There are investments you can’t make from a structured, nine-to-five, narrowly teleological environment. … The best search strategies for complex problems like life generally don’t seek out particular homogeneous objectives, but interesting novelty. The search space is too complicated and unknown for linear objective-chasing to work. … you cannot pursue interesting novelty—things that no one else is doing or which you have never seen before, or the little threads of nagging curiosity or doubt—by chasing along known direct value gradients. But that’s where the treasure is.
—Quit Your Job