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Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

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Re: Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

#11

Post by hispanic »

josephagoss wrote: post #5

I'm not sure if this is a good idea for everyone. I think Steve gets a little lost in his world and think that what works for him will work for everyone. A lot of people will find this type of technology a solution in search of a problem. This type of analysis may even distract from peoples lives. Would the knowing that you do a certain thing a certain percent of the time almost become self fulfilling? This is the ty…

Wow. Doesn't seem to be big into serendipity, does he?

In general, I don't see the point of doing all that analysis. Or, at least he doesn't provide many good reasons (in my opinion) for doing it. This is the only one I could see:

> Very early on, back in the 1990s, when I first analyzed my e-mail archive, I learned that a lot of e-mail threads at my company would, by a certain time of day, just resolve themselves. That was a useful thing to know, because if I jumped in too early I was just wasting my time.

Now, this seems like a genuinely useful insight. But, in my mind, this isn't personal analytics. This is email analytics. See mailstrom - http://mailstrom.co/

Re: Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

#13

Post by rodh257 »

I use Fitocracy to track my fitness, MyFitnessPal to log every bit of food I eat and http://askmeevery.com/ to email me once a day reminding me to rate things between 1 and 10, like health, happiness, productivity. These all don't take much effort really, and they give me some interesting history. I'm hoping to do things like correlate what I eat with how well my workouts go, or how healthy I feel in the future.

Re: Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

#15

Post by josephagoss »

hispanic wrote: post #11
josephagoss wrote: post #5

I'm not sure if this is a good idea for everyone. I think Steve gets a little lost in his world and think that what works for him will work for everyone. A lot of people will find this type of technology a solution in search of a problem. This type of analysis may even distract from peoples lives. Would the knowing that you do a certain thing a certain percent of the time almost become self fulfilling? This is the ty…

Wow. Doesn't seem to be big into serendipity, does he? In general, I don't see the point of doing all that analysis. Or, at least he doesn't provide many good reasons (in my opinion) for doing it. This is the only one I could see: > Very early on, back in the 1990s, when I first analyzed my e-mail archive, I learned that a lot of e-mail threads at my company would, by a certain time of day, just resolve themselves. T…

I agree, finding useful things is good, I missed that one about the time of day.

It comes down to time invested in analyzing and useful data out.

I'm on the fence about it. If truly useful information can be obtained without having to set up anything then that's a good thing. However a lot of personal analysis would happen away from the computer too. How to record real life away from PC data?

Maybe Google glass could automatically detect what your eating?

Its all about time. Do you want to spend x amount of time time analyzing/setting up instruments/inputting real life data into a computer/iPhone, to potentially save y time? and risk saving no y time and losing x time?

I think some more people doing this and showing a clear positiveness would be a good thing.

Also another aspect is some people will enjoy collecting data and others won't. Some people take a thousand photos on holiday, others 10. I think this type of personal data aggregation will appeal to some and just seem daft to others. Which is the beauty of humanity I guess.

Re: Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

#16

Post by gwern »

rthomas6 wrote: post #12

This reminds me of Quantified Self. http://quantifiedself.com/

Yes, but I think it's at best a partial QS, almost a degenerate parody of QS; I've argued ( http://www.gwern.net/Zeo#what-qs-is-not-just-data-gathering ) that Wolfram here is exemplifying for us how not to do QS - he is gathering an enormous amount of data, but failing to do anything with it besides visualization.

Re: Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

#18

Post by hispanic »

josephagoss wrote: post #15
hispanic wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. Doesn't seem to be big into serendipity, does he? In general, I don't see the point of doing all that analysis. Or, at least he doesn't provide many good reasons (in my opinion) for doing it. This is the only one I could see: > Very early on, back in the 1990s, when I first analyzed my e-mail archive, I learned that a lot of e-mail threads at my company would, by a certain time of day, just resolve themselves. T…

I agree, finding useful things is good, I missed that one about the time of day. It comes down to time invested in analyzing and useful data out. I'm on the fence about it. If truly useful information can be obtained without having to set up anything then that's a good thing. However a lot of personal analysis would happen away from the computer too. How to record real life away from PC data? Maybe Google glass could…

> However a lot of personal analysis would happen away from the computer too. How to record real life away from PC data?

Good (and thought-provoking) point. This approach implicitly encourages a tech/gadget-heavy focus in one's life - which makes me queasy. And what would be the end-result of this analysis? More-efficient, but deeper-ingrained use of technology? If the result of the analysis were people putting down their smartphones and, instead, have face-to-face conversations with other people - or people no longer playing Candy Crush Saga and, instead, putting that time toward a cause that improves the world, I'd be all for it. But, I don't see that happening.

Re: Stephen Wolfram on Personal Analytics

#19

Post by PavlovsCat »

pavlov wrote: post #10
PavlovsCat wrote: post #8

"Don’t collect data. If you know everything about yourself, you know everything. There is no use burdening yourself with a lot of data. Once you understand yourself, you understand human nature and then the rest follows." --- Kurt Gödel I have no need for the the notion that my act of living constitutes an object ("my life")... that would be burning down the village in order to "improve" it.

Couldn't agree more. (I am satisfied with your training, Cat.)

Likewise! :P
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