There is no way of living in direct contact with reality
February 27, 2024 1:24 PM Subscribe
Almost everyone I’ve met would be well-served thinking more about what to focus on. Building mental models, figuring out the explore vs exploit trade-off, and more.
> Have you ever noticed this when interacting with someone who has a less accurate model than you: that it’s like they have a VR headset on and are fighting against monsters you know are not there? For instance, there was a Swedish couple who were working at the embassy in New Delhi in the 1990s. They had a housekeeper. On the housekeeper’s birthday, they made her a cake and invited her to eat at their table. She refused. She insisted she had to eat on the floor, or else she’d be reborn as a lower animal. It is tempting to say, “You can take off the headset, there is nothing there. Have some cake.” But we all have headsets on. There is no way of living in direct contact with reality.
> The trick is to collide your mental model with the outside world as often as possible. This is what exploring does. You think you know the distribution of payoffs of the slot machines, but you try something new. You discover that you were wrong. You update your model.
> Many of the mental models I have are things I’ve picked up from others. On closer inspection, it turns up that they too picked up from someone else, who picked it up from someone else—going back to someone who lived in the 1950s. This is not the 1950s. Have some cake.
> Have you ever noticed this when interacting with someone who has a less accurate model than you: that it’s like they have a VR headset on and are fighting against monsters you know are not there? For instance, there was a Swedish couple who were working at the embassy in New Delhi in the 1990s. They had a housekeeper. On the housekeeper’s birthday, they made her a cake and invited her to eat at their table. She refused. She insisted she had to eat on the floor, or else she’d be reborn as a lower animal. It is tempting to say, “You can take off the headset, there is nothing there. Have some cake.” But we all have headsets on. There is no way of living in direct contact with reality.
> The trick is to collide your mental model with the outside world as often as possible. This is what exploring does. You think you know the distribution of payoffs of the slot machines, but you try something new. You discover that you were wrong. You update your model.
> Many of the mental models I have are things I’ve picked up from others. On closer inspection, it turns up that they too picked up from someone else, who picked it up from someone else—going back to someone who lived in the 1950s. This is not the 1950s. Have some cake.
If I look at Elon Musk, I have a hard time even grasping that he has the same number of hours in a day as I have.
It's easy to do lots of (fun) things when someone else scrubs your bathroom, cooks your food, does your laundry, etc.
I never compare myself to anyone who has enough money to outsource most of their reproductive labour. We're not playing on the same planet.
But then again, I lost it with the author somewhat when they said that they were leaving the country and relocating somewhere without a job. Maybe I am far too conventional, but I really like eating and having a dry roof over my head, so I would never do anything without a plan for that.
posted by jb at 2:12 PM on February 27 [16 favorites]
It's easy to do lots of (fun) things when someone else scrubs your bathroom, cooks your food, does your laundry, etc.
I never compare myself to anyone who has enough money to outsource most of their reproductive labour. We're not playing on the same planet.
But then again, I lost it with the author somewhat when they said that they were leaving the country and relocating somewhere without a job. Maybe I am far too conventional, but I really like eating and having a dry roof over my head, so I would never do anything without a plan for that.
posted by jb at 2:12 PM on February 27 [16 favorites]
So, what's so wrong with Sweden's school system that they felt they needed to flee the country rather than subject their child to it?
posted by hippybear at 2:21 PM on February 27 [12 favorites]
posted by hippybear at 2:21 PM on February 27 [12 favorites]
Why is eating on the table presented as the "real" option? Sitting at a table to eat is a contingent, cultural practice as much as sitting on the floor is...
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:30 PM on February 27 [12 favorites]
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:30 PM on February 27 [12 favorites]
Being a hindu is wearing a VR headset?
Clearly, you have not understood the concept of maya, this world is an illusion.
posted by infini at 2:38 PM on February 27 [7 favorites]
Clearly, you have not understood the concept of maya, this world is an illusion.
posted by infini at 2:38 PM on February 27 [7 favorites]
can predict with near-certainty how long it will take the author to fanboy [Elon]
It's a Substack so that makes it especially easy.
posted by splitpeasoup at 2:59 PM on February 27 [4 favorites]
It's a Substack so that makes it especially easy.
posted by splitpeasoup at 2:59 PM on February 27 [4 favorites]
The motivation to leave was that we wanted to homeschool Maud, who was 3. In Sweden, this is illegal, so most Swedish homeschoolers end up on various small islands in the Baltic Sea.
This used to be called a self-own
posted by rhymedirective at 3:11 PM on February 27 [14 favorites]
This used to be called a self-own
posted by rhymedirective at 3:11 PM on February 27 [14 favorites]
Almost everyone I’ve ever met would be well-served by spending more time thinking about what to focus on.
well, he's not wrong
—Sam Altman
wait, wait oh yes he is!
posted by chavenet at 3:14 PM on February 27 [6 favorites]
well, he's not wrong
—Sam Altman
wait, wait oh yes he is!
posted by chavenet at 3:14 PM on February 27 [6 favorites]
I read the whole thing. Several things bother me.
One is that the author segues from "we need more and better mental models" to "getting the most possible done is our goal". I don't think I share this belief. I don't want to find and then focus on a single thing, even if that would lead to some awesome outcome. I LIKE doing lots of different things to a relatively mediocre level. I do not see myself ever dialling down the exploration to zero.
Another is that while exploring may give you contact with many many options, your notion of what is good and best will change, not least because of the things you have experienced. There is an implicit premise that your values and outlook are stable - that this is how you can refine down to the single thing you will eventually exploit. Again, I do not think I am this kind of person. The author actually talks about how decisions made in education as a young person trap you, but I don't see this exploration process he outlines as being that different (if you develop as a person while exploring).
But the big unspoken thing here is the premise that you have the freedom to explore. Everybody should; but few do. As it happens, I do have that privilege myself, but I am acutely aware how few people share it.
I guess when you have a newsletter your audience is already accepting your premises and they don't need restating or defending but coming to this cold, I would appreciate that.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 3:21 PM on February 27 [11 favorites]
One is that the author segues from "we need more and better mental models" to "getting the most possible done is our goal". I don't think I share this belief. I don't want to find and then focus on a single thing, even if that would lead to some awesome outcome. I LIKE doing lots of different things to a relatively mediocre level. I do not see myself ever dialling down the exploration to zero.
Another is that while exploring may give you contact with many many options, your notion of what is good and best will change, not least because of the things you have experienced. There is an implicit premise that your values and outlook are stable - that this is how you can refine down to the single thing you will eventually exploit. Again, I do not think I am this kind of person. The author actually talks about how decisions made in education as a young person trap you, but I don't see this exploration process he outlines as being that different (if you develop as a person while exploring).
But the big unspoken thing here is the premise that you have the freedom to explore. Everybody should; but few do. As it happens, I do have that privilege myself, but I am acutely aware how few people share it.
I guess when you have a newsletter your audience is already accepting your premises and they don't need restating or defending but coming to this cold, I would appreciate that.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 3:21 PM on February 27 [11 favorites]
Sometimes I worry that mental models are in for the same treatment as "rationalism" soon -- a widely used term with a long academic history, familiar to most people who have set foot in a humanities department, gets thinkpieced into a watchword for A Certain Kind of Guy. The long history of mental models in psychology, philosophy, and design describes them as far more granular, flexible, and personal than the way they're discussed here (and elsewhere). Mental models are core tooling of our minds, not apps you can install to think more like [insert guy you are fan of]. I like how @i_am_joe's_spleen put it
posted by PikeMatchbox at 3:29 PM on February 27 [8 favorites]
"One is that the author segues from "we need more and better mental models" to "getting the most possible done is our goal". I don't think I share this belief. "The first idea is huge, and generally belongs to the broader world of researchers but the second is... good for Substacks. As a fan of the huge overall theory, I'd hate for it to get winnowed down to a grindset / PKM kind of idea. So throwing this link in here for anyone interested in digging further: https://www.modeltheory.org/about/ -- especially see their publications page.
posted by PikeMatchbox at 3:29 PM on February 27 [8 favorites]
But then again, I lost it with the author somewhat when they said that they were leaving the country and relocating somewhere without a job.
To be clear, although the author is not being candid, they were almost certainly moving to Åland, a Swedish speaking island region of Finland, and thus changing not a huge amount otherwise about their life. Why the author chooses to not to undermine their “everything is possible” opener by making it sound so dramatic is left as an exercise for the reader.
posted by ambrosen at 3:32 PM on February 27 [3 favorites]
To be clear, although the author is not being candid, they were almost certainly moving to Åland, a Swedish speaking island region of Finland, and thus changing not a huge amount otherwise about their life. Why the author chooses to not to undermine their “everything is possible” opener by making it sound so dramatic is left as an exercise for the reader.
posted by ambrosen at 3:32 PM on February 27 [3 favorites]
Heh TIL (and I've even been to Aland, its cute)
Swedish Educational Refugees Flock to Small Islands Outside of Stockholm After Homeschool Ban.
posted by infini at 3:36 PM on February 27 [1 favorite]
Swedish Educational Refugees Flock to Small Islands Outside of Stockholm After Homeschool Ban.
posted by infini at 3:36 PM on February 27 [1 favorite]
Something about this piece really irks me. Maybe it's the idea that of modelling one's priorities after a recommender-system algorithm. Maybe it's the commingling of tech metaphors with pop psychology with GTD with titans-of-industry-worship. Maybe it's the lack of passion or pain, the complete detachment of "It felt comforting to put strict rules on myself like this, especially in the early part of the search." Do people really measure their lives, their time on earth, and plot the results against some expected gain? I struggle with priorities, too, but I have a feeling that this pursuit of ultimate optimization is the opposite of an answer.
posted by swift at 3:50 PM on February 27 [11 favorites]
posted by swift at 3:50 PM on February 27 [11 favorites]
It is quite something to be ambassadors in a foreign land and assume that the natives have a "less accurate" mental model of the world than you do.
The whole explore/exploit thing comes from the language of conquest and imperialism, a particular toxic mental model that we humans seem unable to rid ourselves of.
And that instinct in turn is a vestige of our animal nature, our urge to fight and survive and reproduce, and to destroy.
To be human is to attempt to understand and transcend all that, to realize that perhaps all this is illusion. There might be deeper and more satisfying ways of living, spiritual happiness instead of bites of sugary cake. It is something perhaps they could have asked the housekeeper about.
posted by vacapinta at 9:26 PM on February 27 [3 favorites]
The whole explore/exploit thing comes from the language of conquest and imperialism, a particular toxic mental model that we humans seem unable to rid ourselves of.
And that instinct in turn is a vestige of our animal nature, our urge to fight and survive and reproduce, and to destroy.
To be human is to attempt to understand and transcend all that, to realize that perhaps all this is illusion. There might be deeper and more satisfying ways of living, spiritual happiness instead of bites of sugary cake. It is something perhaps they could have asked the housekeeper about.
posted by vacapinta at 9:26 PM on February 27 [3 favorites]
I read MetaFilter specifically because it usually avoids content like this, bleeding over from the bad places, e.g. the Orange Site.
posted by constraint at 10:58 PM on February 27 [1 favorite]
posted by constraint at 10:58 PM on February 27 [1 favorite]
> The whole explore/exploit thing comes from the language of conquest and imperialism
No, it doesn’t. You can “explore” your own mind, or a new book, or new ideas, without any reference or thought to colonialism.
posted by osmond_nash at 1:21 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]
No, it doesn’t. You can “explore” your own mind, or a new book, or new ideas, without any reference or thought to colonialism.
posted by osmond_nash at 1:21 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]
I introduce you to Santiago Castro-Gomez' concept of the "hubris of the zero point" (Castro-Gomez 2021, english translation) which captures well the mental model of the author of the OP and which in turn has been irking us in its assumption that one's mental model is missing pieces if one is a Hindu who may prefer sitting on the floor, for example.
Walter Mignolo articulates Latin American scholarship on the Colonial Power Matrix (Anibal Quijanes, various cites), within which there is the coloniality of knowledge as one strand. Literally, explore and exploit comes from the language of conquest and imperialism, which underpins the development of the Euro-Western Knowledge System and its deliberately crafted strategy of dominance and hegemony, erasing or rendering illegitimate vast swathes of Other knowledge systems.
Please do ask me to explain further, my dissertation thesis is situated within this conceptualization and I'm in my 8th semester now, writing thousands of words on exactly what is the problem with the OP. I have the entire Treaty of Westphalia (problematic in itself since it not only conceptualized what is a sovereign nation state but also described what was not sovereign therefore open to colonization and exploitation) to write here as a comment.
posted by infini at 1:42 AM on February 28 [6 favorites]
Walter Mignolo articulates Latin American scholarship on the Colonial Power Matrix (Anibal Quijanes, various cites), within which there is the coloniality of knowledge as one strand. Literally, explore and exploit comes from the language of conquest and imperialism, which underpins the development of the Euro-Western Knowledge System and its deliberately crafted strategy of dominance and hegemony, erasing or rendering illegitimate vast swathes of Other knowledge systems.
Please do ask me to explain further, my dissertation thesis is situated within this conceptualization and I'm in my 8th semester now, writing thousands of words on exactly what is the problem with the OP. I have the entire Treaty of Westphalia (problematic in itself since it not only conceptualized what is a sovereign nation state but also described what was not sovereign therefore open to colonization and exploitation) to write here as a comment.
posted by infini at 1:42 AM on February 28 [6 favorites]
References:
Castro-Gómez, S. (2021). Zero-point hubris: Science, race, and enlightenment in eighteenth-century Latin America. Rowman & Littlefield.*
Mignolo, W. D. (2009). Epistemic disobedience, independent thought and decolonial freedom. Theory, culture & society, 26(7-8), 159-181.
Mignolo, W. (2002). The geopolitics of knowledge and the colonial difference. The south atlantic quarterly, 101(1), 57-96.
*memail for PDF
posted by infini at 1:46 AM on February 28 [3 favorites]
Castro-Gómez, S. (2021). Zero-point hubris: Science, race, and enlightenment in eighteenth-century Latin America. Rowman & Littlefield.*
Mignolo, W. D. (2009). Epistemic disobedience, independent thought and decolonial freedom. Theory, culture & society, 26(7-8), 159-181.
Mignolo, W. (2002). The geopolitics of knowledge and the colonial difference. The south atlantic quarterly, 101(1), 57-96.
*memail for PDF
posted by infini at 1:46 AM on February 28 [3 favorites]
just realized the worth of my doctoral studies when it comes to the Blue, hee! I can add references to my own comments now :D
posted by infini at 1:49 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]
posted by infini at 1:49 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]
> Literally, explore and exploit comes from the language of conquest and imperialism
Again, this claim seems to just be a naked assertion - I would ask for a source but I'm not sure how it could even be proved. Is just not possible in your view to use these two words without being spiritually linked to imperialism?
posted by osmond_nash at 2:26 AM on February 28
Again, this claim seems to just be a naked assertion - I would ask for a source but I'm not sure how it could even be proved. Is just not possible in your view to use these two words without being spiritually linked to imperialism?
posted by osmond_nash at 2:26 AM on February 28
Word salad.
It made perfect sense to me. And the paper linked looks interesting. Thanks, infini!
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:46 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]
It made perfect sense to me. And the paper linked looks interesting. Thanks, infini!
posted by The Manwich Horror at 3:46 AM on February 28 [2 favorites]
There is a certain tone of online writing, in pieces that are burbling around productivity something something.
Encountering this type of productivity cult media makes me flinch as if I've incurred a micro-trauma.
posted by lyam at 5:44 AM on February 28 [5 favorites]
Encountering this type of productivity cult media makes me flinch as if I've incurred a micro-trauma.
posted by lyam at 5:44 AM on February 28 [5 favorites]
Mod note: Couple comments and a broken link fixed. Please try to avoid making thread into a back and forth between two people, thank you.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 7:18 AM on February 28 [1 favorite]
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 7:18 AM on February 28 [1 favorite]
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There is a certain tone of online writing, in pieces that are burbling around productivity something something. When I see it, I can predict with near-certainty how long it will take the author to fanboy that fucking tool.
I'd love for it not to completely ruin my impression of the rest of their work but unfortch, it always does.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 1:33 PM on February 27 [35 favorites]