> A lot of human civilization can be understood as a way of creating more and more incentives for more and more complex positive-sum interactions.
this seems right to me, but wildly less so then the others in that list. i’m confused why this is in your “so confident its true that i basically don’t think about it at all” list.
(also, i would be keen to read an andy-essay on the topic!)
most of the second half (tools) i’d heard before in other places, but most of the first half (mental strategies) was new to me. enjoyable to read, too!
> Most people most of the time avoid situations that are such direct reminders of their own limitations. I’ve come around to thinking that being good at powering through these hits to your ego is a core life skill, and just avoiding hits to your ego is maybe the main way you can get stuck and stagnant in life. … you should focus on choosing material that will actually help you learn, setting clear specific goals for what you’re hoping to learn, build systems that test whether you’re actually learning, and try to become more psychologically resilient to feeling stupid and bad in a new subject.
> It makes it easier for me to learn about macroeconomics knowing that I have a strong network of friends who will hang out with me even if I don’t know the deal with macroeconomics.
> Don’t be afraid of starting off with an incredibly simplistic narrative of the world. You just need to add complexity to it later.
the one part i most cleanly disagree with was:
> Commit to strong beliefs when you’re first learning about a new subject and then adjust them over time, instead of staying uncertain the whole time
seems like this requires a pre-req of being really really good at updating on new evidence, which isn’t hard to develop. i think a practice of steelman sessions — where you “pretend” to hold one strong view, then seek out the arguments that pop out as most damaging to your pretend-beliefs; then switching — retains most of the benefits, is a bit more inneffecient, but also ~totally avoids the failure modes you described.
lol again, i forgot to describe the failure mode explicitly: i would worry, with the method you described, that i would accidentally hole myself arbitrarily into one set of beliefs, without being able to adequately update away from them
> A lot of human civilization can be understood as a way of creating more and more incentives for more and more complex positive-sum interactions.
this seems right to me, but wildly less so then the others in that list. i’m confused why this is in your “so confident its true that i basically don’t think about it at all” list.
(also, i would be keen to read an andy-essay on the topic!)
Kinda just threw that one out there tbh
hahaha check
Do you find you retain much from audiobooks and podcasts? I listen a lot but retain very little.
Unsure! I think I've retained a lot more from them than podcasts but a lot less than written material but it's pretty opaque.
great essay!
most of the second half (tools) i’d heard before in other places, but most of the first half (mental strategies) was new to me. enjoyable to read, too!
some quotes that i found particularly striking:
> Most people most of the time avoid situations that are such direct reminders of their own limitations. I’ve come around to thinking that being good at powering through these hits to your ego is a core life skill, and just avoiding hits to your ego is maybe the main way you can get stuck and stagnant in life. … you should focus on choosing material that will actually help you learn, setting clear specific goals for what you’re hoping to learn, build systems that test whether you’re actually learning, and try to become more psychologically resilient to feeling stupid and bad in a new subject.
> It makes it easier for me to learn about macroeconomics knowing that I have a strong network of friends who will hang out with me even if I don’t know the deal with macroeconomics.
> Don’t be afraid of starting off with an incredibly simplistic narrative of the world. You just need to add complexity to it later.
the one part i most cleanly disagree with was:
> Commit to strong beliefs when you’re first learning about a new subject and then adjust them over time, instead of staying uncertain the whole time
seems like this requires a pre-req of being really really good at updating on new evidence, which isn’t hard to develop. i think a practice of steelman sessions — where you “pretend” to hold one strong view, then seek out the arguments that pop out as most damaging to your pretend-beliefs; then switching — retains most of the benefits, is a bit more inneffecient, but also ~totally avoids the failure modes you described.
*failure mode *i* described, lol
lol again, i forgot to describe the failure mode explicitly: i would worry, with the method you described, that i would accidentally hole myself arbitrarily into one set of beliefs, without being able to adequately update away from them
> I use Obsidian for notes and just use its spaced repetition plugin. I should be using it more!
how often do you currently use it? why aren’t you using it more — is this a fake “should”?
I only end up taking notes on some of the media I consume and only check my decks about once per week right now