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Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

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Re: Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

#291
post #4

I can attest to this and took all of my notes on paper in college. However, once I started a real job I realized that this strategy doesn't scale to all situations. In college, I needed to be able to recall all of the information I had ingested: it was low-write, high-read. In the workplace, there's much more information, but I'm unlikely to need most of it: it's high-write, low-read. I need to be able to reference t…

I found just the opposite in college. For me it was high write, low read, concerning my own notes. The only value to taking notes for me was the active nature of writing helped pin the information in my head. Other than assignment and test dates, which were just bullet lists, I rarely looked back at my notes.

I think that was the sole value of doing homework assignments and term papers. Going through the act of working out a problem, or researching then writing about a topic, is what reinforced the learning for me.

Re: Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

#292
post #216
post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you considered buying loose leaf notebook paper instead of printer paper? You get lines and I’d imagine it’s even cheaper.

I actually distinctly prefer not having lines on my paper, because my notes are typically big outlines and drawings and diagrams. I am planning on coming up with a few different paper templates that I can easily print when I need it (I have a cheap $100 brother laser b&w printer that works perfectly and cheaply for this purpose).

I like very lightly printed graph paper. Very pale blue at 5 lines per inch. I can ignore the lines for free hand, but they provide nice guidance for more structured drawings.

Re: Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

#293
post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you get the impression the OP was trying to sell you something?

Psychological studies show that people derive pleasure from policing social norms, and I'm no different. In this case: "Don't brag". So I made fun of OP's writing style. Of course, deriving pleasure at the expense of someone else reflects poorly on me. ...but then: I'm cool with that. The world (especially HN) is full of people worshipping and trying to become statues. In order for that world to be bearable for every…

Well, you're probably more willing than most to have this conversation, so I'm interesting in having it.

I did find the writing style abnormal, but ignoring it, the information in it was at least as useful to me as any other HN comment: mostly not at all, just another little drip of an internet opinion to consider on this topic I probably spend too much time thinking about (optimizing note taking and learning strategies).

So, I acknowledge yes, strange comment style. For your comment: you say some derive pleasure from policing social norms, I don't challenge you as finding it pleasurable, and I like your metaphor as being a pigeon on a statue. Though I could use other terms to describe your comment: "trying to knock someone down a peg," "put someone in their place," "tone policing," and I think I could make an honest argument that it's simply a form of mild bullying. The only difference to me really is if OP deserves it. If they're a jerk boss / shyster salesperson, sure, why not, but do we knock every confident person we see "down a peg" just in case they're a jerk and deserve it? I feel like erring on the side of being nice is a better outcome. Of course I can't just decide for you what you do and don't like, this is me being a pigeon on a pigeon.

One could argue the both of us are in a virtue-signal race to the bottom but I'm just typing this all out of curiosity for your thoughts.

Re: Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

#294
post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Psychological studies show that people derive pleasure from policing social norms, and I'm no different. In this case: "Don't brag". So I made fun of OP's writing style. Of course, deriving pleasure at the expense of someone else reflects poorly on me. ...but then: I'm cool with that. The world (especially HN) is full of people worshipping and trying to become statues. In order for that world to be bearable for every…

Well, you're probably more willing than most to have this conversation, so I'm interesting in having it. I did find the writing style abnormal, but ignoring it, the information in it was at least as useful to me as any other HN comment: mostly not at all, just another little drip of an internet opinion to consider on this topic I probably spend too much time thinking about (optimizing note taking and learning strateg…

Yup, I agree fully with what you just said, also the bullying-part and erring on the side of being nice. I guess there's a few layers to unpack here.

The lowest layer is that I was acting out a psychological impulse, not implementing a premeditated policy. Knocking everyone down a peg just in case they deserve it would be a policy, and certainly one that I wouldn't find agreeable. Why did I have this impulse in the first place? I don't know.

The next layer is: Given the impulse, how did I decide to act it out, given that it conflicted with a very valid ethical imperative to "be nice". First note that OP established themselves as having high social status. I myself am low in status. This is both the default assumption made by most readers in relation to anonymous strangers on the internet, and the actual truth in relation to my person. So this was an instance of "punching up", rather than "punching down". If, for example, OP were a mentally retarded person writing the above and using the word "company" to refer to their occupational therapy work group, we'd have to reinterpret the transaction as "punching down", and what I did would then be absolutely horrifying. The thought (though far-fetched) didn't cross my mind at the time. It might have cancelled out my impulse at some lower level of my psyche.

While punching down is always morally deplorable, punching up is often acceptable, and even has a useful function in society. Just think of the animal kingdom where reproductive success goes to animals of high social status, and animals of low status challenge those of high status with the outcome that reproductive potential isn't wasted.

Even so, if I consistently took any opportunity to deal out punches, provided only that it's punching up rather than down, then I probably could still be said to have a pretty mean personality, and it would probably cause me more suffering than gain. But if, just once every tenth time or so, I just do it, then that feels to me like an amount of karma I can actually afford, plus I'd feel like I'm spending my karma on something useful.

I'm sort of reminded here of the role of the jester in medieval courts: No one but the jester could say anything that might offend the king. But if the jester says it publicly, and it resonates with many, then that resonance is almost like a democratic institution of sorts. It makes the king less likely to do stuff that the jester will poke fun at. It serves the will of the many of low status over the will of the few of high status. So what I'm saying is: We should all take turns, playing the role of the jester. This would be a force for good. It would make it more difficult for someone to hold on to high status, if many of lower status don't want them to have that high status.

Re: Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

#295
post #10

The proportion of the population that is actually good at retaining information is too small to sample, but I'd bet that they don't take notes on average. Retaining information shouldnt have anything to do with how you ingest it. You need to have a place to put it. This means working with that information. Relating it to other pieces of information, imagining examples in real time, or, more formally, writing the shor…

> Retaining information shouldnt have anything to do with how you ingest it.

It must. The ingestion method, and particularly how long the info sits in our consciousness, will govern the depth of indexing operations possible.

Something you’ve seen many times is typically easier to remember than something you’ve only seen once. This is obvious, but under your model it makes no sense.

Re: Writing by hand is still the best way to retain information

#297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting I was diagnosed with ADHD and always felt the teacher was stupid for making us hand write because I spent more time focusing on the writing than remembering what I had written down (and I thought this was likely the case for most people)… but never knew these two things could be related.

As a fellow ADHD-er, the way I handled this as a student was to customize my note-taking system. My whole life people had told me how to take notes in an extremely structured way, and insisted they must be detailed. That required so much focus like you that I couldn't learn. So when I was allowed to stop taking notes, I did, and my grades slightly improved. Then in university it was too much information to not take n…

Sounds like you were primarily having trouble balancing focus with the content side of making notes. With many people, the challenge is actual mark making. We need to intellectualize writing words the way I've heard some people with autism need to intellectualize ingesting and responding to social queues. That muscle memory just doesn't connect the way it does for most people... it's like I'm using the mental process for drawing and don't have some parallel, more automatic mental process for writing. For me, typing is an instant cure for that.
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