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Elliot Temple on April 24, 2019

Messages (73)

doing something important

It would be easy enough to fill my time with volunteer work and family stuff. That's what I was doing before I knew about FI. But I'm not satisfied with that kind of life. I want to do something important. Problems:

1) I don't know what important thing(s) I want to do, and

2) I don't feel confident that I am capable of doing anything important.

I think that learning philosophy will help me with anything important I end up wanting to do.


Anne B at 5:42 AM on April 25, 2019 | #12215 | reply | quote

Broadly, what I am focusing on now:

1) learning to read and write more effectively

2) learning more about the social rules that are around me


Anne B at 5:43 AM on April 25, 2019 | #12216 | reply | quote

Do you have a plan to achieve those goals (reading, writing, social rule knowledge)?


Anonymous at 11:27 AM on April 25, 2019 | #12217 | reply | quote

> Do you have a plan to achieve those goals (reading, writing, social rule knowledge)?

I don't have much of a plan. I have some ideas.

Reading: Continue what I'm doing with the book Mistreated. Try to figure out what the author is saying and why, both big picture and details. Post what I'm doing to the FI list. Do the same kind of thing with other books. Continue taking notes on other things I read, writing down what I think the author is saying.

Writing: Keep writing. Keep trying to be clear in my writing.

Social rule knowledge: Continue looking for examples of puppet strings. Continue thinking about what social rules are at play in situations that come up in my life.

I don't really know what a good plan would look like. I don't know how to construct a plan. How much detail? How many steps? I don't know how to figure out when to move on from one plan part to another plan part. All I can think of is to do stuff that's in the area of what I want to learn and then see if I learn things.


Anne B at 5:28 AM on April 26, 2019 | #12224 | reply | quote

Who are you?


Anonymous at 11:52 AM on May 3, 2019 | #12272 | reply | quote

> Who are you?

I'm not sure what this question means.


Anne B at 11:30 AM on May 5, 2019 | #12284 | reply | quote

doing something important

I'll say more about what I mean by *doing something important*. What I really want is to do something that will significantly change the course of the universe in a good way. But that seems difficult. I don't think I can do it.

Instead I could aim for *solving problems that seem doable and interesting to me* and/or *learning things that seem interesting to me*. That doesn't seem good enough.


Anne B at 11:43 AM on May 5, 2019 | #12285 | reply | quote

> What I really want is to do something that will significantly change the course of the universe in a good way.

Do you really want to? Do you actually avoid activities which you think won't contribute to this goal?


Anonymous at 1:20 PM on May 7, 2019 | #12295 | reply | quote

>> What I really want is to do something that will significantly change the course of the universe in a good way.

> Do you really want to? Do you actually avoid activities which you think won't contribute to this goal?

I now realize I had an unstated assumption in there. I want to do something that will significantly change the course of the universe in a good way that is also something I enjoy doing.

I think I really want this goal. It's hard to tell though. I could be fooling myself and not realize it.

I don't know very well which activities will or won't contribute to my goal. But I can try to avoid activities which don't seem like they could possibly contribute. And I can try to do more of activities that seem like they might contribute. I could do a better job at matching my actions to my goal.


Anne B at 4:32 AM on May 8, 2019 | #12298 | reply | quote

self-improvement

Another big question I have is how to structure my FI learning. By FI learning I mean, broadly, increasing my skills at thinking and learning. I want to be powering up, as discussed in this podcast:

https://curi.us/files/podcasts/overreaching-and-powering-up.mp3

I want to be doing self-improvement, as discussed in this essay:

https://elliottemple.com/essays/life-overreaching-correcting-error

I think of this as happening via a series of exercises that I do and post to the FI list. (There could be some other way to think about it.) I have tried some such exercises.

Most recently, I've been going through a book by Robert Pearl, called Mistreated: Why We Think We're Getting Good Health Care—and Why We're Usually Wrong. I've been trying to see what hidden assumptions Pearl is making, what inexplicit things he's trying to convey, as well as trying to read correctly what he is explicitly saying.

In this post

https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/fallible-ideas/6798E27E-BA3C-44E7-AA53-F50CFBBFFDF9%40curi.us

Elliot estimated that I've got about a 20% error rate and that I would learn faster if I did something easier and had a lower error rate.

Doing something easier would be easier(!) and that would be nice. But what to do that's easier and is a step on the path I want to be going on?

Some ideas I have:

* Look for third grade reading comprehension questions and do some of those.

* Like I did before: look for news articles and look for errors in them. I don't think that's easier than looking at a few paragraphs of Mistreated at a time. I'd probably get way more that 1% of it wrong.

* Look at scientific articles for errors. That seems more difficult than looking at Mistreated.

* Try the LSAT reading comprehension questions that someone posted a while back. That would be more basic comprehension rather than the hidden assumptions and attempts at manipulation that I was trying to find in Mistreated. And it would be difficult reading comprehension compared to third-grade stuff.

* Look at some simple social interactions for hidden stuff.

* Do some beginner logic problems.

* Learn a video game. I don't think I would do it with under a 1% error rate and I don't think it would contribute to getting better at analyzing writing or social stuff.

* Look some more for puppet strings in my everyday life and write about them. I did this for a while, off and on. It's hard for me to tell what my error rate was.

* Continue writing about Mistreated but only talk about things I'm most sure of and ignore the things that seem harder for me.

I don't think I really believe that doing things that are super easy (1% error rate) will result in much learning. But I am willing to try it and see what happens.

The easiest things on this list are the third-grade reading comprehension and beginner logic problems. I think I should try one of those two now. I'm open to other ideas too.


Anne B at 7:19 AM on May 12, 2019 | #12344 | reply | quote

What are you great at? What are you *very* interested in? What good values do hold strongly enough to prioritize them over rationalizations and other crap? What *resources* do you have available to help your learning?

Look at this https://curi.us/1859-how-to-get-unstuck


Anonymous at 2:03 PM on May 12, 2019 | #12350 | reply | quote

> I don't think I really believe that doing things that are super easy (1% error rate) will result in much learning.

You neglected to say why.


Anonymous at 2:04 PM on May 12, 2019 | #12351 | reply | quote

>What are you great at? What are you *very* interested in? What good values do hold strongly enough to prioritize them over rationalizations and other crap? What *resources* do you have available to help your learning?

>

> Look at this https://curi.us/1859-how-to-get-unstuck

What am I great at?

Nothing. I have aimed for good rather than great.

What am I very interested in?

Nothing. I am interested in some things but not *very* interested. One big interest is in people: why they do what they do, how they interact with each other, how they learn, how they think.

What good values do I hold strongly?

This is hard to answer. I think morality is important even though I don't have a clear idea what good morality is. I think truth is important yet there's a lot in me that sabotages truth-seeking.

What resources do I have?

Time. Some persistence. The FI list.


Anne B at 11:16 AM on May 13, 2019 | #12359 | reply | quote

#12359 re good values, look at the chart here:

http://fallibleideas.com/parenting-and-tradition

do you think you have any of those values enough for it to have convinced you to change your parenting (if you were a regular parent, didn't know about tcs, homeschool, etc)? or are none of the example values/traditions very motivating for you? maybe the list will also help you think of others that aren't listed to consider.


Anonymous at 11:18 AM on May 13, 2019 | #12360 | reply | quote

>> I don't think I really believe that doing things that are super easy (1% error rate) will result in much learning.

> You neglected to say why.

I think I won't learn from doing things I already know how to do. And I think I won't learn much from the 1% errors because I only learn from a small percentage of my errors, and a small percentage of 1% doesn't seem like much.


Anne B at 11:22 AM on May 13, 2019 | #12361 | reply | quote

1% error rate is not super easy. Your error rate when walking is much lower than 1%.

And if you *actually do something* and *succeed* (you were right that you already knew how to do it), you can then incrementally make it harder. You have to start somewhere you can already do (step 1), then expand on that (step 2) in manageable amounts.


Anonymous at 11:24 AM on May 13, 2019 | #12362 | reply | quote

#12360

> http://fallibleideas.com/parenting-and-tradition

>

> do you think you have any of those values enough for it to have convinced you to change your parenting (if you were a regular parent, didn't know about tcs, homeschool, etc)? or are none of the example values/traditions very motivating for you? maybe the list will also help you think of others that aren't listed to consider.

The ones on that chart that are most motivating for me are:

The American Dream

Reason

Human Rights

Individualism

Individual Responsibility


Anne B at 12:51 PM on May 13, 2019 | #12363 | reply | quote

#12363 Try to do something with one or more of those. Can it motivate you to do any learning activities to try to change some way you're currently violating them? You are currently violating them a ton (if you understood Rand and Mises, you'd understand that – and if you care about those values, then you'd take steps towards gaining that knowledge even if only to check if you might be betraying your values).


Anonymous at 12:52 PM on May 13, 2019 | #12364 | reply | quote

#12362

> 1% error rate is not super easy. Your error rate when walking is much lower than 1%.

>

> And if you *actually do something* and *succeed* (you were right that you already knew how to do it), you can then incrementally make it harder. You have to start somewhere you can already do (step 1), then expand on that (step 2) in manageable amounts.

Is the following a good example?

I want to learn to read with better understanding. I start with standardized test kinds of reading comprehension at a low level. I gradually increase the level and find out at what level I start to fall below 99% correct answers. Then I do a bunch of questions at the highest level where I'm still getting 99%+ right. I read some tips on reading comprehension and try to learn them and incorporate them into my work. Once I've done that for a while, I try a higher level again and see if I can do it at a 99%+ correctness rate.

Would this be a good idea for a learning project for me? The good things about it are I could find material with answer keys so I wouldn't need any other people to help me figure out my error rate. And I understand how to do the project.


Anne B at 1:20 PM on May 13, 2019 | #12365 | reply | quote

I wrote #12363 :

>> The ones on that chart that are most motivating for me are:

>> The American Dream

>> Reason

>> Human Rights

>> Individualism

>> Individual Responsibility

Anonymous wrote #12364 :

> Try to do something with one or more of those. Can it motivate you to do any learning activities to try to change some way you're currently violating them? You are currently violating them a ton (if you understood Rand and Mises, you'd understand that – and if you care about those values, then you'd take steps towards gaining that knowledge even if only to check if you might be betraying your values).

I could be currently violating these values a ton. I can't tell if I am or not. I'd like to take steps towards understanding this. I don't know what those steps are. It seems too hard right now to read Rand and Mises and understand much of it. I don't know what easier things I can do that are steps towards what I want to learn.

As I see it, my problem is not motivation, it's knowing how to proceed.

I need ideas for simple, easy learning activities I can do now that will help me change ways I am currently violating these values.

One idea just came to me. In #12359 I said that truth is important to me. I recently started videoing myself doing some activities that I wanted to improve at. This is a way of getting at the truth of how I'm doing, a truth that I was unwilling to look at (literally) until now.


Anne B at 7:34 AM on May 14, 2019 | #12375 | reply | quote

I am thinking about doing the learning project described here:

http://curi.us/2198-mario-odyssey-discussion

> By playing Mario Odyssey, you can learn what it's like to get good and something and succeed. You can see how practice works and things that used to be hard become easy. Learn to practice efficiently. Learn to write down notes, to review videos (like other people's speedruns) and get useful help from them, and learn to remember a bunch of information. You can see what correcting errors is like. You can see what getting details right is like and succeed with high quality standards. You can see how to build up your skills. First you learn how to do basic movement. Then you practice until it doesn't take much attention anymore. Then you can learn harder combinations of movement which build on the basic things. Now that the basic things are easy for you, your attention is free to focus on combined sequences.

I wonder if the project as a whole would be easy enough for me. Would I be able to do all the things in this paragraph? Would this count as a basic, easy project for me, as suggested in this post?:

https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/fallible-ideas/6798E27E-BA3C-44E7-AA53-F50CFBBFFDF9%40curi.us

> I’d suggest, as I suggest to everyone, working on more basic stuff and trying to build up to more complicated stuff. This has been explained in other posts already.

I could give it a try and see how it goes. But so far just about every project I've tried has ended up being not super easy for me. I fear this will be the same and I'd be better off doing something easier for now.


Anne B at 8:59 AM on May 14, 2019 | #12376 | reply | quote

> One idea just came to me. In #12359 I said that truth is important to me. I recently started videoing myself doing some activities that I wanted to improve at. This is a way of getting at the truth of how I'm doing, a truth that I was unwilling to look at (literally) until now.

You know there have been lots of suggestions to record video of yourself doing FI activities, like writing emails, which you and others have not done?

That was a way of proceeding which was shared, which you have not done.

> As I see it, my problem is not motivation, it's knowing how to proceed.

You could have proceeded by responding to this (linked a few comments above):

https://curi.us/1859-how-to-get-unstuck

You didn't.

You could have proceeded using the Girls Chase book. You refused.

You were told how to proceed with *The Fountainhead*. You did not follow instructions.

You could be doing the "FI Beginner Learning Process" idea. I don't think you are.

You could be learning basic reading and grammar, as Justin has been. You don't do that.

You could have learned the Lords of Waterdeep game, tried to get good at it, and discussed it. You didn't.

> I start with standardized test kinds of reading comprehension at a low level.

All the tests I've seen are bad – ambiguous questions, false answers, unstated cultural assumptions.

> But so far just about every project I've tried has ended up being not super easy for me.

IIRC: you made a similar complaint months ago and were asked to list what you had done that didn't work, and you did not make a list.


Anonymous at 11:33 AM on May 14, 2019 | #12377 | reply | quote

#12377

I am having a hard time responding to this post. I feel frustrated and defensive reading it. What to do?

I will try the advice given below and just post this and see what happens.

https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/fallible-ideas/C006C3A7-9371-4CD3-AA84-D39E7B7B4E09%40curi.us

> I think you spent those hours hurting yourself (and partially blaming FI/me/anon/etc for that harm). I doubt they significantly improved the post, and they could easily have made it worse.

>

> You spent those hours contrary to my advice about speaking on FI like you would in person (where you reply to people verbally within a few seconds).


Anne B at 1:01 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12378 | reply | quote

I tried to buy the Girls Chase book. The link on their website didn't work for me and I couldn't find the book elsewhere. I was about to write to the Girls Chase people and ask how to buy the book. Then this was posted:

https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/fallible-ideas/C006C3A7-9371-4CD3-AA84-D39E7B7B4E09%40curi.us

> Stop. Don’t. Abort. You have to do things you want to do. Otherwise you’ll mistreat people, especially yourself. When you dislike things and have a bad time, that means you don’t understand how to get value from them: they aren’t working, they aren’t productive, you aren’t learning (if those things were happening, you’d like it).

>

> You don’t want to think rationally about PUA. You don’t want to learn it. You’re biased against it. You need to find some other topic where you can have a good time and make progress there instead.

This seemed like good advice to me so I stopped trying to think about Girls Chase.


Anne B at 1:06 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12379 | reply | quote

https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/fallible-ideas/C006C3A7-9371-4CD3-AA84-D39E7B7B4E09%40curi.us

> Stop. Don’t. Abort. You have to do things you want to do. Otherwise you’ll mistreat people, especially yourself. When you dislike things and have a bad time, that means you don’t understand how to get value from them: they aren’t working, they aren’t productive, you aren’t learning (if those things were happening, you’d like it).

>

> You don’t want to think rationally about PUA. You don’t want to learn it. You’re biased against it. You need to find some other topic where you can have a good time and make progress there instead.

I fear this applies to FI in general. I think I want to think rationally about FI but I don't seem to do so. I think I want to learn FI but I don't seem to do so. Maybe I'm biased against FI. Maybe the only topics I'd enjoy are away from the FI community. Maybe the best thing to do is leave.

That doesn't seem right though.


Anne B at 1:11 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12381 | reply | quote

Mario is a better plan than giving up and leaving.


Anonymous at 1:14 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12382 | reply | quote

I don't think it's always right to give up on something when I'm having a bad time. FI is a good example of this. I'd rather keep trying to find a way to do it that's not a bad time for me.


Anne B at 5:35 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12383 | reply | quote

I was trying to find a learning project that satisfies all of these criteria:

1) I can do it with an error rate of 1% or less.

2) I can tell when I've made an error.

3) It's a step towards other things I want to learn.

I can't think of anything that fits all of these criteria. So I can either keep trying to think of something or give up on one of these things.


Anne B at 5:36 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12384 | reply | quote

I think I might enjoy playing Super Mario Odyssey. However, it seems like it would be a long project to try to get super good at it. I think I'd make mistakes in my process. I'd get stuck. My rate of errors that I couldn't fix myself would be higher than 1%.

All the things listed in #12377 would be too hard for me. They wouldn't be basic, easy things for me to do.

>> But so far just about every project I've tried has ended up being not super easy for me.

> IIRC: you made a similar complaint months ago and were asked to list what you had done that didn't work, and you did not make a list.

I will try to make such a list here. These are projects I have tried recently, in reverse chronological order.

* Reading Mistreated and looking for hidden assumptions, attempts at manipulation, other thinking problems. Elliot estimated I had a 20% error rate.

* Finding examples of puppet strings. Based on the errors that were pointed out to me, I had an error rate of well over 1%. There were probably more errors that were not pointed out to me.

* Reading scientific articles and finding mistakes in their thinking. I gave up because I could tell it was too hard.

* Reading news articles and finding mistakes in their thinking. I found some but I was told I missed a lot. I'm pretty sure I made errors in well over 1% of what I wrote about what I did find.

* Reading news articles and finding factual and grammar mistakes. This was easier. I'm guessing it was still more than a 1% error rate.


Anne B at 5:57 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12385 | reply | quote

> You could have proceeded by responding to this (linked a few comments above):

>

> https://curi.us/1859-how-to-get-unstuck

>

> You didn't.

I thought the conversation in #12359, #12360, #12363, #12364, and #12375 was in response to that link.


Anne B at 6:18 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12386 | reply | quote

I'm not saying that the projects I listed in #12385 didn't work. I'm saying that they were not < 1% error rate projects for me. If I want something I can do with under a 1% error rate I'm going to have to find much easier projects.


Anne B at 6:44 PM on May 14, 2019 | #12387 | reply | quote

> I was trying to find a learning project that satisfies all of these criteria:

>

> 1) I can do it with an error rate of 1% or less.

>

> 2) I can tell when I've made an error.

>

> 3) It's a step towards other things I want to learn.

>

> I can't think of anything that fits all of these criteria. So I can either keep trying to think of something or give up on one of these things.

4) I enjoy doing it.


Anne B at 8:10 AM on May 15, 2019 | #12392 | reply | quote

I thought of something that might satisfy the four criteria above.

I wanted to study grammar and I wanted to start with very easy grammar stuff.

I looked online for grammar games for kids but those seemed more like they were testing grammar knowledge rather than teaching it.

Then I tried Khan Academy. I did the first grammar unit there, on nouns. They have instructional videos and then quizzes meant to show you if you understand the stuff. My error rate was less than 1%. Grammar is a step towards better reading. And I did kind of enjoy it. The guy who made the videos put in some humor and some bonus history, which were nice.

I ran into one significant question, which I researched elsewhere. That led to another significant question. I'll probably post about these questions on the FI list. I'm pretty sure now about my answer to the first question, although not completely sure. I don't know the answer to the second question. This is a bit frustrating/scary since it's only the first unit. But I'll try to proceed with those questions or decide to drop them for now.


Anne B at 3:15 PM on May 17, 2019 | #12426 | reply | quote

Anne, how do you think your grammar project is going? Satisfied so far? Getting close to bored or stuck? Anything unexpected happen, good or bad? Do things seem to be getting better or worse? etc


Anonymous at 10:39 AM on June 11, 2019 | #12732 | reply | quote

I've been doing grammar analysis of simple sentences. I've done about 30 sentences.

I've learned to look things up when I'm unsure about them. I was not in the habit of doing that before.

I practiced doing post-mortems a little.

I've learned some things about grammar, although I may forget them.

Analyzing the simple sentences is getting easier. I don't hate it. It was sometimes frustrating or upsetting at first but now it isn't. But it is kind of boring.

I don't know how to decide when to move on. I could wait until I think I have an error rate of < 1%. I'm not there yet. Or I could move on to complex sentences now. I lean towards doing more simple sentences.


Anne B at 8:07 AM on June 12, 2019 | #12748 | reply | quote

I'm considering using this story to get simple sentences from:

https://fsgworkinprogress.com/2011/05/17/orientation-by-daniel-orozco/

It has present tense, imperatives, and helping verbs, all of which I'd like to work on.


Anne B at 10:25 AM on June 12, 2019 | #12749 | reply | quote

My grammar work has been more difficult recently.

Sometimes I get discouraged and frustrated. I think I'm working on easy things and still they seem hard to me and I'm not making much progress. Sometimes I want to give up. I think I should know this stuff already and be learning it faster and be retaining more of what I learn.

Sometimes when this happens I do something else for a few hours or a day and then come back to the grammar.


Anne B at 11:06 AM on July 6, 2019 | #12967 | reply | quote

You can go into less detail on grammar stuff if you prefer. You don't have to know how every word works. That's up to you.


Anonymous at 12:42 PM on July 6, 2019 | #12968 | reply | quote

Status Update

I'm continuing to work on grammar. I haven't gotten frustrated in a while. I do some just about every day but when I get tired of it I stop instead of pushing myself to do more than I want to.


Anne B at 6:28 AM on July 25, 2019 | #13144 | reply | quote

Status Update

I've continued studying grammar. I've done the exercises in this essay:

https://fallibleideas.com/grammar

I've also made up my own exercises for extra practice on particular things. I've also read and responded to other people's FI posts about grammar. It has been helpful having other people on the FI list who are currently studying grammar or are interested in grammar.

I'm not sure if I want to continue studying grammar. If I do, I could go through Peikoff's grammar course. Or I could analyze more sentences that I find myself. I could start with finding sentences with “that” since I've been thinking about the grammar of “that” recently.

My grammar study has been successful so far. I have mostly enjoyed it rather than feeling frustrated or bored. I have learned some grammar. I have gotten the experience of studying something successfully by looking things up and writing and answering posts. This is different from my school experiences of study, where I listened to a teacher and read books and then took tests.

I don't know how to tell when to move on to a new topic. Some other things I'd enjoy studying are: reading comprehension, logic, programming.


Anne B at 11:29 AM on August 12, 2019 | #13290 | reply | quote

IMO try listening to some Peikoff material and see how you like it (also read my notes if you haven't). Give it a chance. You might enjoy comparing what he says to what you've learned. And now (with grammar stuff fresh in your mind) is a better time for that project than later.

Your grammar study seemed successful to me to. You got very noticeably better at it.


curi at 11:34 AM on August 12, 2019 | #13291 | reply | quote

I'm up to Lecture 3 and Homework 2 in Peikoff's grammar course. So far I think I'm learning from it and I plan to continue with it.


Anne B at 10:21 AM on September 4, 2019 | #13441 | reply | quote

unbounded criticism

I read this article again. Here's part of it (formatting removed).

http://curi.us/2033-lots-of-thoughts

> I can break anyone. I can ask questions, criticize errors, and advocate for more progress until they give up and refuse to speak. No one can handle that if I really try. I can bring up enough of people’s flaws that it’s overwhelming and unwanted.

>

> There are limits on what criticism people want to hear, what demons they want to face, what they want to question. Perhaps they’ll expand those limits gradually. But I, in the spirit of BoI, approach things differently. i take all criticism and questions from all comers without limiting rules and without being overwhelmed.

[...]

> occasionally people here ask for full, maximum criticism. they don’t like the idea that i’m holding back – that i know problems in their lives and their thinking that i’m not telling them, that are going unsolved. (or that i could quickly discover such problems if i thought about them, asked them some questions, etc). i’ve often responded by testing them in some little way which was too much and they didn’t persist in asking for more.

>

> it’s difficult b/c i prefer to be honest and say what i think openly. i generally don’t lie. but i neglect to say lots of things i could. i neglect to energetically pursue things involving other ppl which could/should be pursued if they were better and more capable. i could write 10+ replies each to most posts here with questions and arguments (often conditional on some guesses about incomplete information). there’s so much more to be said, so many connections to other stuff. people don’t want to deal with that. they want bounds on discussion.

I'm imagining what would happen if I asked for unbounded criticism... People would give me a long list of things that I'm doing wrong. Some of the things on the list I would already know about and know that I wasn't willing to face yet. Many of the things on the list would be new to me. Would I be able to read through the list, pick out one or two things to work on next, put the rest aside for now, and remain optimistic about making progress? I'm tempted to try even though I may not succeed.

TheRat interpreted my mostly posting about grammar these days as meaning that I'm afraid to post about anything else for fear of being wrong and getting more criticism. That has some truth to it.

Potential problems with asking for unbounded criticism:

1) I might not know how to decide what to work on first.

2) I might feel overwhelmed and give up.

3) I might feel overwhelmed and make less progress than I would have by just continuing with grammar.

4) There might be so much criticism that I don't even have time to read it all. (Actually, that's not really a problem. And it's unlikely.)

5) Something might get posted publicly that I don't want other people to know about. (This in itself is an issue I know about and don't want to face.)

6) I might not get unbounded criticism. People might not want to give it.

Potential good things about asking for unbounded criticism:

1) I might make faster progress.

2) Some things I already know I'm not facing might feel less scary if I saw them in black and white.

3) The whole idea of unbounded criticism might feel less scary if I tried it.


Anne B at 3:38 PM on September 18, 2019 | #13554 | reply | quote

status report

I'm still working on grammar. I sort of enjoy it and sort of don't. I want to move on to something else but I also want to finish the Peikoff course first.

I'm up to Homework 4, Part 2, Question 10.


Anne B at 3:41 PM on September 18, 2019 | #13555 | reply | quote

a little more criticism

#13554

I want to try getting more criticism, but gradually. Anyone who's reading this, please don't hold back your criticism of me quite so much. I want to see how I handle getting more good criticism.


Anne B at 5:03 PM on September 22, 2019 | #13580 | reply | quote

#13580 That's hard because you mostly post about grammar which is optimized for *not* getting into philosophical issues, so it's hard to turn up the criticism. I could try to read your grammar stuff in more detail and give more detailed grammar criticism, but I don't want to, and I have way less expertise to use for creating grammar criticism.


curi at 9:40 PM on September 22, 2019 | #13581 | reply | quote

Yes, my grammar work is optimized for not getting criticism.

One reason I'm happy with my grammar work is that I'm scared of criticism and I'm not getting much right now. I don't think fear is a good reason to be doing something.

On the other hand, I can see that I'm learning grammar and learning how to successfully learn something, and that is good.

These pros and cons will apply to the next thing I study too. I plan to pick something else that won't get much criticism. Now I wonder if that's a bad plan.

Is it better to study easy things where I learn tiny bits at a time? Or is it better to read and study more difficult things, where I'll have more trouble and get more criticism? Or some of each?

In any case (this is addressed to everyone), please don't hold back any criticisms of me you happen to think of. I want to work on handling more now.


Anne B at 5:44 AM on September 23, 2019 | #13583 | reply | quote

Reading

I want to start reading books on the Fallible Ideas reading list (http://fallibleideas.com/books). I know I won't understand them all that well, but I can still get an idea of what they are like.

It's too hard to not read anything while I build up better reading skills. So I end up reading low-quality stuff. That seems wrong when I can be reading good stuff instead.


Anne B at 2:45 PM on October 7, 2019 | #13748 | reply | quote

End Grammar Project

I've completed the Peikoff grammar course. I'm ending my grammar project for now.


Anne B at 5:23 AM on October 14, 2019 | #13791 | reply | quote

Begin Logic Project

I want to study logic next. I've been saving up ideas for it. Here's what I've got so far:

- do practice LSAT questions

- brilliant.org logic course

- learnlogictheeasyway.com

- Peikoff logic course

- look for logic errors in Discord chat, posts, comments, articles, books, etc.

I will try some or all of these and see what I think. Other ideas are welcome.


Anne B at 5:33 AM on October 14, 2019 | #13792 | reply | quote

another idea for studying logic

I have started a list of logic things that I want to look into further. For instance, someone posted something about a syllogism and I realized that's a logic thing. I looked up some info on syllogism and just reading a few websites gave me some questions about syllogisms that I want to think about and write about and research more.

I could do the same with the other things on my list, and my list could become pretty long. Logic seems like a big topic. I hope I can work on little pieces at a time and not get overwhelmed.


Anne B at 4:50 PM on October 16, 2019 | #13811 | reply | quote

Why would you get overwhelmed? Problem-solving should be fun. As universal knowledge creators, you're in no less or better position to solve your problems than anyone else. Anyone who tells you otherwise is just being authoritative.

You should learn things that are helping you solve your problems. Nobody can tell you what your learning curriculum should be. If learning logic is fun to you it means it is helping you solve your problems, there is no reason to fear inadequacy. You're human, thus you can learn anything.

For more on this read this book: https://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Infinity-Explanations-Transform-World/dp/0143121359


Anonymous at 5:20 PM on October 16, 2019 | #13812 | reply | quote

> authoritative

You use words without knowing what they mean and how to use them. You shouldn't do that. It's important to know what you know, know what you don't know. If you don't know something, don't do/use it, or else find out how to do/use it correctly. But don't go ahead with making errors, that just makes things worse.

If you can't tell what you do and don't know with reasonable accuracy (mistakes will happen sometimes ofc), it's really important to start learning that. The way to begin learning that is to work on some projects which are easy enough for you that you're highly successful. This will help you understand what high enough quality knowledge is like, and give you a point of comparison so you can better recognize when you don't have that level of understanding.

Your error is a very high probability indicator (over 99.99%), in our culture, that you have these problems in a big way. Statistically, demographically, over 99.99% of people who make that error would have the problems I outlined above, rather than it being a fluke. It's quite rare for that kind of thing to be a random error.

See also: http://fallibleideas.com/overreach


Dagny at 5:37 PM on October 16, 2019 | #13813 | reply | quote

Nonsense

#13813 Overreach is absolute nonsense. It is anti-Popperian.

There is no such thing as overreaching because there is no such thing as an error free state. Overreach is a misconception borne out of a desire to avoid problems.

Problems are not something to avoid or to try to mitigate. Problems are opportunities.

You epistemology is deeply flawed and you'll have a hard time thinking creatively if you shackle yourself with nonsense such as overreaching.

Why are schools considered authoritarian? They have a set curriculum and tell people "you should learn this, and not that. That is too hard for you, don't overreach, try this easier problem instead." Sound familiar? Overreaching is just an attempt to control people, it is no different from school authorities telling you what you can and cannot learn. worse, what you should and should not pursue. Nonsense.

For more on this read "Conjectures and Refutations" by Karl Popper, and "The Beginning of Infinity" by David Deutsch.


Anonymous at 6:40 PM on October 16, 2019 | #13814 | reply | quote

You don't know what overreaching is. It's about managing your rate of errors relative to your rate of correcting errors, not about avoiding problems. It's about avoiding *too many problems at once* (weighted by size, complexity, difficulty). That is a thing people have substantial control over, e.g. you could start 20 hard projects today, and every day this month, or only 1 per day, and that would affect how many problems you have to deal with.


curi at 7:11 PM on October 16, 2019 | #13815 | reply | quote

AOPS Prealgebra

#13811 Solving math problems involves things related to logic, such as: stating ideas precisely, applying definitions, making inferences, checking for contradictions, and explaining your thinking.

For math novices who know basic arithmetic and want to learn more, AOPS *Prealgebra* can be helpful. Justin Mallone, Kate Sams, and I have completed parts of it. On 10 July 2017, Justin Mallone wrote:

> i think the [Art of Problem Solving] series explains stuff better than most books. there’s companion videos available on youtube from Richard Rusczyk that are decent as well.


Alisa at 8:18 PM on October 16, 2019 | #13816 | reply | quote

Propositional Logic

I'm focusing on propositional logic now, in the Learn Logic the Easy Way course.

learnlogictheeasyway.com

I completed the first level and the first few lessons of the second level.

I was trying to relate the lessons there to logic knowledge outside the course and I was making too many errors. For now I'll stick with this course.


Anne B at 12:26 PM on November 19, 2019 | #14386 | reply | quote

I looked at some logic material, trying to decide what to study from next.

I want something that I can link to and have people be able to see without having to register or pay.

I want something that has exercises and answers to them.

I decided on this for now:

https://courses.umass.edu/phil110-gmh/MAIN/IHome-5.htm

> Gary Hardegree

> Symbolic Logic: A First Course

It's a logic textbook that is available online.


Anne B at 3:33 AM on November 25, 2019 | #14560 | reply | quote

Update

I’ve switched from learning logic to a new focus.

I had a few days where I was conscious of being very unhappy with myself and with FI. For details, see some of the trees I posted to the FI list in the past week, starting with this post:

https://groups.google.com/d/msg/fallible-ideas/Xv8BYg5lGCM/LoDR0OTQBAAJ

Big picture: I’ve been putting a lot of pressure on myself, some of it disguised by feeling as if the pressure came from other people.

I’m currently working on solving this problem. I have a draft of a project plan for it:

1) When I get a suggestion from someone else or from myself, I do this: I write it down in a list of suggestions. I write how I feel about the suggestion, especially whether I feel pressured. I write out my decision about what to do with the suggestion, along with my reasons. I say out loud to myself, “Advice I get is just advice; it has no power to control me. It is a suggestion and not an order. It’s my responsibility to evaluate advice and decide whether or not to follow it, based on my own judgment as to whether it will benefit me.”

2) I try to regularly notice whether I’m having fun. If I’m not, I ask myself to consider stopping what I am doing. Maybe I’ll set a timer to do this at random times?

I think part 2 is going to be harder than part 1. I think I will continue to pressure myself to do things I don’t enjoy doing. I’ve started formally on part 1. I’ve started informally on part 2.

Easier projects: I learned how to make trees with MindNode. I learned how to link to Discord posts. I’m trying to figure out whether and how to use Markdown. I’ve started spending more time on a non-FI project that I am actually happy to do. I gave some conscious thought to which non-FI projects I enjoy and which I don’t.


Anne B at 12:33 PM on December 13, 2019 | #14824 | reply | quote

Update

My new plan is to work on improving some thinking habits. I want to:

1. Greatly reduce my error rate

2. Do postmortems on errors

3. Remember that is is my responsibility to decide what I think and do, and consciously decide whether to follow advice/suggestions/requests/orders from the voice in my head or from other people

4. Focus on the real world rather than the social world

5. Notice when I’m emotional and realize that my emotions will affect my thinking

6. Enjoy trying to solve difficult problems

7. Notice when I’m uncomfortable with something I’m doing and take that as a sign that maybe I’m not doing one of the other things on this list well

To work on these habits, I plan to:

A. Check every FI post for these things before I post it.

B. Re-read my list twice a day and try to keep it in mind the rest of the time.

C. Remind myself of one or two of these before non-FI events where I think I might need that particular reminder.

As I do this plan, I may study some subject areas. Today I'm trying out some programming stuff in Simply Scheme.


Anne B at 5:44 AM on January 24, 2020 | #15242 | reply | quote

Evaluation

I think I’ve done pretty well but not super well at my plan from January 24:

1. I reduced my error rate in FI, mostly by only addressing topics that I thought I could write about with few errors and by cutting out almost all FI Discord chat. It’s hard to know how many errors I’ve made in FI over the past month. Eventually I’d like to re-introduce informal and social chat and more formal writing about more difficult topics, but not yet.

2. I did some postmortems.

3. I am getting better at taking responsibility for my choices. I still sometimes feel the urge to do what I’m told or to do what I think I’m supposed to do. But I don’t feel it as strongly or as often. And sometimes I catch myself and think through, with reasons, whether I actually want to do something. The procedure labeled “1)” in my December 13 post above was helpful.

4. I’m continuing to try to tell the difference between the real world and the social world. When I’m clear about the difference, I’ve been able to keep social stuff out of my FI posts. I may still be missing identifying some social stuff.

5. I’ve been noticing sometimes when I’m emotional.

6. I can’t tell if I’m getting better at enjoying working on difficult problems. Tentatively, I think yes.

7. Noticing when I’m uncomfortable has been helpful to me. There have been several times during the past month when I’ve realized I wasn’t comfortable with something I was doing and I was able to identify the cause of my discomfort and change course.

I did A, B and C consistently at first and then I started doing them less often.

I’ve continued working on Simply Scheme. I’m near the end of Chapter 1. I think I’m learning from it. I've written several FI emails about it.

Regarding my December 13 update: I think I have greatly reduced the frustration I was feeling about the speed of my progress. It’s hard to measure, though.


Anne B at 8:48 AM on February 28, 2020 | #15664 | reply | quote

Current Plan

1. Continue to try to keep the following in mind, reminding myself at least a few times a week:

- have a low error rate

- do postmortems

- remember that it’s my responsibility and right to decide what I do, based on reasons and not emotions

- don’t feel frustrated by problems; enjoy learning

- focus on the real world rather than the social world

- notice when I’m emotional or uncomfortable

2. Continue with Simply Scheme

3. Continue considering some other projects to do alongside the Simply Scheme project


Anne B at 8:50 AM on February 28, 2020 | #15665 | reply | quote

another thing for the Current Plan

Also in my current plan: Write down a summary of what FI work I do every day.


Anne B at 8:56 AM on February 28, 2020 | #15666 | reply | quote

> 4. I’m continuing to try to tell the difference between the real world and the social world. When I’m clear about the difference, I’ve been able to keep social stuff out of my FI posts. I may still be missing identifying some social stuff.

Keeping social stuff out of FI posts has both upsides and downsides. The downside is it prevents some criticism. You also haven't been sharing your analysis of social stuff for people to comment on. You're going it alone and should expect to be missing identifying tons of stuff because it's a very big, tricky area.

FWIW I thought your recent replies to GISTE about grammar were good. If you compare them to your first few posts about grammar, I think it's clear you improved lots.


curi at 10:07 AM on February 28, 2020 | #15667 | reply | quote

Plan Update

**Evaluation of how previous plan went**

1.

> Continue to try to keep the following in mind, reminding myself at least a few times a week:

> - have a low error rate

> - do postmortems

> - remember that it’s my responsibility and right to decide what I do, based on reasons and not emotions

> - don’t feel frustrated by problems; enjoy learning

> - focus on the real world rather than the social world

> - notice when I’m emotional or uncomfortable

I got tired of checking this stuff consciously so I stopped. I want to go back to doing it once a day.

2. In Simply Scheme, I worked through all of Chapter 2 and started working on Chapter 3.

3. Some of the other projects I was thinking of were making my own website and sharing my daily karate practice. I got both of those started.

4.

> Also in my current plan: Write down a summary of what FI work I do every day.
I did this just about every day. I’ll continue.

**New plan for going forward**

1. Check and think about the below list once a day:

- have a low error rate

- do postmortems

- remember that it’s my responsibility and right to decide what I do, based on reasons and not emotions

- don’t feel frustrated by problems; enjoy learning

- focus on the real world rather than the social world

- notice when I’m emotional or uncomfortable

2. Continue with Simply Scheme as I have been.

3. Continue my karate practice as I have been.

4. I've been taking notes on more things that I read and listen to. I want to continue doing this. I might or might not share some of it.

5. I want to again focus on how I receive suggestions, and also explicitly include criticism as well as suggestions. So in addition to the once a day thing in 1. above, every time I get a suggestion or criticism, I want to:

- stop and think before responding

- write down (for myself) reasons for agreeing or disagreeing with it

- remember that it's my responsibility to judge whether or not to follow it.


Anne B at 11:19 AM on March 26, 2020 | #16151 | reply | quote

From Discord

https://ptb.discordapp.com/channels/304082867384745994/647276416857276426/692065514306142237

> [10:37 AM] Kate: […] I wonder if there are things you can do to encourage vs discourage second-handedness.

> [10:38 AM] curi: there are many. recently i've been giving less advice and responding to ppl less.

I think this has helped me. I’ve been less focused on what I think curi and other people want me to do and I’ve been using my own judgment more. However, I do want more than zero suggestions and criticism, both so I can learn from their content and so I can get practice in responding to them.

Maybe it would help if it wasn’t just curi giving me advice and criticism, but other people too? I don’t know.


Anne B at 11:28 AM on March 26, 2020 | #16152 | reply | quote

I wonder if my current plan is too long and complicated. It’s tough for me to judge.

I think it’s doable. The only things I’ve committed to doing at a particular frequency are 1 and 3 once a day, and those don’t take very long each day.

I could be overreaching and making too many errors on the Simply Scheme stuff or something else. I wouldn’t necessarily know it if I was.


Anne B at 11:29 AM on March 26, 2020 | #16153 | reply | quote

I have a website now:

https://aelanwave.wordpress.com

It has my current learning plan, blog posts, and learning notes from some of my projects.


Anne B at 2:50 PM on April 20, 2020 | #16399 | reply | quote

I want to look at some research papers about diet and see whether they’re good. If there’s good research on diet, I’d like to know what is is. If a lot of it is bad, I’d like to be able to say that to people in conversation and give some good reasons. First I tried to get a general idea of things to look for in evaluating research papers:

https://aelanwave.wordpress.com/2020/12/12/common-errors-in-research-papers/

Then I found a paper that I’ve seen cited and I read through it and wrote some criticisms:

https://aelanwave.wordpress.com/2020/12/18/analysis-predimed-study-on-mediterranean-diet/

It took me several days and I feel like my post isn’t as well-organized as it could be, which are both signs I might be overreaching. Any thoughts on whether I’m overreaching? If so, any ideas on how to go about this with a smaller next step than taking another paper and doing the same kind of thing with it?

Do you see anything I said that is wrong? I am less concerned about criticisms of the research that I failed to see, but feel free to point those out if you want.


Anne B at 10:34 AM on December 18, 2020 | #19198 | reply | quote

#19198 blog posts seemed fine but I'm wondering what part took several days. Also several days is ambiguous - like you could have spent a bit of time across several days working on this, or a lot of time.


Justin Mallone at 6:26 AM on December 19, 2020 | #19201 | reply | quote

It took a while to read through the paper and related material, taking notes on things that struck me. Then it also took a while to go back through my notes, decide which things were most important to say, decide what order to say them in, and write them up. Then several times I reorganized what I wanted to say. It didn’t seem coherent to me. And I felt like I was missing a lot.

You’re right that “several days” is ambiguous. Instead I should have written that it took me longer than I thought it would. I think that’s what I meant.


Anne B at 1:25 AM on December 21, 2020 | #19211 | reply | quote

GitHub Website

I made a website on GitHub. I’ve wanted to do this before but been scared of and confused by GitHub. But I did a bunch of reading and watching videos and figured out how to make some progress. I am pleased that I tried it instead of putting it off longer. I’m getting practice in using Markdown as I make these pages, which is something I wanted to practice.

Here’s the home page so far: https://aelanteno.github.io/sicp-exercises/ . Exercises 2.40 and 2.41 have links to my solution pages for them. I don’t consider any of these pages final yet.

The below are on my To Do list or my Question list for this GitHub website project. I’m putting them here as a status report rather than as a request for help, although if anyone feels like offering low-effort helpful information, that’s fine. Criticism welcome too.

- I used the GitHub website interface to do all of this. It looked like another layer of learning to do it via downloading apps and installing things and using a command line. Can I get away with continuing to just use the website interface?

- Do I want to change the title that’s shown at the top of every page? If so, to what, and how do I do that?

- I want to make the title banner shorter from top to bottom. How do I do that?

- If I want to change colors in some places, how do I do that? Examples: the colors in the top banner, the font or background color for block quotes, the font color for links and headings. I think I need to learn about css for that and about other things surrounding css. I would like to figure all that out eventually and I think I can do it even though it looks scary.

- I used syntax highlighting for my code blocks. I’m not happy with the way it looks (to my eyes and on my screen). The blue and the teal are too close to each other. The black and the red are too dark/harsh compared to the blue and the teal. I don’t like how it makes the argument to a lambda the same color as a procedure I’ve defined. Maybe I’ll look into how to change the colors. Or maybe I’ll remove syntax highlighting.

- If I continue to use syntax highlighting, is there a way to do it without typing “scheme” each time I make a code block? Probably. I want to look into that.

- Do I really want to move all my previous SICP answers to the new website and try to make them more clear and more geared towards people who are themselves working on SICP? That will take a lot of time.

- Is there a way to accept comments on each of my pages? I’d like readers to be able to comment. (What if people comment with spam? Is there a way to remove that and how do I decide what counts as spam?)

- I’ve been writing my markdown files in TextEdit for Mac. Maybe there’s something better to use.

- Is this project overreaching for me? I don’t think so, even though it’s hard. I’ve made progress and I think I can make more progress. My goal isn’t to figure everything out perfectly, just get more comfort with doing this stuff and learn how to make a basic website on GitHub. I’ve already made a basic website. I expect I’ll learn more. However, I could be looking at this wrong and be overreaching. Comments especially welcome on this.


Anne B at 9:22 AM on February 13, 2021 | #19979 | reply | quote

SICP Project

An ongoing question is whether the SICP project is overreaching for me (the project of learning the stuff in the book as opposed to the project of making a website to post solutions). I’m learning stuff but not mastering anything.

One goal I have is that I want my exercise solution write-ups to be clear enough to be helpful to other people who are trying to do the exercises. It’s hard for me to tell if I’m meeting that goal.

Another goal I have is to be able to do most (90%? 95%?) of the exercises without looking at anyone else’s solutions. Doing an exercise means writing code that does what it’s supposed to do, not necessarily writing the best code possible to do what it’s supposed to do. I think I’m meeting that goal at 95% but I haven’t gone back and checked.


Anne B at 9:56 AM on February 13, 2021 | #19980 | reply | quote

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