[mechanical_fish]

No, you're not just being cynical, and it is in fact crazy to pretend that entrepreneurs don't generally need the same things that everyone else needs.

The OP is apparently anxious to pretend that the average Ramen-eating couch-surfing startup hacker is in danger of actually starving to death, freezing to death, or pining away for lack of human contact. Whereas most of them are just slumming, living extremely cheaply on purpose as part of their chosen lifestyle. There's a difference between an athlete on a strict diet and a desperate, starving person who is wasting away.

And while history does contain apparent examples of people who desperately invented new businesses as their only alternative to starvation, when you ask these people what motivated them to start their businesses they tend to say "starvation!"

Of course, I'm not going to argue that entrepreneurial behavior is actually well-explained by Maslow's hierarchy because, as noted elsewhere in this thread, it's not clear that Maslow's hierarchy is good at explaining anyone's behavior.

[billpatrianakos]

Yes, I meant to mention that last bit about it not being good at explaining anyone's behavior. The hierarchy is like a generalization that can apply very generally to anyone or anything. It reminds me of explanations of instinctual behavior in animals.

In any case it's great fodder for newbies to entrepreneurship to feel warm and fuzzy by reading. We always need to organize and explain everything so it only makes sense that someone would write this even if it ends up being wrong.