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Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

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Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#41

Post by cableshaft »

kleer001 wrote: post #38
cableshaft wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll check out Marvin Minsky, thanks for the mention. I am planning to take advantage of this weekend and try to get a little caught up on how to play videos for my games. I've got 6 designs already filmed (Cake Walk is the one that's a finalist in a game competition): https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDjU-rdSngu-eeqJnc2On... If I get the newest one up this weekend, it will probably be called 'Shared Fate'. I d…

> I didn't think Show HN is really the place to show off analog board games Let's game it out: Worst case scenario it gets flagged for removal and your account gets deleted. How likely is that? ;) Most likely scenario, I think, it goes the way of most posts, ignored. Best case scenario, people like it and you get some good conversations about it, some interest, and a few new players.

I think I still have a bit of residual hesitation from my Reddit days when I posted about a video game I worked on to a couple of subreddits (r/gaming and r/indiegames, I believe) and an admin shadowbanned me from the entire Reddit site for self-promotion (and didn't realize it until a moderator informed me months later that he'd been manually approving my comments periodically. I just thought people didn't care about half of my comments anymore).

Makes me a little more cautious of posting in places where it may not be welcome.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#42

Post by jiggunjer »

dehrmann wrote: post #37
durnygbur wrote: post #13

These hints reminded me that we don't have "great scientists" anymore. Can you list recent Nobel Prize laureates? Great scientists were basically people-institutions and all the mundane and scrupulous work was done by assistants, doctoral candidates, technicians, as we have an example of Hilbert and some much less known mathematician. There still exist relicts of this system in the academia. With increasing emancipat…

Arguably, this is because all the low-hanging fruit has been picked, and all the remaining problems are too complex for a single person to solve.

I'd say it isn't complexity, but resources. New data needs highly specialized equipment and materials. Even then the accuracy and precision may be lacking.

If we could manipulate the microscopic with the ease of the macroscopic we'd be making many more discoveries.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#43

Post by dang »

Rota had at least three different ten-lesson sets: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...

Looks like the previous discussions of this set are:

2017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989599

2016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11747598

2011 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3220746

2007 (1 comment) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=85611

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#44

Post by dredmorbius »

535188B17C93743 wrote: post #16
durnygbur wrote: post #13

These hints reminded me that we don't have "great scientists" anymore. Can you list recent Nobel Prize laureates? Great scientists were basically people-institutions and all the mundane and scrupulous work was done by assistants, doctoral candidates, technicians, as we have an example of Hilbert and some much less known mathematician. There still exist relicts of this system in the academia. With increasing emancipat…

We do have "pop scientists". While they're not all necessarily "groundbreaking" or "leading researchers", I wouldn't discount the impact of folks like Neil Degrasse Tyson, Michio Kaku, and Brian Greene.

Carl Sagan, to a previous generation.

Arguably one might make the same case for Michael Faraday or Humphry Davy, who's fame in large part devolves from excellent and hugely popular public demonstrations of their work.

It's not that they didn't (necessarily) also do groundbreaking work. But they were phenomenally effective communicators.

Extended to writing, Darwin, Einstein, and Feynman could be similarly considered.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#45

Post by kleer001 »

cableshaft wrote: post #41
kleer001 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I didn't think Show HN is really the place to show off analog board games Let's game it out: Worst case scenario it gets flagged for removal and your account gets deleted. How likely is that? ;) Most likely scenario, I think, it goes the way of most posts, ignored. Best case scenario, people like it and you get some good conversations about it, some interest, and a few new players.

I think I still have a bit of residual hesitation from my Reddit days when I posted about a video game I worked on to a couple of subreddits (r/gaming and r/indiegames, I believe) and an admin shadowbanned me from the entire Reddit site for self-promotion (and didn't realize it until a moderator informed me months later that he'd been manually approving my comments periodically. I just thought people didn't care abou…

Fair enough. HN isn't Reddit, if it needs to be said.

Also I've found there's a knack to promoting your game on Reddit and you may have been a bit too forward. From what I recall it works if you take time to figure out what tone and explanation works. I feel there's a tutorial out there somewhere about how to market well on social media. Myself I'm not an expert.

Also Reddit mods can be petty little tyrants. I'm sorry one traumatized you so.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#46

Post by joe_the_user »

alderz wrote: post #18

Related to the "Every Mathematician Has Only a Few Tricks" point, there is a Mathoverflow question https://mathoverflow.net/questions/363119/every-mathematicia... that tries to list all of those tricks, which is pretty interesting.

That quote about hating Erdos is interesting. I think my professor for UCLA undergraduate honors seminar from years ago, hated Erdos (he at least express dislike for a colleague of Erdos who operated similar). My impression is Erdos appeared to operated as something like a whirlwind of chaotic fact and theory finding whereas at least some other mathematicians aim to build larger unifying structures. It's a sort of Erdos versus Bourbaki divide (not to say who's right).

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#47

Post by dredmorbius »

dang wrote: post #43

Rota had at least three different ten-lesson sets: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... Looks like the previous discussions of this set are: 2017 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15989599 2016 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11747598 2011 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3220746 2007 (1 comment) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=85611

Wait, we can limit Algolia results by comment counts?

Oh, also author, points, and timestamps:

https://hn.algolia.com/help

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#48

Post by auggierose »

kleer001 wrote: post #26
cableshaft wrote: post #23

"Richard Feynman was fond of giving the following advice on how to be a genius. You have to keep a dozen of your favorite problems constantly present in your mind, although by and large they will lay in a dormant state. Every time you hear or read a new trick or a new result, test it against each of your twelve problems to see whether it helps.” Basically just did this again this week. I was re-reading a three year o…

RUMINATING! I just watched a bunch of Marvin Minsky lectures about his theory of the Society of Mind. One of his early questions was (paraphrased) "With all these words for emotions where are the words for thinking?" He eventually popped the ones he'd found up on the board. And, of course, I sketched up some of my own. But nowhere in either of those lists was the quite apropos reference to how a whole swath of unrela…

It's weird that when thinking of Minsky, I will always also think of Epstein now.

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#49

Post by auslegung »

kleer001 wrote: post #26
cableshaft wrote: post #23

"Richard Feynman was fond of giving the following advice on how to be a genius. You have to keep a dozen of your favorite problems constantly present in your mind, although by and large they will lay in a dormant state. Every time you hear or read a new trick or a new result, test it against each of your twelve problems to see whether it helps.” Basically just did this again this week. I was re-reading a three year o…

RUMINATING! I just watched a bunch of Marvin Minsky lectures about his theory of the Society of Mind. One of his early questions was (paraphrased) "With all these words for emotions where are the words for thinking?" He eventually popped the ones he'd found up on the board. And, of course, I sketched up some of my own. But nowhere in either of those lists was the quite apropos reference to how a whole swath of unrela…

In Hebrew, it's the word לְהַרהֵר pronounced hir'her, which is often translated as "meditate". From https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/hbd/m/meditation.htm...

> Most references to meditation occur in the Old Testament, especially in the Psalms. The Hebrew words for meditation primarily were derived from two separate roots. The first (hagah ) literally means “to utter in a low sound.” The word is used to denote the growling of a lion (Isaiah 31:4 ) or the cooing of a dove (Isaiah 38:14 ). Therefore it has been suggested that, in ancient Hebrew meditation, Scripture frequently was recited in a low murmur. The second root word (siach ) has the basic meaning of “to be occupied with,” or “concerned about.” Thus meditation is the repetitious going over of a matter in one's mind because it is the chief concern of life.

Just in case you're interested in other options :)

Re: Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught (1997) [pdf]

#50

Post by lioeters »

auslegung wrote: post #49
kleer001 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

RUMINATING! I just watched a bunch of Marvin Minsky lectures about his theory of the Society of Mind. One of his early questions was (paraphrased) "With all these words for emotions where are the words for thinking?" He eventually popped the ones he'd found up on the board. And, of course, I sketched up some of my own. But nowhere in either of those lists was the quite apropos reference to how a whole swath of unrela…

In Hebrew, it's the word לְהַרהֵר pronounced hir'her, which is often translated as "meditate". From https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/hbd/m/meditation.htm... > Most references to meditation occur in the Old Testament, especially in the Psalms. The Hebrew words for meditation primarily were derived from two separate roots. The first (hagah ) literally means “to utter in a low sound.” The word is used to denote t…

Mmm, that's a tasty word and definition. Thank you for sharing the meaning of "meditation" in the Old Testament sense of the word.

A similar word comes to mind, to contemplate.

> contemplation (n.) c. 1200, "religious musing," from Old French contemplation and directly from Latin contemplationem "act of looking at," contemplari "to gaze attentively, observe; consider, contemplate," originally "to mark out a space for observation,"

> from assimilated form of com-, here probably an intensive prefix, + templum "area for the taking of auguries" (see temple (n.1)).

---

Tangentially related, in Japanese there are (at least) two senses of "to think".

- 思う - to think, feel, remember, believe

- 考える - to think, cerebrate, cogitate, presume, take for granted, assume, conceive, consider

As someone who grew up there, it's hard to describe the difference in English. The first one is associated with feelings and images, and the second one is more about logical thinking.

For me, I have some thoughts or ideas (some of them from books I read) that I've been pondering for many years. That feels like 思う - it's a long-term, more abstract kind of thinking, often in the back of my mind. I find myself coming back to them, almost by chance, and discovering new perspectives and depths.

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