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Maybe the default settings are too high

raptitude.com

181–190 of 332 posts

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#181
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if that were true (and it obviously isn't), what then would be the point of expending tremendous time and energy to "dam it off and keep it dry"? These are alternative ways to keep the tents dry ... which entails that they were never soaked in the first place. > A tent that’s been in a lake The tents were never in the lake. A few inches of the campsite was in the lake at high water. > sounds like a throwaway to…

I guess the term "tent" is pretty broad, this is what I see: [0], the cotton does not take being in water very well. But I guess a synthetic ultra light tent will do better. I also assumed the tents were already there when he arrived (complete assumption, but the term campsite conjures up a place with tents already there), and so must be of the more heavy more stationary kind. Anyway, the point is, I also had this qu…

> Maybe it's a cultural difference.

It appears that you are confused with West European camping, which is where you drive two days to the south of France (most of which stuck in traffic), pay large amounts of money for a patch of perfectly flat grass where you are allowed to park your car and set up your tent. In a grid pattern with hundreds of other tents. Where there is a building nearby for toilets and showers. And a swimming pool plus live entertainment for the children.

OP appears to be talking about camping in nature.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#182
post #50

This can work with the way you think as well. Many years ago, I had a technical manager who never felt any pressure to be the first to come up with the answer to a question or the solution to some problem. If I was having a technical conversation with him, and we arrived at a particularly subtle or complex issue, he could go completely silent, just staring straight ahead with his fingers to his lips. I would find it…

I do this a lot as well. I have a bad habit of just freezing physically when I start to think. Since my work is conducted over video, my colleagues will often think I dropped off the call XD

Personally I find it a bad habit of mine, I have no idea how people gracefully take time to think. Whenever I do say something like “hold on, let me just think for a moment” my brain completely freezes and I get no thinking done.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but isn't there still an advantage to this? If two people are silently doing this then they don't influence one another as much, helping find a wider range of solutions as well as identify issues with certain solutions that the other might not have seen. Instead if you're blurting out your thinking more in unison. Naturally you'll stray less, exploring less. Of course you want collaboration but I find the magic…

Another way to think of it is if you're blurting out your thinking you're reducing redundant work and perhaps inspiring the other person to think of additional solutions that are offshoots of what you're dismissing. I see merits to both ways of looking at this.

Probably true for many. When thinking about hard problems I'm usually not thinking in language, at least not the kind we speak between us humans, so it can be incredibly distracting if I have to "translate" back and forth while both thinking and communicating.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#184

I feel like this advice could also somewhat apply to your manner of speaking. I'm a pretty fast speaker, and I've noticed that when I try my best to go slower, I understand what I'm trying to say better, I figure out gaps in logic and errors in the sentence while speaking, instead of after, and I get the message across better. And when I'm giving an impromptu speech of some sort, if I slow down and think about every…

I, too, speak ridiculously fast. People laugh at me and some (a lot of) people have problems understanding me. As much as I try, as soon as I am not paying attention I speak at the same pace again. Did you manage to slow down your speech consistently?

I did! It took me a few months though. You just have to work at it a lot and be very conscious of your speech.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he might shrug and say "I don't know" I have far more trust for people willing to say this. > I would start blurting out half-baked ideas to fill the silence I find that I'm more likely to do this but try to make an effort to stop. There's times to spitball but we should also spend time thinking. And let's be real 30-60s is not that long > This manager also typed with one or two fingers, and pretty slowly too. But…

> typing isn't the bottleneck. Not even close. I find it absolutely is much of the time - I'll determine the architecture/overall solution, know exactly what needs to go in a multitude of files, and now actualizing all that isn't really thinking anymore, just donkey work. Getting AI to do this has been incredible now that it's finally good enough. I've had Copilot make flawless 500+LOC C++ classes in the first pass,…

If you use that much time for donkey work, you are using the wrong tools. If it is so simple so that can delegate it to a LLM, you need to use a language with more expressive power.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#186
post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My spouse and I dealt with this on our honeymoon. We were both working 50-80 hour weeks for months leading up to our trip. The first day we got to this all-inclusive resort we spent the whole time trying to min/max and be as efficient and calculated as possible. It was a stressful, miserable day. Day two we looked at each other, had an adult beverage with breakfast, and relaxed for the rest of the trip.

I'm not really a resort person. But I do subscribe to some travel feeds mostly in the vein of maybe finding some places/attractions/restaurants/etc. that I'm not familiar with. The number of hyper-scheduled spreadsheets I see is amazing. Doesn't mean I don't often have some itinerary and even book some particular, popular attractions/venues. But the 30-minute block scheduling is something I do for work (if that). ADD…

I have an upcoming trip planned in asia - never been before.

My firm rule is - have a loose plan, aim for one activity per day, an emergency option, or two, if the weather plays up, and that's it.

It's the type of plan that has worked for every holiday that I have taken that involves a different city to the one I live in.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#187
post #50

This can work with the way you think as well. Many years ago, I had a technical manager who never felt any pressure to be the first to come up with the answer to a question or the solution to some problem. If I was having a technical conversation with him, and we arrived at a particularly subtle or complex issue, he could go completely silent, just staring straight ahead with his fingers to his lips. I would find it…

I often do this in meetings and have gotten into the habit of saying "I'm thinking". It's not much but it gives both of us time to think and explicitly makes it clear I don't expect the person to say something. I think that helps.

”Thinking longer for a better answer”

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I, too, speak ridiculously fast. People laugh at me and some (a lot of) people have problems understanding me. As much as I try, as soon as I am not paying attention I speak at the same pace again. Did you manage to slow down your speech consistently?

I did! It took me a few months though. You just have to work at it a lot and be very conscious of your speech.

Thanks! I will keep trying then. I was starting to assume that was me and that's it.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not just America. But it's partly a cultural thing. If someone would imitate the style of a century ago, he would be mocked for it and considered a self indulgent show off. The best example i can bring is Jacob Reese Mogg, otherwise known as The Rt Hon Gentleman from the 18th century. One thing that is thankfully unique to America is that rudeness as a debating tactic can win elections.

I’m no expert in other country’s politics, but it would be pretty surprising if that was unique to America. Boris Johnson? Nicolas Sarkozy? Silvio Berlusconi?

Not even close. The nearest equivalent is Prime Ministers Questions which is a regular staged event.

Look at the debates from 2015 where Trumps opponents are rendered speechless by his overbearing personality. He makes himself the centre of everything and is completely shameless about it. He's an American phenomenon. BUT, the reason it works is because he means what he says and does what he says he'll do. America has always appreciated straight talkers more then Europe.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#190
post #175

By coincidence I also finished The Fellowship of the Ring about two weeks ago. I have always had the intuition about reading speed that it is very easy to be a speed reader if you skim over things. I've always questioned how much of speed reading is just skipping stuff and filtering for the most important word tokens. You could skip all of Tolkien's scenery descriptions, you could skip Tom Bombadil and Lothlorien and…

I think both ways of reading are fine. Sometimes you just want to get on with the plot, other times you want to immerse yourself. Or maybe you always just want to get on with the plot, which is fine, just don't complain about the book being boring, it just wasn't for you. Which is how I feel about Lotr. But at the same time, rushing over the songs, boring parts with Tom etc is also how I managed to make it work for me.
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