Effective learning

Takeaways and further thoughts after listening to the beginning of an interview of the applied researcher Andy Matuschak by Dwarkesh Patel :

1. An undemanding reader asks no questions and gets no answers: Ask questions while reading and see how well you can answer them.
2. When you think you understand something, test to see if that is the case. Find the boundaries of your knowledge.
3. Metacognition is difficult during cognition. eg. planning a syllabus of study while trying to understand a topic of study.
4. Start with the opinions/advice of those who you think can help you. In time, question the effectiveness of that advice with respect to your goals and change your plan accordingly.
5. Be aware of the constraints you are implicitly within. Discovering that you have a passion for ocean geology can be a rare event if you live in a landlocked country with few opportunities to pursue your passion.
6. There are things that System 2 (using Daniel Kahneman’s nomenclature) may no longer actively remember but System 1 does: abstract knowledge without specificity. If you want detailed knowledge, this might not be sufficient. Make a choice based on your goals.

I have enough to practice and test based on this so I’ll resume listening to the interview some other time.