I wonder what he thinks the “non-doing” 80% spend their time on. While I’m sure there exist pure-consumption-mode “observers”, I suspect most are simply engaged in pursuits and goals that are invisible to him.
The Dead Planet Theory
61–70 of 86 posts
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#62One of my strongest recommendations to people on social networks is to engage down-thread. Talk to other people, not just the top post. Get beyond your glancing para-social relationship, and expand your Metcalfe-factor by commenting and liking other people's engagement. Especially for new or young networks, a lot of people are truly starved for engagement & don't see the pattern of being engaged with . Engagement has…
Here is a fascinating (and troubling) look at comment manipulation by the platform. Here on TikTok a woman shows the differences between the top comments shown on her account versus her (male) partner's:
https://www.tiktok.com/@elieli0000/video/7446090349551815968
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#63I think I disagree with the article. I think it is true that if you choose to expend time and energy on something that few people spend effort on , then you can become better than most people at that one thing. However, it seems that the article is trying to say that is true for everything and for everyone, and i disagree with that. The missing key factor is that you have to find something unpopular and easy which wi…
> If you read a few books on mathematics you think you're easily going to become one of the top mathematicians? Many ambitious people try to study math and decades later are disappointed by how they are still mediocre in their field or simply fail to make it into an academic career. Many PhDs in general, actually.
I don't know about being one of the top mathematicians, but I'd argue that actually, fully reading a few graduate level technical books is more than even most PhDs do.
I was once a PhD student in theoretical physics myself and I'd say that we mostly skim over the books or read only the sections that are immediately and obviously relevant to us.
I once did read one of the shorter known-to-be-difficult books of my field fully from cover to cover, and worked out most of the exercises in the book. After this exercise, I realized that I immediately had much better understanding of the somewhat foundational things described in the book than many of the more senior researchers had. And this was a book that everyone in my field knows, but apparently no-one actually reads it.
The reason why no-one reads actually the difficult books, even when half of their job is reading them, is because it's harsh, gruelling work.
So yeah, maybe you won't become the next Terence Tao by reading three or four graduate level mathematics books, but you can get pretty good if you actually seriously do it without any cheating or skimming.
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
>If you read a few books on mathematics you think you're easily going to become one of the top mathematicians? No - but you will easily become more educated in math than most people. 99.9% of people couldn't tell you the difference between a derivative and a integral. It's not about becoming an expert. You don't need to be the best in the world to be usefully good at something.
I have an engineering degree and I can’t remember the difference since I have literally never needed either since school. Just like examples in the post it self, sure you can get better fast, but if no one cares why bother? Oh you got a bit better ELO in chess, nice, what now? Now your average friends don’t want to play you and you aren’t good enough to beat anyone at the chess club. So either you quit or you have to…
You’re right, you should just be bad at everything. That’s a much better way to live your life.
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
All those people you mention have studied mathematics for a long time, Grant Sanderson has probably studied it the "least" but that still means a BSc in his case which is not something you accomplish in a weekend. All the textbook authors are usually professors.
The parent's quip was that you can't rise to the top of the field. My point is that it's irrelevant. Textbooks used in college coursework are usually written by academics, for obvious reasons. Plenty of independent learning / pop textbooks are written by "normal people" who aren't tenured professors.
It's not about being in the top of the field. Even just getting to the point of being able to halfway competently talk about mathematics takes a grueling amount of work.
> Plenty of independent learning / pop textbooks are written by "normal people" who aren't tenured professors.
Idk, Simon Singh is one very well known example of "pop maths" and he has a PhD in particle physics, that's quite a bit more than just "do the reading for a year". Other examples like Eugenia Cheng and Ian Stewart are similarly credentialed.
It's the same in other fields, really. Yes, you can learn to play simple tunes on the piano relatively quickly, but even just being able to play the full Für Elise just takes so much more than that. Or you can learn Hiragana relatively quickly which I guess means that you understand more about Japanese than 95% of people, but it'll still not be enough for you to engage with Japanese in any meaningful way.
The beginner stage is always the easiest. It's after that that it gets really hard.
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#66I think I disagree with the article. I think it is true that if you choose to expend time and energy on something that few people spend effort on , then you can become better than most people at that one thing. However, it seems that the article is trying to say that is true for everything and for everyone, and i disagree with that. The missing key factor is that you have to find something unpopular and easy which wi…
> If you read a few books on mathematics you think you're easily going to become one of the top mathematicians? Many ambitious people try to study math and decades later are disappointed by how they are still mediocre in their field or simply fail to make it into an academic career. Many PhDs in general, actually. I don't know about being one of the top mathematicians, but I'd argue that actually, fully reading a few…
While what you said may be true simply by the virtue of graduate level textbooks being so dense, I think GP wanted to imply that "just reading a moderate amount of mathematics" isn't sufficient to get anywhere. I would say that 3-4 entire graduate level textbooks (which you wouldn't understand anyway without having done the undergraduate stuff beforehand) is much more than "a moderate amount".
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
of course it is, it is the premise of the article. The author compares and ranks the people who perform activities.
Just because a rank exist doesn't mean a competition exists. I might rank people on the street by height, but they're not competing with each other. In the context of the article, a rank is a measurement that the observer takes, it's not necessarily a motivator for the behaviour of the people he's observing (although in some cases it might be).
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#68One of my strongest recommendations to people on social networks is to engage down-thread. Talk to other people, not just the top post. Get beyond your glancing para-social relationship, and expand your Metcalfe-factor by commenting and liking other people's engagement. Especially for new or young networks, a lot of people are truly starved for engagement & don't see the pattern of being engaged with . Engagement has…
Here is a fascinating (and troubling) look at comment manipulation by the platform. Here on TikTok a woman shows the differences between the top comments shown on her account versus her (male) partner's: https://www.tiktok.com/@elieli0000/video/7446090349551815968
Great video - thanks for sharing!
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#69I wonder what he thinks the “non-doing” 80% spend their time on. While I’m sure there exist pure-consumption-mode “observers”, I suspect most are simply engaged in pursuits and goals that are invisible to him.
The article gives off such strong "be a wolf, not a sheep" superiority complex vibes
Re: The Dead Planet Theory
#70I wonder what he thinks the “non-doing” 80% spend their time on. While I’m sure there exist pure-consumption-mode “observers”, I suspect most are simply engaged in pursuits and goals that are invisible to him.
And his take on the other 20% doers smells like survivorship bias. But obviously he is right on taking the initiative to increase your chances.
Chances of success or for a fulfilling life is the underlying topic here and whatever connection you can draw to a dead planet.