Why Books Donʼt Work | Andy Matuschak

How Can We Learn Better? To start answering the question, I dove into the notes and work of @andy_matuschak, who is a full-time researcher on learning, and an advocate of 1. Deliberate Practice and 2. Spaced Repetition in knowledge work. I have to be honest: though I love learning, I find both of these methods difficult and unwieldy in most cases... See more

Second, the education system assumes that once we understand something, it will stick in our minds for as long as we need it to. These minds are envisaged as a little like computer hard drives: unless violently knocked, they will hold on to data for the long term. This is why we might imagine that education could stop at the age of twenty-two, once

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How many people actually go back and try and understand this, or other such topics, in a deeper way? Very few. Moreover, the ‘meta’ lesson is: don’t question it too deeply, you’ll fall behind. Just learn the algorithm, plug in the numbers, and pass your exams. Speed is of the essence. In this way, school kills the “will to understanding” in people.... See more

“Do we really need to go through courses with very specialized knowledge that often provides a huge amount of stuff that is very detailed, very specialized, very arcane, and will be totally forgotten in a couple of weeks? Especially now, when all the information is on your phone. You have people walking around with all the knowledge of humanity on

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