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Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

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Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#131

Post by fasterik »

codeTired wrote: post #126
simonw wrote: post #89

I started publishing "TIL" posts a few years ago and everything in this post here resonated 100% with my experience of writing those. The great thing about TILs is that once you form a solid set of habits around them they can be extremely quick to put together: the majority of my TIL posts take between 15 minutes and half an hour to write. I make extensive personal notes on everything I'm doing (in GitHub issues thre…

I have this odd fear that sharing what I learned today will make me look stupid. “Look it’s 2023 this dude just learned about http error codes”. Silly example but you get the idea.

Anyone who thinks they don't have gaping holes in their knowledge, and criticizes others for it, is probably suffering from a severe case of Dunning-Kruger.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#132

Post by fasterik »

simonw wrote: post #91
winter_blue wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, that's actually deeper than it sounds. I do wonder though: did a lot of famous scientists (like Einstein, Feynman, Turing, etc) use writing as a vehicle for learning?

See "inventor's notebook": https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventor%27s_notebook - some good examples of famous notebook habits are linked to from there (Einstein and Tesla and Edison and da Vinci are all mentioned).

I wish I was better at thinking in handwritten notes. I've been using computers my whole life, so typing feels very natural to me, while handwriting feels slow and cumbersome. I've become pretty proficient at thinking in code and moving things around in text editors, but whenever I try to do something on paper with equations it feels like there is a mental block there. This has prevented me from learning as much math and physics as I would like to have learned.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#133

Post by whartung »

Early on, this was a motivator for me to contribute to StackOverflow.

I'd look at questions that I sort of maybe knew the answer to, but the question was a reasonable excuse to dive into more details and understanding so I could better communicate and answer the question. It was great way to get some arcane details about how things work.

It's also related to that phenomenon of the process of writing out a sufficiently detailed question to a problem ends up answering the problem for you.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#134

Post by zaep »

codeTired wrote: post #126
simonw wrote: post #89

I started publishing "TIL" posts a few years ago and everything in this post here resonated 100% with my experience of writing those. The great thing about TILs is that once you form a solid set of habits around them they can be extremely quick to put together: the majority of my TIL posts take between 15 minutes and half an hour to write. I make extensive personal notes on everything I'm doing (in GitHub issues thre…

I have this odd fear that sharing what I learned today will make me look stupid. “Look it’s 2023 this dude just learned about http error codes”. Silly example but you get the idea.

The TIL-framing is not integral to writing and publishing little snippets. You can always omit a framing and stick only to the information.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#135

Post by beltsazar »

winter_blue wrote: post #56
p4bl0 wrote: post #50

I remember an old PhD comics strip where a professor says “Remember kids, the only difference between fooling around and science is writing it down.”. In the context the goal was obviously for it to be funny but it is actually a very good and wise advice.

Wow, that's actually deeper than it sounds. I do wonder though: did a lot of famous scientists (like Einstein, Feynman, Turing, etc) use writing as a vehicle for learning?

> When historian Charles Weiner looked over a pile of Richard Feynman’s notebooks, he called them a wonderful ‘record of his day-to-day work’.

> “No, no!”, Feynman objected strongly.

> “They aren’t a record of my thinking process. They are my thinking process. I actually did the work on the paper.”

> “Well,” Weiner said, “The work was done in your head, but the record of it is still here.”

> “No, it’s not a record, not really. It’s working. You have to work on paper and this is the paper. Okay?”, Feynman explained.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#136

Post by belic »

simonw wrote: post #89

I started publishing "TIL" posts a few years ago and everything in this post here resonated 100% with my experience of writing those. The great thing about TILs is that once you form a solid set of habits around them they can be extremely quick to put together: the majority of my TIL posts take between 15 minutes and half an hour to write. I make extensive personal notes on everything I'm doing (in GitHub issues thre…

How often do you go over these notes and review or study them? I don't mean ones you need and hence use, but all of them? I have an issue where I feel I have so many notes that I forgot what's in there, and sometimes I remember or find out when I don't need it, and I seem to lack a habit of reviewing my notes.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#138

Post by johnnyanmac »

codeTired wrote: post #126
simonw wrote: post #89

I started publishing "TIL" posts a few years ago and everything in this post here resonated 100% with my experience of writing those. The great thing about TILs is that once you form a solid set of habits around them they can be extremely quick to put together: the majority of my TIL posts take between 15 minutes and half an hour to write. I make extensive personal notes on everything I'm doing (in GitHub issues thre…

I have this odd fear that sharing what I learned today will make me look stupid. “Look it’s 2023 this dude just learned about http error codes”. Silly example but you get the idea.

Don't be afraid to take advantage of Cunningham. if you try asking or looking something up and it's not accessible, you'd be surprised how many people would come swarming once you start writing about it, departed to correct you ad show you links to valuable tribal knowledge.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#139

Post by kuhewa »

lolinder wrote: post #86
quickthrower2 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only difference between fooling around and science is p < 0.05 ?

It's still science even with a low p value! It's just a negative result instead of a positive one. Such results really ought to be published, even if they aren't usually.

Well, not all of them deserve to be published. But I understand your meaning.

Re: Writing about what you learn pushes you to understand topics better

#140

Post by mochaki »

hosh wrote: post #107
simonw wrote: post #89

I started publishing "TIL" posts a few years ago and everything in this post here resonated 100% with my experience of writing those. The great thing about TILs is that once you form a solid set of habits around them they can be extremely quick to put together: the majority of my TIL posts take between 15 minutes and half an hour to write. I make extensive personal notes on everything I'm doing (in GitHub issues thre…

I think it’s a great habit and an effective method for consolidating what one learns … at least until someone cheats themselves using GPT to write up a TIL essay.

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