Max Microblogging

I finished reading *It's Not Luck*. This is the 4th Goldratt book I've read (the others being the goal, critical chain, and the choice).

I like it. I found the audiobook was lacking in some parts b/c there are some important diagrams early on and about half way through. I'm going to review those sections particularly b/c I want to make sure I understand the methods and can replicate them. I looked at the diagrams (I have the print version too) but didn't follow them closely.

I like the end; there's like a quick-fire recap of the methods used. There's some info that was new (or at least I didn't spot it earlier) like: goals have obstacles; big goals have intermediate objectives (which are in some ordered dependency graph with both parallel and serial parts); each intermediate objective should address some obstacle. That sounds pretty common sense, but the related method is the simplest and clearest method of planning I've heard. (the main part of the method that's missing from that list is the "what are you going to do about it?" question/answer.)

I also like the company strategy stuff in the last few chapters, especially the idea of deliberately leaving excess capacity in market segments to keep a company flexible. The idea is that company resources are general/flexible across multiple segments, then you can prioritise resources to service high-profit segments, tho make sure to always leave some excess capacity in each market segment. When market segments lose demand or become unprofitable, you can always move to another market segment b/c you left excess capacity (i.e. didn't full exploit that segment). It also means that you can avoid over-saturation of a market becoming a bottleneck (which could also mean that a company becomes like over-specialised for a segment; i.e. loses flexibility).

the steps of learning (do it right/once, do it consistently, do it fast) work well for explaining physical tasks like speedrunning, and some think-work like coding (where those 3 steps are sometimes said: make it work, make it right, make it fast). but how do those steps work for learning more abstract ideas (e.g. calculus, theory of constraints, philosophy)

I think the first way of thinking about the 3 steps can work for calculus (but it's harder to see for ToC or phil). With maths you generally get shown a method / proof / formula / etc and then get problem exercises of increasing complexity, and sometimes challenge questions. the exercises are usually: some basic ones first (completing them shows you can do step 1), then some complex ones (completing them shows you can use the idea consistently), then some more complex ones (completing them shows you can use the idea consistently enough to mix with prior/other techniques, mb with some creative thinking). challenge questions push your ability to use the idea (consistently and quickly) s.t. you can use the idea in creative new ways with previously learned ideas (this helps to create/improve structural knowledge). the progression of exercises maps well to correctly, consistently, quickly.

ToC and Philosophy ideas are harder to relate to the 3 steps. I think, roughly, the process follows the same pattern but doesn't make sense with those steps as they're currently named. WRT abstact ideas, what does "do it once" mean? excepting analogies to things like pyramids and structural integrity (like, engineering), how do the ideas of "consistency" and "speed" relate? They *sort* of have natural ~connotations, like consistency <-> 'know how/when to use the idea', and speed <-> 'idea has low overhead / it's intuitively able to be mixed with other ideas'. Even those ~connotations are a bit of a stretch, tho.

I think these steps are a good ~translation for the original steps: realise the idea (eureka), chew on the idea (so that you get a fuller understanding and develop structural knowledge), and integrate the idea (use the idea in new ways and in combination with your everyday thoughts). These steps don't necessarily happen all at once for a ~complete idea. Like "theory of constraints" is a big idea made up of lots of smaller chunks, some of which aren't documented in Goldratt's *The Goal*.

How can we still learn complex ideas, then? When we try to learn complex ideas, we learn them incrementally with smaller ideas. Some ideas are more easily learned than others, which can be due either to better (or more fortunate) structure, or because they're smaller ideas themselves (fewer components), or because they overlap a lot with stuff you already know. When ideas are big *and* unintuitive it means that there are a lot of new concepts that you need to learn all at once. That's hard. Sometimes it get's easier if you realise an instrumental goal that let's you use a subset of the idea (e.g. ToC applied to factories, rather than the full ToC). You can't rely on that, tho; a shortcut like that isn't always available.

The biggest idea you know is basically your full mind, and it's made up of lots of smaller ideas (sub-ideas), which are themselves still massive and complex compared to their sub-ideas, etc.

Learning complex ideas can have a long first step, and might involve some chewing on smaller ideas. When you get the big eureka moment it's because you've integrated the smaller ideas. I think the chewing process for the big idea will help work on integration for the smaller ideas, too (you can still have work to do with the smaller ideas *after* you start using them).

Note: I *think* I am using 'chewing' and 'integration' in the objectivist sense, but IDK. If I am not I would appreciate someone letting me know.

#19954

> Goldratt has a lot of good ideas in his books, and concepts like 'excess capacity and how it relates to constraints' helps us understand the core of falliblism: that we can still 'know' things even if there are problems and ultimately all ideas will be refuted by ever-better ideas. it helps us answer why it's okay to use newtonian gravity in a toy simulation.

Can you explain more about how “excess capacity and how it relates to constraints” helps us understand “that we can still 'know' things even if there are problems and ultimately all ideas will be refuted by ever-better ideas”? That connection sounds interesting but I don’t get it.

#19963 Where are the 5+ successful past projects at 90% of the size, complexity and difficulty of the makeup project? And at 80%, and 70%, and 60%, etc., all the way back incrementally to simple projects like crawling to a location as a baby.

#19963

> Max, do you think you achieved *mastery* of some significant, new things in your makeup project?

No.

I think I got better at some things (some makeup related, some video production related, some people/social related). Even if I gained mastery over those things, I don't think they're *significant* compared to the size of the project or the project's goals. I think that relative scale matters, e.g. mastering teeth-brushing is significant if the project is like 1-2 hours long (mb split up), but it's not significant if the project is days or weeks long or way bigger in scope.

It's not worth me spending 30+ hours on something just to get a relatively small skill like doing video editing quickly (relative to filming + copying + rendering), or knowing whether lipstick is applied well/badly. It's nice that I have those skills now, but I could have used movies or stock footage and just practiced editing them to learn that skill in a few hours. (I don't think I mastered those anyway, but I am consistent in some ways.)

> If not, I think you should have higher standards and stop overreaching.

It just occurred to me that 'high standards' and 'high ambitions' are, in some ways, contradictory. Or mb not contradictory, just that it's easy to mistake the two and, when they are mistaken, it can be really bad for the project (i.e. it'd fail).

> Can you self-evaluate the correctness of any of your new makeup knowledge with similar confidence to your self-evaluations of counting to three or judging whether the word "with" is spelled correctly?

No.

Not for anything significant, at least. Super basic stuff maybe, but a lot of that is just common sense.

A case in point is my claim that Mecca did color matching wrong (against my face, not my neck). I have an explanation for that, but I only learned it after like 8 days of watching videos about makeup, and I don't know other ways of checking if I'm right or not besides like asking ppl. I have lots of ways of checking 1,2,3 and the spelling of "with".

> The same goes for all your other philosophical work. Keep it simpler. Practice things. Aim for mastery.

I think I lack some of the skills needed to self-eval. If I think about trying to self-eval on e.g. Goldratt stuff, IDK how I can do that besides writing about it to find contradictions or holes in my understanding. Discussion helps, too, but that's not self-eval anymore. Convergence and non-contradiction with other knowledge is good, too, but I think that's more like a hint than self-eval; it doesn't help to decisively find that I'm doing something wrong. Finding contradictions does tho.

I think there might be some like good general methods that could help with self-eval of philosophical work, but I'm not sure of them. Like I suspect they're out there but don't know what they are yet.

Mb writing bridging explanations (roughly: doing integration) is a good way to self-eval some. Feels like that's only a partial strat tho.

> Aim for a low error rate where correct criticisms are uncommon, surprising and treasured.

This struck me as really important.

I think my mindset around criticism still has some serious issues, like I value crits a bit but I can't tell quickly and reliably if crits are correct, surprising, and valuable. Sometimes I can, but those are exceptions, not the norm. I think mb I am still chewing on the idea that crits are valuable/desirable. I know they are in a bunch of explicit ways, but the idea isn't fully integrated w/ my mindset yet.

I think I wasted some opportunities when replying to 'a girl anon' that I could have made better use of, but IDK exactly how.

An issue for me atm is that I can tell when crits are uncommon and surprising, but I don't treasure them. yet (i hope).

-----

Notes: I feel like mb some of my paragraphs that expand on my 'No' answers are like excising things or evasive but I'm not really sure. I wanted to write more than just 'no' and to think a bit about the ways that minor successes are used to justify major failures. If there's dishonesty in those paragraphs then I don't think I know how to expand honestly, yet. Mb they're okay as reflections. i also wanted to reconsider whether I should think of the makeup project as successful via writing things out, and I am changing my mind on that, but there's more to do.

Ctx: I thought off and on about this reply for approx 6 hrs. So I did slow down some. I didn't write down a goal for this reply, tho. It's much easier to think of goals for posts that aren't replies compared to posts that are replies. I guess I put some of my goals for the reply in 'notes' above, but IDK if I had all those in mind before starting, or if I added them later on / retroactively.

#19960

> Can you explain more about how “excess capacity and how it relates to constraints” helps us understand “that we can still 'know' things even if there are problems and ultimately all ideas will be refuted by ever-better ideas”? That connection sounds interesting but I don’t get it.

yes. i think this would be good practice for me so I want to write a bit about it.

first, tho, do you agree with the second bit you quoted? i.e.:

>> the core of falliblism: that we can still 'know' things even if there are problems and ultimately all ideas will be refuted by ever-better ideas.

(I included a bit extra of the quote for context)

If you don't agree with that then I guess that something I write that directly responds to your request would not be very useful to you.

I went through my plan and successfully uploaded the level 3hr 15min after I finished planning, so 4 hrs and 15 min all up.

level code **GL0-1HH-MVF**

I iterated on the level mostly while uploading, which took 45 min. There were some difficult jumps that I made easier; particularly at the end, and I reduced the difficulty of the 'consistent' phase to be more forgiving to the player since the hazards aren't meant to actually kill the player at that point, tho they can still die if not careful (that's deliberate).

the rest of the level dev was done fairly incrementally; I didn't change much after I put down an initial design and did some short play-testing (to make sure jumps worked and there wasn't any cheese).

I included 2 challenge areas, the first one of which is secret.

The second challenge area is right at the end and can kill the player if they're not careful. if they're really good then they will have been able to keep the mushroom this far, so it's easier.

the entire course, including secrets/challenges, can be done without damage.

I didn't alter the plan, but I think I had some oversights: I didn't plan for experiment/prototyping to overlap with the game-mode/level-theme choice. as it turns out there's a lot of flexibility here so the initial stuff I chose worked fine, but I should have planned some for some experimenting there. realistically it'd probs be okay to include it in the 'prototype' step I planned, but I feel like I should have included it. i count this as a minor error that I should be conscious of when doing future plans.

another minor error I made was spelling 'consistent' with an 'a': 'consistant' in the level. that error was also made in the diagrams I uploaded before.

I am surprised by how smoothly and quickly everything went compared with my past level-creation explorations.

I'm reminded of a line from *It's Not Luck* (ch29):

> We didn’t have time for mistakes, so we had to spend extra time planning!

#19971

>> Can you explain more about how “excess capacity and how it relates to constraints” helps us understand “that we can still 'know' things even if there are problems and ultimately all ideas will be refuted by ever-better ideas”? That connection sounds interesting but I don’t get it.

>

> yes. i think this would be good practice for me so I want to write a bit about it.

>

> first, tho, do you agree with the second bit you quoted? i.e.:

>

>>> the core of falliblism: that we can still 'know' things even if there are problems and ultimately all ideas will be refuted by ever-better ideas.

>

> (I included a bit extra of the quote for context)

The statement seems reasonable to me. I can't think of anything better. But saying I agree with the statement seems like it would require more knowledge of fallibilism and epistemology than I have.

#19985 I think what you're saying is that the part of my learning attitude "where I like think it's better or more valuable to explore things on my own than bootstrap via other ppl's knowledge" has problems. (There could be other problems related to the other stuff I said too, but the above is like the essence of it?)

I originally had trouble understanding your msg because I *thought* I rememberd/knew what I wrote, but after re-reading it, I didn't. I thought I had said something more like 'this is a part of my thinking that has a mistake' but really I just said 'this is a part of my thinking'.

Part of the reason I thought I'd said something more self-criticising is that I've talked a bit with curi about it in the tutorials and I've made some posts about it here, e.g. #18021 (I ctrl+f'd for 'exploratory' to find that, but I didn't find other examples, so I may not have posted about it as much as I thought.)

I think your msg is saying that, even if I have posted about this problem and mb recognise it a bit, that it's a bigger problem than I realise and has bigger impacts than I realise, even still. Also that if I want to get better at learning and thinking then I have to address this mistake as somewhat of a priority because it's a major error.

Does this line up with what you meant?

(my goal with this post was to ask the right q's that would give answers that let me figure out if I understood what you said or provide some way fwd if I still didn't understand)

I have been intensely focused on work the past 2+ weeks (and have had some major successes). That will continue for at least another 2 weeks, and probably much longer. That means I won't post here nearly as much. FYI.

#20250

Rereading, the way I put the first two sentences is misleading. I said:

> I think I just realised something.

> I've changed my attitude a bit since mid-feb (in the right direction but not really going past any major breakpoints).

That makes it sound like the thing I just realized was something I did in February.

That's not the case; the second sentences was meant to be like bg context but I didn't fix the placement in editing. I meant to include it, but to find a good way to integrate it as bg context.

this is part of my ongoing work on my major idea-conflict about learning.

What's the return on learning?

Let's say that you devote 1/2 of your working life on self-improvement. Or that your employer lets you devote 1/2 your working hours to self-improvement in a business-focused direction.

How long does it take for you to hit Return On Investment (ROI)? If you're spending 1/2 your hours on learning, then the point you reach ROI is when you get more than twice as good at your job (or your hobby, or whatever).

Say that: if you are good at learning, you get 1% better at doing your job per day. I think that's actually achievable for context-specific things (i.e. right person + right ideas + right subject matter). Well, your productivity "principle" is 1, and the "compounding interest" that you get from learning is 0.01 and the period is `d`. So `(1 + 0.01)^d > 2` is our ROI point. That means `d > ln(2)/ln(1.01)` which means, approx `d > 69.7`. *70 days* is the ROI point.

Is that practical in general? probs not. What about an improvement of 0.1% per day? That leads to `d > 693.5`, so like ~2 years. I think the 'real', general, maximum rate of improvement is between 1% and 0.1% for most ppl WRT most things, i.e., most ppl can get twice as better at most things in less than 2 years. There's definitely a period of high getting-better growth for completely new subject matters, tho.

Is there going to be a major factor in someone's growth rate? Yes. It will be, provided they're willing and motivated to learn, *the organizational quality of the learning material*. Organization of materials covers *which things in what order with what other context?* That *must* be the major factor because, provided someone is willing and motivated, the order and quality of ideas that they're introduced to is directly related to their learning progress. How could it be otherwise? If order and quality were not decisive factors, then the order of learning materials wouldn't be that significant (contradicted by structural epistemology) and/or the quality of materials wouldn't be that significant (contradicted by error-rate and overreaching). Note that *organizational quality* necessarily includes both order and content.

Mb a good time to mention: there is some excess capacity in the order of learning material; that's good because it allows for chewing and higher-quality self-judgements about one's learning. There's also some excess capacity in the quality of learning material; it only needs to be good enough to meet major breakpoints in the quality of the student's understanding. The student can't learn ideas perfectly, but provided they avoid major structural issues w/ what they do learn, then the student will have enough excess capacity in what they have learned to do useful work. They can also improve their ideas later without the overhead of bad structure. Humility helps here -- if they think their knowledge has too much reach then that can inhibit future learning.

So, one's ROI on learning is heavily dependent on the organizational quality of learning material. Material that meets major breakpoints (i.e., doesn't introduce major structural issues) is worth seeking. Material that is well written and easy to understand is worth seeking.

**Seek organized learning material. Follow through.**

One of the benefits of doing philosophy is that the skills you develop help you to mix and refine multiple sources. If there is a simplistic but accessible source of info, and a high quality but badly-written source of info, then being able to consume both quickly and efficiently with minimal errors is *profitable*. Not every subject has easy-to-find material that's high quality in both regards, so this skill matters.

#20252 Btw anon, I appreciate you commenting and agree with you. I think you put this idea well and succinctly:

> Explicit analysis and error correction of the pretty-good stuff removes the cap on progress.

I guess that ppl think that, b/c they're good at something, whatever specific limits they have are like ~universal among all other comparable ppl. Like they're at a "hard cap" rather than a soft one. A problem that comes out of this is that a ubiquitous soft cap is difficult to tell apart from a hard cap -- if ppl don't have the philosophy skill to tell the diff then they're self-limiting.

#20334 Thx.

For anyone reading this after the fact: I replied to curi's post, and if there's more discussion specific to that topic it'll probably be under that thread.

#18803

> This is a bit of a guess at a general method for doing FI.

You need to organize your life and form some good habits (or otherwise set up things you happily, easily do regularly). They should include practice, reading and writing (e.g. freewriting, notes, forum posts, outlines, summaries, attempts to clearly explain something).