NonTrivial
A podcast about the patterns that exist at the intersection of science, philosophy and complexity, and how these speak to universal principles related to skills, growth and life.
Episodes
In this episode I discuss how doing everything in a day is almost always an impossibility, but is in fact possible if you learn to categorize your work in a fashion akin to how nature operates.
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In this episode I discuss how making decisions in an uncertain world is best handled, not through explicit weighing of choices, but by focusing on high level targets (like balance) that cut through the noise.
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In this episode I discuss how reading should be done for more than just entertainment and knowledge. Reading should be done every day to train the mind in extended concentration, maintaining a single thread of thought, and holding your attention deliberately. I discuss what I think it means to read well, and show how this skill goes well beyond just reading, amplifying our personal and professional lives.
Become a Me...
In this episode I discuss the importance of creating a physical snapshot of your life, to add meaning and direction to your efforts.
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In this episode I discuss the idea that our environment should make the "decisions" for us, when it comes to crafting our lives and the things in it.
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In this episode I discuss the new direction engineering is headed, and why it sounds to many as unsophisticated. It's a "throw everything in a pot to see what happens" outlook on how to build things, which I argue is in fact a far more sophisticated approach than best-laid plans. Something we should learn to embrace in our creativity and life in general.
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In this episode I argue that platforms like X are in fact a better source of truth than mainstream news outlets, despite their errors and lack of expertise. I lay out the underlying mechanism behind how truth persists in large collectives, and show how natural dynamics in large complex systems effectively materialize truth.
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In this episode I talk about a recent comment made by Ben Affleck, suggesting that AI does not currently create. I challenge this, outlining how AI follows the same overall approach to creativity as humans. Further, I argue that our creativity should be challenged by AI, as this ensures we challenge ourselves to be as humanly creative as possible.
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In this episode I discuss what I believe is missing from almost all debates today; an understanding of the dynamics at play in the systems being discussed. I argue that knowledge of natural systems and their dynamics can land debates on something more rigorous and true than the mere swapping of facts.
O'Connor / Shapiro Debate
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7rtkLJqbxM
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In this episode I discuss the importance of placing guarantees in your life, to ensure you biggest realizations get folded into your processes going forward.
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Externalizing your memory to machines ultimately makes you less productive.
It feels like the opposite when you first do it. That’s what today’s products depend on.
But what feels like an advantage is really just seeing the isolated definition of a task become optimized.
Real world tasks do not function according to such isolation definitions.
In the long run, externalization causes you to do m...
In this episode I discuss the potential of the human mind in terms of assumed versus actual boundaries. People frame their mental potential in terms of space and time complexity (although most don't call it that); in other words, they assume their potential is limited by the speed and space of the task (how much time it takes, the amount of raw information involved). But nature computes in ways that are very different from how...
You can read more effectively by hovering above words and waiting until the text you thought would be too much to comprehend materializes in the mind. But if you try, sometimes it seems to work and sometimes it doesn't. But if you learn to hover and wait, it eventually always works. There is a universal pattern at play here, that occurs in many areas of life. In this episode I talk about the need to enter into situations imper...
In this episode I discuss how to be more niche in your life and with your projects, and why that's the only way to truly grow.
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In this episode I discuss how standing too close to the techniques we use can end up ruining their ability to help us.
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In this episode I argue that all that is required to produce your best work is the title of that work. The title captures the essence of what you're hoping to communicate, while everything else can be achieved automatically. The "everything else" includes the structures, transitions and details that will appear very deliberate, and at times even "academic", yet in reality came about my simply bringing your ...
Most of us want some kind of work-life balance. We tend to assume this means creating a distinct separation between when we work and when we play. In this episode I argue that balance is more naturally achieved when we bring work and life together into a single flow.
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In this episode I argue that it often makes more sense to go through life caring less. In today's society we are told we need to care more about how we look, how we speak, what we contribute to, etc. But we all care by default, and the real challenge is caring less about things that don't matter.
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In this episode I talk about the need to realize that we are always in a war of some kind. This is true for our personal lives as much as society. If we stand for anything, than we must accept that messy friction is a part of life, and that embracing this reality leads to less problems in the long run. If we believe in anything, we must be willing to pick up the sword.
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In this episode I look at the online judgement directed at those who post reading lists. I argue that what really matters is not so much what you read, but how you read, since the information you are after can only be gleaned by reading many different books.
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