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How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

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Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#41

Post by scroot »

photochemsyn wrote: post #31

One useful first step in becoming a better writer - in particular if your subject is complex - is to to delete your Twitter account and never look at another Twitter thread. Character limits kill creativity and complexity. The presentation does leave out one very necessary requirement for becoming a good-to-great writer: you have to do a lot of reading. If you're going to write about a complex scientific or technical…

Barry Cunliffe is a great scholar. Europe Between the Oceans is another great example.

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#42

Post by Buttons840 »

Trasmatta wrote: post #35
Buttons840 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've suggested creating a company forum at a few different places, but it's always received like a strange idea that nobody will actually engage with or give any thought to. Email, Slack, etc, none of them create a good long term record that outsiders and newcomers can consume. Some companies have a wiki, but I've never seen them used. Forums are good for long form communication, people can put in more effort knowing…

Our team has begun using GitHub Discussions for this purpose, and it's actually pretty good. I've been actively trying to push conversations there from Slack, but some people still seem really hesitant to use it. Or even worse, some people seem to try to use it like a chat application, sending a bunch of short and quick replies, rather than letting the conversation evolve slowly and async.

I've heard 90+% of people will not participate in online discussions. It makes me wonder what people would do if you forced them to do so as part of a job. How many people can participate in a forum and make coherent multi-paragraph arguments? We HN participants can, but we're a biased group. A lot of people are accustomed to conversational-style communication as found in Slack or social media, and they may not have written a formal argument since high school.

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#43

Post by TuringTest »

lijogdfljk wrote: post #5
yeetsfromhellL2 wrote: post #3

I like this. I'm diving into the zettlekasten thing after reading How to Take Smart Notes , and stopping to think about how I write so that it's as simple and clear as possible, while still being informative enough for my future self is what flexes my head muscle the most. This complements it nicely.

Mind describing the value you gained from How to Take Smart Notes ? Sounds interesting to me, as someone wanting to catalog all "information" i take in

If you haven't already, you may take a look at networked thinking applications, like the open source logseq[1] or all the similar proprietary outliner alternatives out there.

There is a growing ecosystem based on a modern note-taking style heavily based on bi-directional links for organizing your knowledge with a bottom-up strategy, and a friendly community sharing advice while discovering the possibilities of these tools.

Plus, you can do zettlekasten or GTD on these tools if you have already built a habit on these techniques. The outliner will accomodate that habit, and let you grow it long-term into a personal knowledge database providing opportunistic insights.

[1] https://logseq.com/

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#44

Post by gfodor »

photochemsyn wrote: post #31

One useful first step in becoming a better writer - in particular if your subject is complex - is to to delete your Twitter account and never look at another Twitter thread. Character limits kill creativity and complexity. The presentation does leave out one very necessary requirement for becoming a good-to-great writer: you have to do a lot of reading. If you're going to write about a complex scientific or technical…

On the contrary, a person skilled at Twitter could have compressed the essence of what you wrote into 280 characters.

I’ve found the best books and essays are similarly compressible, with the rest of the information being about bolstering it as being worthy of the precious few slots in your L1 cache.

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#45

Post by heinrichhartman »

Forgive me for bringing up my own material here, but I wrote a piece that is highly relevant in this context only two days ago:

Writing for Engineers - https://www.heinrichhartmann.com/posts/writing/

This text is particularly geared towards Software Engineers and focuses more on the psychology of getting started with writing. Lot's of overlap with the content in this post (which has much more depth on the "how to write well" part).

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#47

Post by Baeocystin »

Buttons840 wrote: post #42
Trasmatta wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our team has begun using GitHub Discussions for this purpose, and it's actually pretty good. I've been actively trying to push conversations there from Slack, but some people still seem really hesitant to use it. Or even worse, some people seem to try to use it like a chat application, sending a bunch of short and quick replies, rather than letting the conversation evolve slowly and async.

I've heard 90+% of people will not participate in online discussions. It makes me wonder what people would do if you forced them to do so as part of a job. How many people can participate in a forum and make coherent multi-paragraph arguments? We HN participants can, but we're a biased group. A lot of people are accustomed to conversational-style communication as found in Slack or social media, and they may not have…

I think you're spot-on. If anything, it's closer to 99%. I've run/managed various forums over the years, and the disparity between the active participants and the passive readers was always wider than you'd think.

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#48

Post by Trasmatta »

Buttons840 wrote: post #42
Trasmatta wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our team has begun using GitHub Discussions for this purpose, and it's actually pretty good. I've been actively trying to push conversations there from Slack, but some people still seem really hesitant to use it. Or even worse, some people seem to try to use it like a chat application, sending a bunch of short and quick replies, rather than letting the conversation evolve slowly and async.

I've heard 90+% of people will not participate in online discussions. It makes me wonder what people would do if you forced them to do so as part of a job. How many people can participate in a forum and make coherent multi-paragraph arguments? We HN participants can, but we're a biased group. A lot of people are accustomed to conversational-style communication as found in Slack or social media, and they may not have…

Oh yeah, good point. A lot of people these days have never used a communication medium like that. It would be interesting to work at a company that really prioritized people who prefer that communication style, over the non stop stream of consciousness that Slack turns into.

Re: How to write more clearly, think more clearly, and learn complex material [pdf]

#50

Post by rfrey »

gfodor wrote: post #44
photochemsyn wrote: post #31

One useful first step in becoming a better writer - in particular if your subject is complex - is to to delete your Twitter account and never look at another Twitter thread. Character limits kill creativity and complexity. The presentation does leave out one very necessary requirement for becoming a good-to-great writer: you have to do a lot of reading. If you're going to write about a complex scientific or technical…

On the contrary, a person skilled at Twitter could have compressed the essence of what you wrote into 280 characters. I’ve found the best books and essays are similarly compressible, with the rest of the information being about bolstering it as being worthy of the precious few slots in your L1 cache.

The essence, perhaps... with none of the nuance or shading. If one thinks that is unnecessary, dispensable fluff, Twitter is no doubt sufficient for most writing.

And a rhyming dictionary contains all poetry in many fewer pages.

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