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Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

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Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#401
post #4

Running. Been running ~ 2 years fairly seriously. Lost a lot of weight, and have never been healthier. Now have run marathons under 3 hours, qualified for Boston, ran in international races, Hawaii, etc. Running and any active sports feel fun when you are fast.

I wish everyone who runs that may they never stop , ever :-) Was a long distance runner from 2012-2016. It was so fun, used to look forward for my morning run every single day - I'd once forgotten all my credit cards when flying to another city but not my running shoe. Almost never missed it for anything. Minor injury broke it for 1.5 months. Been struggling to pick up again since then. It's 2 years. Procrastination…

Agreed. It's crazy - I run 6 days a week, but if I ever skip just TWO days or more, it's really hard to feel motivated to run the next time.

Streaks are really important in anything that requires deliberate practice.

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#402

Computer Science degree. Sure, lots of us "learnt" programming in our bedrooms or whatever by doing our own thing and messing about in whatever language. I went into my compsci degree arrogantly thinking that I pretty much knew how to code already so please just give me the bit of paper saying I have the degree and I'll be on my way thanks very much. I was very wrong. Although I was pretty good at the coding (or at l…

I went into my degree thinking the same thing, and I learned very little, because I generally knew more than the tutors. The biggest win from my college time was from the library and access to books on compiler theory, my real interest. Now, decades later, I despair at how poorly new and many not so new developers we hire really understand complexity theory. Complexity theory is the single biggest thing you can learn…

I agree 100% that complexity theory is the most important thing you learn that doesn't come intuitively. Unfortunately, a lot of us idiots, I suspect maybe the majority, have to have scalability completely beat down into us until it's internalized and fully respected. It's similar to the hot stove lesson where you know conceptually that it COULD and probably WILL hurt, but a lethal mix of naivete, optimism and some arrogance convinces you to push that shitty 1.5-seconds-a-transaction piece of code anyway and then - oh wow! - it scorches you. If you're in a shop with no existing or only surface-level code reviews, then you learn the lesson in production, and it brands you for life. In an instant, all that big O theory and combinatorics you did in college makes complete sense. This is the single most common lesson every shop with junior developers learns at every place I've ever been at.

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#403
post #198

> Your most important asset is your ability to produce income. You... may want to reconsider that one.

I would love to know, oh wise one, which of your many assets is going to help you when you have no means of securing a roof over your head, no means of a meal every night, no means of healthcare, or safety. I'm going to go ahead and agree with OP. Your ability to make money is your greatest asset, and one you should protect.

Agreed. I actually spent the early part of my 20s thinking money wasn't so important, but I started to regret it when I realize I wanted to become independent, eventually start a family, and it all required money to achieve those means. I also used to despise the idea of having to get married, playing life by a to-do list of checkboxes (that society forces upon you in some sense), but I realize you can always have your cake and eat it too. Besides, higher levels of income usually require you to be reaching some level of competency and proficiency in a hierarchy of other people speaking the same language (productivity, logic, etc.) Also, it also serves as a very pragmatic and quantitative metric, something to continually strive towards. Sure, I can grow my own vegetables, read/write a bunch of books, go travel the world, and be a really interesting person, and that would be great, but where are you getting the roof over your head and the meal every night? Good news is, you can have your cake and eat it too.

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went into my degree thinking the same thing, and I learned very little, because I generally knew more than the tutors. The biggest win from my college time was from the library and access to books on compiler theory, my real interest. Now, decades later, I despair at how poorly new and many not so new developers we hire really understand complexity theory. Complexity theory is the single biggest thing you can learn…

I agree 100% that complexity theory is the most important thing you learn that doesn't come intuitively. Unfortunately, a lot of us idiots, I suspect maybe the majority, have to have scalability completely beat down into us until it's internalized and fully respected. It's similar to the hot stove lesson where you know conceptually that it COULD and probably WILL hurt, but a lethal mix of naivete, optimism and some a…

Is there a clear line between 'respecting complexity' and 'premature optimisation'?

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, and we are able to do so via the artifices of trade and commerce - the only thing that need be agreed-upon is the price, the quantity and the quality.

And things like social norms, etiquette, laws, contracts, and so on... We are not economic robots.

I can't say I like the grandparents "robotic" tone, but I have to disagree with you here on what all is required for coordinated efforts. People disagree locally on norms and etiquette all the time precisely because we are not robots. In fact the simple mechanism of agreeing on a price allows us to coordinate our activities despite disagreeing on so much else. Our differences play a role in making us human. So does our ability to coordinate without all being of the same mind.

On a larger scale, trade persists across legal divides - with much of this facilitated via contracts, which are actually not excluded by the grandparent comment. Here what I am really claiming that contracts are a form of generalized price. So trade, coordinated work, productive efforts large and small, are basically all facilitated by people coming to agreement on price, one way or another (unless the type of coordination involves a group of friends coordinating via friendship - or maybe some generalized version of that). The "price" agreement itself may be long winded (e.g. a contract with many conditions) but it is the basic mechanism of price that coordinates so much. Even world peace. Nations that trade together are less inclined to go to war with one another. (Absent a coercive situation that is. Without coercion, trade is mutually beneficial, by the standards of the parties willfully involved, and nobody wars with their benefactor)

Therefore, I would argue that we only need generalized prices (and a lack of coercion) in order to coordinate peaceably. We do not need to agree on norms and etiquette. Of course, if one party decides to spoil things and coerce another into a bad deal, or into conforming to its norms, etc., law becomes more important. (Of course in reality somebody always tries to spoil things so law is important from the very beginning, especially locally. I might argue that law becomes weaker anyway as we scale up towards nation state scale coordination where laws differ on both sides and contracts sort of blend into treaties). I am making broad statements about large scale action and I don't like that. Maybe better to sum up the position by saying given basic conditions - 1. property rights that try to be consistent, 2. dependable and consistent legal protection, and 3. a functioning price system (the less manipulated the better), we can coordinate imperfectly, but better than expected given the vast swaths of differences of opinion, taste, and preferences, that make us so human.

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#407

Readline —- I’m sometimes amazed at the number of relatively seasoned developers who don’t know simple commands like ctrl-r. This one really pays off because almost all shells and repls like ipython or the mysql client implement it. Sample cheat sheet: https://readline.kablamo.org/emacs.html You don’t have to learn it all, but mastering the basics like moving to the end/beginning on the line, moving/deleting by word,…

Nice! I’ve been at this game for a while and ctrl-r must have slipped right past me till now. I’ve regularly do ‘history | grep ___’ but ctrl-r looks like a far better solution.

I'll just mention fzf then.

https://github.com/junegunn/fzf

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#408
post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't believe it's the only game, rather, I believe it's the best. The alternatives are theoretically wonderful, but when you lose the security of regular meals, a roof over your head, a shower, etc... Suddenly I'm not convinced. Judging from the fact that you too are posting from a computer, running on the internet, I can assume you haven't adopted the virtuous life of income free bliss that you speak of?

Oh, for heavens sake. That's as far as you can see? You can get that in prison. We were born and raised on a giant slave plantation. There are enough resources to take care of everyone, so much that some of it has to be kept off the market to keep up the illusion and prices. I'm currently scraping by at a bare minimum, growing my own vegetables and foraging whatever I can find in the area. And I find it infinitely mo…

What do you mean by 'visualization of sports and other areas'? Are you talking about the projection of images for mass consumption which leads to emulation, or realisation of said images? Interesting stuff. I know myself that my biggest limit is my ability to imagine my own future, and how that vision is constantly cropped by my peers, and culture. What are you doing on hn may I ask? Sounds like an interesting life.

Re: Ask HN: What things have richly rewarded the time invested in mastering them?

#409
post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Far less chances of getting injuries with bodyweight exercises > I found no evidence for this, From Wikipedia: """ Bodyweight exercises have a far lower risk of injury compared to using free weights and machines due to the absence of an external load that is placing strain on the muscles that they may or may not be able to deal with. However, the lower risk of injury is only provided that the athlete/trainee is pr…

I stand corrected on this, my sentence was too strong and large, I should have been more specific. I still maintain the rest of my points though.

The quote actually addresses the rest of your points pertaining to calisthenics (correct progression, with good form, is important; those who "rush" are likely to get injured regardless of weights).
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