Tractability, what is tractable to a world government is different to what is personally tractable to me. Then the tractability of the news increases based on how many actions or decisions of an individual reader the news can inform or influence. I cannot change macroevents like wars, but they may influence my personal decision making.
This of course opens the door to counterproductive motivated reasoning. For example of a top-of-mind news story: the Palisades fire—can I stop the fires? No. But maybe I can donate something to those who were displaced? That is something which is personally tractable. But, let’s say for the same of example I decide against it because I convince myself “the only people displaced were rich people who can afford to live there, so I wouldn’t be helping anybody.”—I’ve convinced myself, probably against the evidence, that it is intractable or at least futile.[1]
Maybe my line of thinking is unproductive because it is just kicking the can up the road? Making news consumption a problem of personal agency simply raises the question of “okay, well, how do you put a reasonable circle around your agency?” and the current question of “which news should I consume” remains unanswered.
No need for anyone to inform me that there can be a difference between something being intractable and it being futile.
Lighting a candle and writing a prayer/request addressed to Inanna that I burn on the candle that I may have a good Valentines Day is tractable. The tasks themselves I am capable of and manageable. I am confident it is futile for me, even the placebo effect wouldn’t work because I personally don’t believe in that goddess’s power.
A question you can ask yourself is whether your relationship to the news is proactive or reactive.
A proactive approach is good. I’ve been learning about foreign affairs for many years. When the Ukraine War started, I immediately reacted, and did so with a comparative advantage. I consider this approach proactive, because I had prepared for the events long before the hit the news. By the time they hit the news, it was too late to begin studying foreign policy.
A reactive approach is non-agentic. If you’re paying attention to things because they’re in the news, then you’re at the mercy of whatever fads farm the most engagement. If the top thing on your mind is the top thing in the news, then that means you’re letting a propaganda machine tell you what to think about. It means you’re an NPC.
I’m interested in how you can convert that information proactively?
I’m aware that, for example, keeping abreast of macro or geopolitical changes can influence things like investing in the stock-market. But I’d be lying if I’m aware of any other possibilities beyond that.
I think that, more than drinking from the propaganda trough makes me an NPC, protagonists in games do novel things, potentially unexpected (from the perspective of the game designers). NPCs are predictable and habitual. If I cannot extract utility from the news, macro or micro, then I fear I’m an NPC.
I’m not talking about post-rationalizations like “Oh I just read for entertainment” or “Well it helps me engage in conversation and make small talk”—because, again, those are NPCish predictable expected means of extracting utility.
I mean something which comes under the broad category of ‘lateral thinking’ or ‘radical problem solving’.
I’m interested in how you can convert that information [news] proactively?
This is a great question, and like many questions, there is a trick hiding in it. The thinking is backwards.
That’s not how proactive thinking works. Imagine if a company handed you a coupon and your immediate thought was “how can I use this coupon to save money”? That’s not you saving money. That’s the company tricking you into buying their product.
Proactive thinking doesn’t start by watching the news and figuring out how to make best use of it. That’s reactive thinking. Proactive thinking starts totally blocking out all the news for a while, and figuring out what you want. Then go find the resources you need to accomplish that. Usually “the resources you need” won’t be news because news is ephemeralgarbage.
I want to let you know I’ve been reflecting on the reactive/proactive news consumption all week. It has really brought into focus a lot of my futile habits not just over news consumption, but idle reading and social media scrolling in general.[1] Why do I do it? I’m always hoping for that one piece of information, that “one simple trick” which will improve my decision making models, will solve my productivity problems, give me the tools to let me accomplish goals XY&Z. Which of course begs the question of why am I always operating on this abstracted, meta-level, distanced level from goals XY&Z and the simple answer is: if I knew how to solve them directly, I’d be actively working on the sets to solve them.
That’s a lot of TMI but I just wanted to give you a sense of the affect this had on me.
That’s not how proactive thinking works. Imagine if a company handed you a coupon and your immediate thought was “how can I use this coupon to save money”? That’s not you saving money. That’s the company tricking you into buying their product.
Or those little “specials” at the Gas Station—buy one chocolate bar, get another free—the customer didn’t save 100% of the price of the second chocolate bar, they lost 100% because they had no intention of buying a chocolate bar until they saw that impulse-hacking “offer”.
Tractability, what is tractable to a world government is different to what is personally tractable to me. Then the tractability of the news increases based on how many actions or decisions of an individual reader the news can inform or influence. I cannot change macroevents like wars, but they may influence my personal decision making.
This of course opens the door to counterproductive motivated reasoning. For example of a top-of-mind news story: the Palisades fire—can I stop the fires? No. But maybe I can donate something to those who were displaced? That is something which is personally tractable. But, let’s say for the same of example I decide against it because I convince myself “the only people displaced were rich people who can afford to live there, so I wouldn’t be helping anybody.”—I’ve convinced myself, probably against the evidence, that it is intractable or at least futile.[1]
Maybe my line of thinking is unproductive because it is just kicking the can up the road? Making news consumption a problem of personal agency simply raises the question of “okay, well, how do you put a reasonable circle around your agency?” and the current question of “which news should I consume” remains unanswered.
No need for anyone to inform me that there can be a difference between something being intractable and it being futile.
Lighting a candle and writing a prayer/request addressed to Inanna that I burn on the candle that I may have a good Valentines Day is tractable. The tasks themselves I am capable of and manageable. I am confident it is futile for me, even the placebo effect wouldn’t work because I personally don’t believe in that goddess’s power.
Not all activity is productivity, as Alice found in Through the Looking Glass, you can expend a lot of energy to end up in the same place.
Like wise you can read a lot of news, but is it actually informing any decisions?
A question you can ask yourself is whether your relationship to the news is proactive or reactive.
A proactive approach is good. I’ve been learning about foreign affairs for many years. When the Ukraine War started, I immediately reacted, and did so with a comparative advantage. I consider this approach proactive, because I had prepared for the events long before the hit the news. By the time they hit the news, it was too late to begin studying foreign policy.
A reactive approach is non-agentic. If you’re paying attention to things because they’re in the news, then you’re at the mercy of whatever fads farm the most engagement. If the top thing on your mind is the top thing in the news, then that means you’re letting a propaganda machine tell you what to think about. It means you’re an NPC.
I’m interested in how you can convert that information proactively?
I’m aware that, for example, keeping abreast of macro or geopolitical changes can influence things like investing in the stock-market. But I’d be lying if I’m aware of any other possibilities beyond that.
I think that, more than drinking from the propaganda trough makes me an NPC, protagonists in games do novel things, potentially unexpected (from the perspective of the game designers). NPCs are predictable and habitual. If I cannot extract utility from the news, macro or micro, then I fear I’m an NPC.
I’m not talking about post-rationalizations like “Oh I just read for entertainment” or “Well it helps me engage in conversation and make small talk”—because, again, those are NPCish predictable expected means of extracting utility.
I mean something which comes under the broad category of ‘lateral thinking’ or ‘radical problem solving’.
This is a great question, and like many questions, there is a trick hiding in it. The thinking is backwards.
That’s not how proactive thinking works. Imagine if a company handed you a coupon and your immediate thought was “how can I use this coupon to save money”? That’s not you saving money. That’s the company tricking you into buying their product.
Proactive thinking doesn’t start by watching the news and figuring out how to make best use of it. That’s reactive thinking. Proactive thinking starts totally blocking out all the news for a while, and figuring out what you want. Then go find the resources you need to accomplish that. Usually “the resources you need” won’t be news because news is ephemeral garbage.
I want to let you know I’ve been reflecting on the reactive/proactive news consumption all week. It has really brought into focus a lot of my futile habits not just over news consumption, but idle reading and social media scrolling in general.[1] Why do I do it? I’m always hoping for that one piece of information, that “one simple trick” which will improve my decision making models, will solve my productivity problems, give me the tools to let me accomplish goals XY&Z. Which of course begs the question of why am I always operating on this abstracted, meta-level, distanced level from goals XY&Z and the simple answer is: if I knew how to solve them directly, I’d be actively working on the sets to solve them.
That’s a lot of TMI but I just wanted to give you a sense of the affect this had on me.
Or those little “specials” at the Gas Station—buy one chocolate bar, get another free—the customer didn’t save 100% of the price of the second chocolate bar, they lost 100% because they had no intention of buying a chocolate bar until they saw that impulse-hacking “offer”.
On the flip side is the wasteful consumption that I don’t read—my collection of books that I probably won’t ever read. Why buy them? Seems as pointless as reading ephemeral news slop.