Gah that maximising the chances of being right thing. I wish I'd figured that one out earlier but 12 years of bad habits developed at school (where you had to be right at all costs or be ridiculed for the idiot that you clearly were even if no one else knew the answer either) carried over into 2-3 years of uni and while I probably started showing some indication of improvement when I chose to go part time so I could actually enjoy myself it still trickled though for ages, and probably still is! DX

And the rest of it explains other people's reactions to stuff "outside the norm" nicely, though the innovation being blanded down by groups of people insisting on making it acceptable to them through "refinements" reminded me for some reason of a Simpsons episode where Bart gets his ear pierced and Lisa comments something along the lines of "How rebellious! ...in a conforming sort of way." XD