there. They?re not as smart as the nerd, but they are smart enough to grasp what it is the nerd does … [...]
And then some of us have delusions of nerd-hood while merely being a frustrated geek.
Peace out
Kaz Maslanka’s last blog post..Axiomatic Poems
Good stuff.. and accurate in description of all three. Although I sort of think dorks try the hardest to be cool.. they just aren’t. Nerds and geeks are in their own world and don’t even care about being cool
Susan, mandilee – Thanks. Don’t be strangers.
Smash – agree with everything. Including not all nerds will change the world, although many do. Sometimes the nerd’s social difficulties that come about from his genius are so out of control that they outweigh the benefits of his brain. Two great movies that illustrate this wonderfully are Proof (with Anthony Hopkins, Gyllenhall and Paltrow) and Beautiful Mind (with with pre-bash-you-face-with-a-phone Russell Crowe.
Kaz – So true. It reminds me of a quote: “just because no one understands you doesn’t make you an artist or a genius” I think it applies to frustrated geeks most of all.
Bobby Rio – I dunno, bro. I disagree. Nerds may not really care, but geeks do want to be cool. They may think they’ll never fit into the big crowd and try to be rebel by affecting a deliberate form of anti-cool, but trust me, they fall into the same wannabe cool trappings within their little groups too. Take one group of geeks, the hipsters. They pride themselves on being quirky anti-conformists just because they don’t shop at the Gap or wear suits, but they watch the same movies (right now Juno), subscribe to the same politics (Go Obama!), live in the same socially accepted cool neighborhoods (Williamsburg? Greenpoint? Austin TX?), validate themselves by possessions (Ipods and Vespas instead of SUVs), shop at American Apparel and vintage stores…geeks are as guilty of the same approval-seeking herd behavior as the “mainstream” crowd they disdain, they’re just less intellectually honest about it.
I think I fall into the ‘geek’ category: I’ve never considered myself to be a genius or prodigy of any kind, but I was reading at 2, writing my first stories at 4 or 5, and being treated as a ‘human dictionary’ by the other kids in my class, and in Mensa at 13 with a 172 IQ. Then there was the time I made up my own language. How geeky is that?
I still had friends, but they definitely seemed separate from me, and I was perceived as a bit geeky – good at something (languages) – but still able to make friends easily and be seen as worth hanging out with. Just not ‘cool’. So, definitely not a nerd, certainly not a dork. Being a geek isn’t so bad. After all, the geek shall inherit the earth…
china blue’s last blog post..“To Get Comfortable, I Like to Touch My Nipples…”
Shit, you really know how to pique a guy’s interest with your blog post title, China. In the time I’ve had that little “so-and-so’s last blog post” feature, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a title so guaranteed to cause a mass exodus of fellas from my site. Also, reading at 2? Freak!
not me, chief.
i’ve been teased too many times and for too long. Your jedi mind-tricks don’t work on me, lady.
I’ve recently come to the conclusion that provocatively dressed and/or behaved women are a waste of MY time. (this has nothing to do with you china blue). These women are like walking pornos. softcore pornos that tease and tittilate but give me no more real chance at a non-masturbatory sexual experience than smut mags. And sometimes i’ll get just as much intellectual depth.
furthermore, i’ve gotten to the point in my life where that doesn’t even arouse me any more. i can watch a half hour of porn and barely “fill-up.”
On the other hand, gimme a woman who is hiding something whether naturally, directly, subconsciously or whatever.
I don’t think i’m the only one who gets more aroused by a big set being barely contained by a wool turtleneck.
no no. try to tease me and i’m flipping the channel.
play it straight and i’m lustin after you like pepe lepew.
this is somewhat correlated to the “2nd-hottest-friend theory.”
Smash’s last blog post..SWEET BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY!!!
SP <3’s this post. SP is a geek with freakish athletic ability and a love for sci-fi and comics.
Stank Stank’s last blog post..Country in progress: the United States of America
It would have been nice of you to elaborate further on dorks, but I really liked the contrast between Nerds and Geeks. I had always thought Nerds were a subset of Geeks. I like your definition better.
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Track listing – Invaders Must Die…
The album debuted at the top of the UK Album Chart on the 1st of March with 97,254 albums sold, giving them their fourth consecutive number one album in the UK……
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