To me, Paul Graham is approximately the apex of good writing for the internet. I’d always assumed the sequences had succeeded despite, not because of, EY’s writing style. (I’ve wondered how many people were dissuaded from LW because they pick up things quickly, value their time, and were getting a frustratingly low insight/minute ratio from the Sequences.) It’s interesting to hear that others disagree.
I’ve occasionally had the experience of wanting to convey a concept from the Sequences to somebody who hasn’t read them, but when I try to find a good post to link them to, I realize that the description of the concept is spread out over three or more posts that each individually have a frustratingly low content-to-words ratio. (The LW wiki helps a bit, but there the descriptions are often too concise to be useful.)
I suspect that the popularity of the Sequences is both despite and due to the writing style. This problem with the style didn’t matter so much when the posts were being written and they showed up once a day in my RSS feed—in order to properly learn a concept, you need to encounter it several times with slight variations, and the actual message being spread out over many posts was originally helpful in this respect. It spread out the message over several days of reading and thus helped learn it better than if there had been just one clear, to-the-point post—that you read once and then forgot.
However, now that nobody is reading the posts at a one-per-day rate anymore, the style and format seems harmful. When you’re reading through a (huge) archived sequence of posts, unnecessary fluff will just create a feeling of things having being written in a needlessly wordy way. And it makes it very hard to usefully link to posts about specific concepts.
Are there some specific concepts that come readily to mind? Maybe we could experiment with making much more substantial, useful wiki pages, riddled with quotations / excerpts from LW and elsewhere. The current standard size and tone of the wiki pages could be preserved—as the lead sections for much longer articles.
(Broadly) wikipedian style is also useful for keeping articles organized and concise because of the section structure. Sections make topic divisions obvious, and ‘See more’ links can be included at the beginning of each section for more details.
We needn’t be bashful about copy-pasting large chunks of the Sequences where it’s useful to do so, and at the same time the more transparent structure of the wiki, and our ability to leave anything out that isn’t absolutely essential, would let us piece together more to-the-point presentations. The wiki would then become our go-to resource for quick but thorough introductions to concepts, and would include links to the relevant Sequence posts (and primary literature, etc.) for people who want more examples and poetry. (Both of which can be immensely important.)
I notice that comment was written two months before Eliezer published Skill: The Map is Not the Territory. Does this article satisfy you, or does it still deviate from what you’d ideally link to? If so, in what ways does it (or it + the sister articles) deviate?
That article has the problem that I was asking for a good page that would explain and summarize the meaning of the phrase. Skill never actually explains the phrase—rather it starts from the assumption that the reader already knows what that means. You may be able to figure out the intended meaning from the examples, but it would take some effort, particularly if you’re not already familiar with these kinds of ideas.
I’ve wondered how many people were dissuaded from LW because they pick up things quickly, value their time, and were getting a frustratingly low insight/minute ratio from the Sequences.
For some people (myself included if I’m honest), a low insight/minute ratio might be a reason for liking the sequences. They enjoy seeing smart folks agree with and reiterate their beliefs. It makes the reader think “ah yes, this person is right, he is smart, just like me”.
I’ve wondered how many people were dissuaded from LW because they pick up things quickly, value their time, and were getting a frustratingly low insight/minute ratio from the Sequences.
I have a friend for whom this is the case. I’ve tried linking her to LW and she finds the sequences (a) move slowly and (b) mostly appear to reiterate stuff that she already knows about biases etc, from reading pop-psych/philosophy/science, books/blogs. I feel like she’d be a valuable member in most intellectual communities, but so far she’s been disinterested in this one.
Granted, another part of this is she appears to be disinclined towards “optimization” as a drive. Or something. I’ve still yet to fully understand this.
Granted, another part of this is she appears to be disinclined towards “optimization” as a drive.
No idea whether it relates to your friend or not, but… the fact that the big names on Lesswrong seem to be really happy people appears to me to be anomalous. I seem to recall seeing a study somewhere that maximizing makes people less happy than satisficing. But optimization is just maximizing utility. It’s a puzzle.
Yeah. I think she doesn’t like the ideally of continually trying to improve stuff… so it does appear to be contrary to satisficing, though perhaps on a meta-level. Like, if something’s not working in her life, she’ll go and fix it, but she doesn’t operate from a perspective of continual growth. Ongoing growth, absolutely: Dweck-wise, she definitely has a growth mindset… but there’s no sense of “how can I make today marginally better than yesterday” etc...
Could you elaborate on the difference between continual and ongoing growth? Dweck-style growth mindset seems similar to LW-style life optimization on a practical level to me.
Uhhh, continual is a subset of ongoing. Essentially, my friend fixes things when they’re obviously problematic, and actually does a fair bit of self-modification in the process, in addition to modifying her environment. I think perhaps it’s somewhat like she just tries to find a local optimum, and then goes back to doing stuff with her life.
The mindset test basically asks two questions phrased a bunch of different ways, and those questions amount to “to what extent are your abilities (talent/intelligence) fixed?” My friend certainly believes (and demonstrates) that if necessary she can level up at any given thing, but for the most part her focus is on actually doing stuff, rather than growth.
I’ve tried a few times to sit down and read the sequences, but I’ve never been able to, for the reason I think lukeprog’s style is trying to address. There’s only so much background information I can stand, especially if the writer isn’t clear on where he’s going. And this is coming from someone who sat down and read Mencius Moldbug. And some of Nietzsche. And read HPMOR in three days.
I’m still interested in LW, obviously, but for… other reasons.
(As for my own style: I hate writing anything longer than a comment, so when I do, I have to keep myself amused, which usually means Carlylean bombast.)
To me, Paul Graham is approximately the apex of good writing for the internet. I’d always assumed the sequences had succeeded despite, not because of, EY’s writing style. (I’ve wondered how many people were dissuaded from LW because they pick up things quickly, value their time, and were getting a frustratingly low insight/minute ratio from the Sequences.) It’s interesting to hear that others disagree.
I’ve occasionally had the experience of wanting to convey a concept from the Sequences to somebody who hasn’t read them, but when I try to find a good post to link them to, I realize that the description of the concept is spread out over three or more posts that each individually have a frustratingly low content-to-words ratio. (The LW wiki helps a bit, but there the descriptions are often too concise to be useful.)
I suspect that the popularity of the Sequences is both despite and due to the writing style. This problem with the style didn’t matter so much when the posts were being written and they showed up once a day in my RSS feed—in order to properly learn a concept, you need to encounter it several times with slight variations, and the actual message being spread out over many posts was originally helpful in this respect. It spread out the message over several days of reading and thus helped learn it better than if there had been just one clear, to-the-point post—that you read once and then forgot.
However, now that nobody is reading the posts at a one-per-day rate anymore, the style and format seems harmful. When you’re reading through a (huge) archived sequence of posts, unnecessary fluff will just create a feeling of things having being written in a needlessly wordy way. And it makes it very hard to usefully link to posts about specific concepts.
Are there some specific concepts that come readily to mind? Maybe we could experiment with making much more substantial, useful wiki pages, riddled with quotations / excerpts from LW and elsewhere. The current standard size and tone of the wiki pages could be preserved—as the lead sections for much longer articles.
(Broadly) wikipedian style is also useful for keeping articles organized and concise because of the section structure. Sections make topic divisions obvious, and ‘See more’ links can be included at the beginning of each section for more details.
We needn’t be bashful about copy-pasting large chunks of the Sequences where it’s useful to do so, and at the same time the more transparent structure of the wiki, and our ability to leave anything out that isn’t absolutely essential, would let us piece together more to-the-point presentations. The wiki would then become our go-to resource for quick but thorough introductions to concepts, and would include links to the relevant Sequence posts (and primary literature, etc.) for people who want more examples and poetry. (Both of which can be immensely important.)
Here’s one example.
I notice that comment was written two months before Eliezer published Skill: The Map is Not the Territory. Does this article satisfy you, or does it still deviate from what you’d ideally link to? If so, in what ways does it (or it + the sister articles) deviate?
That article has the problem that I was asking for a good page that would explain and summarize the meaning of the phrase. Skill never actually explains the phrase—rather it starts from the assumption that the reader already knows what that means. You may be able to figure out the intended meaning from the examples, but it would take some effort, particularly if you’re not already familiar with these kinds of ideas.
seconded.
For some people (myself included if I’m honest), a low insight/minute ratio might be a reason for liking the sequences. They enjoy seeing smart folks agree with and reiterate their beliefs. It makes the reader think “ah yes, this person is right, he is smart, just like me”.
I have a friend for whom this is the case. I’ve tried linking her to LW and she finds the sequences (a) move slowly and (b) mostly appear to reiterate stuff that she already knows about biases etc, from reading pop-psych/philosophy/science, books/blogs. I feel like she’d be a valuable member in most intellectual communities, but so far she’s been disinterested in this one.
Granted, another part of this is she appears to be disinclined towards “optimization” as a drive. Or something. I’ve still yet to fully understand this.
No idea whether it relates to your friend or not, but… the fact that the big names on Lesswrong seem to be really happy people appears to me to be anomalous. I seem to recall seeing a study somewhere that maximizing makes people less happy than satisficing. But optimization is just maximizing utility. It’s a puzzle.
Yeah. I think she doesn’t like the ideally of continually trying to improve stuff… so it does appear to be contrary to satisficing, though perhaps on a meta-level. Like, if something’s not working in her life, she’ll go and fix it, but she doesn’t operate from a perspective of continual growth. Ongoing growth, absolutely: Dweck-wise, she definitely has a growth mindset… but there’s no sense of “how can I make today marginally better than yesterday” etc...
Could you elaborate on the difference between continual and ongoing growth? Dweck-style growth mindset seems similar to LW-style life optimization on a practical level to me.
Uhhh, continual is a subset of ongoing. Essentially, my friend fixes things when they’re obviously problematic, and actually does a fair bit of self-modification in the process, in addition to modifying her environment. I think perhaps it’s somewhat like she just tries to find a local optimum, and then goes back to doing stuff with her life.
The mindset test basically asks two questions phrased a bunch of different ways, and those questions amount to “to what extent are your abilities (talent/intelligence) fixed?” My friend certainly believes (and demonstrates) that if necessary she can level up at any given thing, but for the most part her focus is on actually doing stuff, rather than growth.
I’ve tried a few times to sit down and read the sequences, but I’ve never been able to, for the reason I think lukeprog’s style is trying to address. There’s only so much background information I can stand, especially if the writer isn’t clear on where he’s going. And this is coming from someone who sat down and read Mencius Moldbug. And some of Nietzsche. And read HPMOR in three days.
I’m still interested in LW, obviously, but for… other reasons.
(As for my own style: I hate writing anything longer than a comment, so when I do, I have to keep myself amused, which usually means Carlylean bombast.)