What I understand today is that when the Stoics said that there was an opportunity in every obstacle, what they meant was the opportunity to practice virtue. To be a good person despite the bad things that have happened. To do good in the world despite the bad that has befallen you. They were speaking of the idea of arete. Excellence—in all forms.
~ Ryan Holiday
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Reading time: About 4 minutes, 800 words
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This issue is https://7forsunday.com/60
I recently cracked open Listening: Interviews, 1970-1989 by Jonathan Cott. The Introduction alone knocked one of my socks off; I leapt out of my reading chair to search the Internet hoping the Introduction might be published publicly so I could share it. Alas, instead I found this:
There ought to be a word in English that describes the nearly uncontrollable urge to leap out of a reading chair, race to find a friend, and press the book you are reading urgently into their hands. When they politely agree to take a look, you say no, no, you have to read this right now. Let me hold your coffee.
~ W. Scott Olsen from, https://www.startribune.com/review-listening-interviews-1970-1989-by-jonathan-cott/570698762/
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Which—thank you W. Scott Olsen!—is an altogether different thing, which knocked my other sock off. I took a few moments to noodle it and didn’t have any good ideas. Then I asked Chat-GPT (v3.5 if you’re keeping score)…
Make up a new english word which describes the nearly uncontrollable urge to leap out of a reading chair, race to find a friend, and press the book you are reading urgently into their hands. When they politely agree to take a look, you say no, no, you have to read this right now while I hold your coffee.
How about “bibliofervor”? It combines “biblio,” relating to books or reading, with “fervor,” conveying intense passion or enthusiasm. This word captures the strong, almost irresistible impulse to share a captivating book with a friend, urging them to read it immediately, even going as far as offering to hold their coffee just so they can dive into the story right away. It’s that delightful moment when a book is so enthralling that you can’t help but share it with someone else in real-time.
Oi! That is a superlative answer. NEW WORD: Bibliofervor :)
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Quitting, for me, means not giving up, but moving on; Changing direction not because something doesn’t agree with you, but because you don’t agree with something. It’s not a complaint, in other words, but a positive choice, and not a stop in one’s journey, but a step in a better direction. Quitting—whether a job or a habit—means taking a turn so as to be sure you’re still moving in the direction of your dreams.
~ Pico Iyer
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This is super important. Everybody’s impatient at a macro [level], and just so patient at a micro [level], wasting your days worrying about years. I’m not worried about my years, because I’m squeezing [everything] out of my seconds, let alone my days. It’s going to work out.
~ Gary Vaynerchuk
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Not only do I not shop, but I very specifically try to not spend one cent. NOT because I hate shopping—I do hate shopping. And NOT because I hate sales, mobs, false-scaricity, commercialism, consumerism—I do hate those too. No, I do it because I like people; And no people should have to work any sort of holiday chaos insanity. I digress.
But I do have a Black Friday tradition! I have a rather enormous collection of sappy holiday music. I shuffle that play list and turn it up. If you’ve never heard Ella Fitzgerald’s rendition of Sleigh Ride… uh… I don’t know what to say. (Other than, go find a copy and play it.) Giddy up! Giddy up! Let’s go!!
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In this situation, before committing to a three year PhD, you better make sure you spend three months trying out research in an internship. And before that, it seems a wise use of your time to allocate three days to try out research on your own. And you better spend three minutes beforehand thinking about whether you like research.
~ ‘jsevillamol’ from, https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/eZCrCB3HiDB55Ccqx/spend-twice-as-much-effort-every-time-you-attempt-to-solve-a
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This one caught my eye because the vague heuristic of spending increasing amounts of effort at each attempt to solve a problem felt true. But I was thinking of it from the point of view of fixing some process— Like a broken software system that occasionally catches fire. Putting the fire out is trivial, but the second time I start trying to prevent that little fire. The third time I find I’m more curious as to why does it catch fire, and why didn’t my first fix make a difference. The fourth time I’m taking off the kid gloves and bringing in industrial lighting, and power tools. The fifth time I’m roping in mathematicians and textbooks and wondering if I’m trying to solve the Halting Problem.
Turns out the context of the problem doesn’t matter. The answer is, “2.” Every time you attempt to solve a problem—any sort of problem, any context, any challenge, any unknown—the most efficient application of your effort is to expend just a bit less than twice the effort of your last attempt.
Not, “it feels like twice would be good,” but rather: Doubling your efforts each time is literally the best course of action.
…and now that I’ve written this. My brain dredges up the Exponential Backoff algorithm. That’s been packed in the back of my brain for 30 years. I’ve always known that was the chosen solution to a very hard problem. (“Hard,” as in proven to be impossible to solve generally, so one needs a heuristic and some hope.) They didn’t just pick that algorithm; Turns out it’s the actual best solution.
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I recently found James Cridland’s article, A Podcast Industry Guide to WebSub, or PubSubHubbub. It’s a good unpack of how the RSS-is-a-pull-service impediment to scaling is solved by creating aggregators that support pushing RSS update notifications.
…how does your podcast player notice that daily podcast is out, without polling the podcast’s RSS feed every minute?
I’ve added a link to Cridland’s article to my Deep Dive About Podcast Feeds.
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The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will.
~ Vince Lombardi
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Solemn. Good way to start a mindful day in NYC w friends.
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Always start by doing stuff…
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I don’t know the actual meaning of maturity. But for me, maturity is when a person hurts you and you try to understand their situation rather than hurting them back.
~ unknown
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The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
~ Gandhi
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Orthopedic surgeons in Belgium have hunted down the enigmatic structure in cadavers. And what do you know — the good Parisian doctor [who discovered it 150 years ago] was right.
There is an overlooked ligament in the knee. And it might be important for keeping your knee from twisting and turning, especially after an injury to the anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL.
~ Michaeleen Doucleff from, http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/11/07/243710560/surgeons-discover-quirky-knee-ligament-all-over-again
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