Topics from “Procedural Knowledge Gaps”
About a year ago, we had a major discussion about procedural knowledge gaps. Here’s what was covered....
How to tell whether food is fresh
pjeby claims that eating raw chicken is safe because the gag reflex identifies it fast
Memorizing the alphabet and other arbitrary lists
Comparison of various how-to sites
General discussion of making things (including Less Wrong) easier to use
Questions about preparing a simple soup.
Starting relationships, especially for heterosexual men.
How to transfer money from one electronic account to another.
Interacting with police. (Don’t talk to US police! The rules are different in the UK.)
How to speak clearly, slowly, etc..
How to order at a bar. Also, some cookbook recommendations.
Personal hygiene—washing, soap, shampoo.
Growing and maintaining long hair.
Telling the difference between flirting and friendliness.
Left vs. Right (which hand, not political).
How to end conversations politely.
Mailing large objects in the US.
How to format comments at Less Wrong.
What might melt in a dishwasher.
Does cranking up the thermostat heat the house faster?.
Potential topics:
How to give clear instructions.
How to see things from other people’s point of view
Cool sidetrack: Fish and lightning
Links and quotes:
Why grad school in the humanities is a bad choice One probably could not devise a better system for keeping people with humanistic values away from power than by confining them to decade-long graduate programs with a long future of transient adjunct positions making less than the minimum wage. From Part 2. The first article is a nice example of applying the far view (look at how things are in general) to a personal decision.
This material, being an index of posts, seems like it ought to be on the wiki.
(If requested, I will take care of doing the markup conversion.)
And is a candidate for the potential sticky threads category.
A Simple Fix for Most Electrical Problems—Clean Contacts
Whether automotive or home, many problems are nothing more than a buildup of oxidation, and therefore contract resistance, on what should be a conducting connection between two electrical connectors. You get this a lot with switches , particularly when they aren’t used frequently.
A few years back, I was visiting my significant other’s family at their home. They had a light that didn’t work well in a storage shed. I flipped the switch a hundred times and Presto! There was light! The abrasion from flipping the switch a hundred times cleaned the contacts of oxidation enough for a decent electrical connection.
I drive an 85 Jaguar XJ6. Jaguar was already known for flaky electricals when it came out, and now the car is 25 years old. I’ve been getting a lot of electrical gremlins, so I just went around cleaning ground straps. A dead headlight came back to life. So did the automatic electric lock on the trunk.
Little wire brushes, rusted screw remover spray, and electrical contact cleaner. The same thing often works with electronics as well. Electrical boards build up oxidation and contact resistance too. Take the boards out of their slots. Clean with contact cleaner, or very gently with fine sandpaper. Reseat board. I’ve fixed a few things with nothing more than that.
A bonus trick—zap any metal gears and moving parts in an open air mechanical gizmo with the rusted screw remover spray, work the part for a while, spray again, and work again. That can remove a lot of the binding of the parts, and make them much easier to move. Top it off with some silicone spray, and you can have an entirely new device. This is what got the trunk lock working again.
It’s amazing how many things you can fix by unscrewing them, taking them apart, looking at them, and then putting them back together.
Great List of Things! The only thing I can thinking that’s missing is how to read a bus schedule.
Also both link to the same comment.
Both link duplications have been corrected.
I’m sure how to read bus schedules isn’t the only thing that’s missing. It’s possible that Procedural Knowledge Gaps should be a yearly thread.
You need to put a line space between “How to buy investments” and “Memorizing the alphabet and other arbitrary lists”. (line 3)
This is a useful index. Thank you for assembling it.
Thanks for proof reading, and you’re welcome.
Alternative investment advice from that post.
This might be relevant: http://lesswrong.com/lw/818/how_to_understand_people_better/