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@ -13,8 +13,19 @@ All major changes on the site
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footnote issues.
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Every page has an [Epistemic State][] now. This is an important step to
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convert this into proper long-term content. Sites are also dated now.
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convert this into proper long-term content. Sites are also dated now, so that
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some obviously out-dated material is clearly visible as such (and new material
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is obvious on the main page).
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I added the story [Milinda and the Minotaur][] I wrote some time ago, but
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never felt like publishing. Thanks to [epistemic states][Epistemic State]
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though, I now can.
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I do plan articles on the Great Filter and languages (use and learning), but
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dunno how long this'll take. For now, this is mostly a setup to make it really
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easy for me to write more stuff und release faster. I have a couple of drafts
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lying around I might revive, particularly a comparison of the [Theravada][]
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path model of enlightenment with the Matrix movie.
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(I also threw away the old changelog because it's useless now anyway. Check
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the [git history][Source] if you care.)
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Before Width: | Height: | Size: 36 KiB After Width: | Height: | Size: 36 KiB |
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@ -1,4 +1,9 @@
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% Fixing Concentration
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---
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title: Fixing Concentration
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date: 2010-07-13
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techne: :incomplete
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episteme: :believed
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---
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I had serious problems concentrating. Typically, I rapidly lost focus or just
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felt blah and unmotivated the whole day, often with a (minor to medium)
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@ -43,20 +48,18 @@ Animal Fat
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Despite what virtually all common wisdom is going to tell you, animal fat is
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probably the most important thing for you to eat. (The second-most important are
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bacteria[^bacteria]). As I'm a bit lazy, I'll do no convincing here and leave
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this to the [Paleo] crowd. (Ignore the libertarians. Just try it yourself for a
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this to the [Paleo][] crowd. (Ignore the libertarians. Just try it yourself for a
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week and be amazed.) If you are an vegetarian, then you really shouldn't be one.
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But the very least don't be a vegan, k? Because then you are royally screwed
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with regards to food.
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[^bacteria]:
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I'm just gonna send you over to [Seth Roberts] on this. I completely agree
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with him on everything about nutrition, having tested it all myself.
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Seriously, grab yourself some strong jogurt (not the sweet stuff, but the
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good, sour one), kefir or miso and eat it. Every day. You can thank me later
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when most of the problems you just lived with are gone.
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[^bacteria]: I'm just gonna send you over to [Seth Roberts][Seth Bacteria] on
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this. I completely agree with him on everything about nutrition, having
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tested it all myself. Seriously, grab yourself some strong jogurt (not the
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sweet stuff, but the good, sour one), kefir or miso and eat it. Every day.
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You can thank me later when most of the problems you just lived with are
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gone.
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[Seth Roberts]: http://www.blog.sethroberts.net/category/umami-hypothesis/
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[Paleo]: http://www.paleonu.com/what-is-panu/
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Eating about 50-100g of butter refuels my energy almost completely in less than
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20 minutes and greatly increases concentration. I perform better on all
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@ -74,8 +77,7 @@ levels of Omega-3, which also greatly increases all kinds of mental functions
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and general health. A good and wide-spread brand is Kerrygold, although there
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are often local alternatives as well.
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[^cheese]:
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I'm not kidding here. I have no idea what exactly is causing it, but
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[^cheese]: I'm not kidding here. I have no idea what exactly is causing it, but
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*something* in certain cheeses is clearly psychedelic. I get a trippy mood,
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incredibly wild dreams and even some mild hallucinations. I suspect the
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tryptophan, but it doesn't really fit the dosage and only seems to happen
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@ -97,9 +99,13 @@ Eating dinner should have you *more* active than before, not *less*.
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Protein
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-------
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TODO
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Sugar
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-----
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TODO
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St. John's Wort
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----------------
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@ -143,10 +149,10 @@ I have a relatively low opinion of most mainstream medication for depression,
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though especially SSRIs may be worth a try. Personally, I also had good
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short-term success with MAO inhibitors, but wouldn't recommend them because they
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are so incompatible with many other drugs or important food. It's just too hard
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to eat right and too easy to kill yourself on MAO inhibitors. Also, raised
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serotonin levels and drugs don't mix at all, especially MDMA or DXM. [Serotonin
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syndrome](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serotonin_syndrome) isn't nice. It's a
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bit of a pity, though, but I can live with that.
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to eat right and too easy to kill yourself on MAO inhibitors. Also, raised
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serotonin levels and drugs don't mix at all, especially MDMA or DXM.
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[Serotonin syndrome] isn't nice. It's a bit of a pity, though, but I can live
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with that.
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Tyrosine
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--------
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@ -185,20 +191,27 @@ trick myself into starting anything, but can just work right away. I only get
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exhausted when I actually did something (and can refuel with sleep and butter)
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and not at random times.
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As a last piece of evidence, I'm just going to mention three numbers. They are the
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number of daily [SRS](/reflections/srs.html) repetitions I could do per day
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before my brain would shut down. A year ago, using almost no caffeine and no
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tyrosine, I managed about 80 reps, max. A few months ago, using caffeine, I got
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up to 150, maybe 200, but that's a good day. 100 would be normal. The last two
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weeks, I did over 500 each day without breaking a sweat. I got up to 800 after 3
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hours of continuous work and that's still not the maximum level. I just normally
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stop after an hour or so because it gets too time-consuming or boring otherwise.
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As a last piece of evidence, I'm just going to mention three numbers. They are
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the number of daily SRS repetitions I could do per day before my brain would
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shut down. A year ago, using almost no caffeine and no tyrosine, I managed about
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80 reps, max. A few months ago, using caffeine, I got up to 150, maybe 200, but
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that's a good day. 100 would be normal. The last two weeks, I did over 500 each
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day without breaking a sweat. I got up to 800 after 3 hours of continuous work
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and that's still not the maximum level. I just normally stop after an hour or so
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because it gets too time-consuming or boring otherwise.
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Tyrosine is, however, useless when your serotonin levels are bad. You can be as
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concentrated as you want, if you are apathetic, nothing will get done. That's
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why I consider St. John's Wort more important, but tyrosine is more noticeable
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right away and ultimately the effect I was hoping for.
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(Outdated, effect doesn't hold up long-term.)
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Nicotine
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--------
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TODO
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Magnesium
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---------
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@ -215,8 +228,6 @@ For simplicity's sake, there are two kinds of exercise: resistance training
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(short, high strength, causes muscle growth) and long-term endurance training.
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The first one is good for you, the second one neutral at best, harmful at worst.
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[citation needed]
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I found endurance training to be utterly useless for concentration. As a
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reference, I have a caved-in chest (about medium) and can't swim. For most of my
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life, I had very poor fitness levels. During the summers of 2009 and 2010, I
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@ -230,13 +241,10 @@ serious strength program, including weight gain (from 75kg to 85kg at 185cm of
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height) and everything[^strength]. Besides obviously improving my fitness and
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confidence, it also increased my energy levels and sleep. Highly recommended.
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[^strength]: Specifically, I follow [Convict Conditioning] and ensure at least
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150g of protein a day, mostly in the form of whole milk, meat and [quark]. I
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exercise twice per week (as prescribed) and level up about one step per month
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for each exercise.
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[Convict Conditioning]: http://www.dragondoor.com/b41/
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[quark]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_(cheese)
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[^strength]: Specifically, I follow [Convict Conditioning][] and ensure at least
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150g of protein a day, mostly in the form of whole milk, meat and [quark][].
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I exercise twice per week (as prescribed) and level up about one step per
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month for each exercise.
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Meditation
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==========
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@ -257,15 +265,9 @@ Because of that, meditation is more of a middle- to end-game strategy. I highly
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recommend it, but you need a certain level of skill and concentration already to
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really use it. If you can't get out of bed, then meditation ain't gonna work,
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either. For introductions to meditation, I recommend going on a 10 day
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[Vipassana] retreat and [Shinzen Young]'s videos.
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[Shinzen Young]: http://www.youtube.com/user/expandcontract
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[Vipassana]: http://www.dhamma.org
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Active Rest
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===========
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[Vipassana][] retreat and [Shinzen Young's][Shinzen Young] videos.
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Sunlight
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========
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TODO
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@ -1,16 +1,21 @@
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% Ways to Improve Your Sleep
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---
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title: Ways to Improve Your Sleep
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date: 2010-05-27
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techne: :done
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episteme: :broken
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---
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Some stuff that I found that actually works.
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f.lux
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=====
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[f.lux] controls the level of blue your monitor shows and tones it down during
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[f.lux][] controls the level of blue your monitor shows and tones it down during
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the night to allow you to get tired naturally (and not stay up all night,
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playing ケロロＲＰＧ like _some_ people). There's quite a bit of research to back
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it up and I achieved some really good results with it.
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playing ケロロＲＰＧ like _some_ people). There's quite a bit of research to
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back it up and I achieved some really good results with it.
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(While [f.lux] has a Linux version, it's just an ugly binary. Use [Redshift]
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(While [f.lux] has a Linux version, it's just an ugly binary. Use [Redshift][]
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instead. All good distros have it in their repository (i.e., Gentoo).)
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Easy Exercise
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@ -26,11 +31,11 @@ Easy Exercise
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> [normal exercise], where the benefits accrue slowly (over weeks and months),
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> the benefits are obvious the next morning (you feel better-rested) and the
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> next day (you’re less tired). (...) The benefits are so large relative to the
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> cost that there’s no motivation problem. Deciding to do it is about as hard as
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> deciding to pick up a $10 bill. Deciding to do conventional exercise is a lot
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> harder.
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> cost that there’s no motivation problem. Deciding to do it is about as hard
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> as deciding to pick up a $10 bill. Deciding to do conventional exercise is a
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> lot harder.
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>
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> Seth Roberts, [Why Did I Sleep So Well?]
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> Seth Roberts, [Why Did I Sleep So Well?][]
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Basically, putting a ltitle bit of stress on muscles causes good sleep. The
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easiest form of doing this is by standing on one leg, while pulling the other
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@ -55,8 +60,8 @@ help as well. Regardless, all artificial light sources pale in comparison to the
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sun, even on a very cloudy day. You aren't able to consciously tell how bright
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something really is (because most of human vision is processed as relative to
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its surrounding, not in absolutes), so it's easy to get this wrong, but during
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my [polyphasic] experiment I found standing outside for even just 5 minutes to
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be a great help in waking up.
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my [polyphasic][Polyphasic Sleep] experiment I found standing outside for even
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just 5 minutes to be a great help in waking up.
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Caffeine
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========
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@ -68,11 +73,11 @@ This hack applies only to some brains, mostly people with bipolar or ADD
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personalities. The best sign is whether uppers like caffeine, cocaine or
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Ritanol, especially in small dosages, make you hyper or calm. I actually get
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sleepy from drinking caffeine. It takes me about 2 to 3 hours, minimum, to
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become more active after a cup of coffee.
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become more active after a cup of coffee.
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The critical part is getting just the right dosage. Caffeine still affects and
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disrupts your tiredness, so drinking to much will prevent you from getting good
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sleep. The tricky thing is that the negative effects will only kick in very
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sleep. The tricky thing is that the negative effects will only kick in very
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late, hours later, while you are working like crazy. I have gone multiple times
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for about 3 or 4 days drinking huge amounts of coffee, like at 10 to 20 cups a
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day, feeling great, sleeping great, until I finally found I suddenly couldn't
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@ -86,9 +91,3 @@ It's quite a paradox state to be in, when you can't fall asleep, but once you
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do, you sleep great. I had even considered taking *both* an upper and a downer,
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like caffeine and diphenhydramine, but found this too silly (and I dislike all
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available downers, including melatonin).
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[Why Did I Sleep So Well?]:
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http://www.blog.sethroberts.net/2008/09/03/science-in-action-why-did-i-sleep-so-well-part-10-2/
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[f.lux]: http://www.stereopsis.com/flux/
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[Redshift]: http://jonls.dk/redshift/
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[polyphasic]: /experiments/sleep/polyphasic_sleep.html
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Before Width: | Height: | Size: 36 KiB After Width: | Height: | Size: 36 KiB |
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@ -1,4 +1,9 @@
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% Polyphasic Sleep
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---
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title: Polyphasic Sleep
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date: 2010-05-06
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techne: :done
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episteme: :broken
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---
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Definition
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==========
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@ -12,7 +17,7 @@ However, the really interesting ones are those where you only sleep about 2-5
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hours in total per day. Yes, that's not a typo: *2 hours per day*. They can
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generally be classified into Uberman sleep, which has 6 naps of 20 minutes each,
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and Everyman sleep, which has one core of 1-3 hours and up to 5 nap of 20
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minutes. Both terms were coined by [puredoxyk], who also has one of the best
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minutes. Both terms were coined by [puredoxyk][], who also has one of the best
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sites on how to adapt to them. I'm not gonna repeat all that here, nor address
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any of the common myths and criticisms (Like, "That's impossible!". It isn't.),
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but instead give my own criticism why I believe it's a *Bad Thing*. Also, a bit
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@ -30,10 +35,10 @@ sleep is right for you. It minimizes the damage this kind of life will do, but
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you will still be worse off. You will still be sleep deprived. [^deprived]
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[^deprived]: Well, as far as I can tell, you are not doing any permanent damage,
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so a week of good sleep will probably fix everything again. Also, many
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polyphasic sleepers will argue that they are not sleep deprived and I certainly
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accept that they don't _feel_ that way. But try using your memory and see how fast
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you crash.
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so a week of good sleep will probably fix everything again. Also, many
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polyphasic sleepers will argue that they are not sleep deprived and I
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certainly accept that they don't _feel_ that way. But try using your memory
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and see how fast you crash.
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Ok, having acknowledged that, let's start with the criticism. In fact, it's a
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very simple criticism because it only involves one point.
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@ -163,4 +168,3 @@ weekend. I even started picking up another language just to have something to
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do! But then, after a while, your brain is completely overloaded and you just
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crash. So it _is_ just like cocaine, really.
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[puredoxyk]: http://www.puredoxyk.com
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@ -28,7 +28,16 @@ is_hidden: true
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[tripzine]: http://www.tripzine.com/listing.php?smlid=268
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[Breaking the Spell]: http://www.philosophypress.co.uk/?p=1001
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[Swartz Dennett]: http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/dennettdumb
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[Seth Bacteria]: http://www.blog.sethroberts.net/category/umami-hypothesis/
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[Shinzen Young]: http://www.youtube.com/user/expandcontract
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[Vipassana]: http://www.dhamma.org
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[puredoxyk]: http://www.puredoxyk.com
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[Why Did I Sleep So Well?]: http://www.blog.sethroberts.net/2008/09/03/science-in-action-why-did-i-sleep-so-well-part-10-2/
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[f.lux]: http://www.stereopsis.com/flux/
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[Redshift]: http://jonls.dk/redshift/
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[Price Purpose]: http://www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com/zara/april__2007.htm
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[Fyfe Purpose]: http://atheistethicist.blogspot.com/2009/07/purpose-to-life-choosing-purpose.html
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[Rational Addiction]: http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/7873033/
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<!-- Wikipedia articles (and similar) -->
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[DXM]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DXM
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@ -52,6 +61,12 @@ is_hidden: true
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[Langton's Ant]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langton's_ant
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[Multiple Drafts]: http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Multiple_drafts_model
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[Vilayanur S. Ramachandran]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vilayanur_S._Ramachandran
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[quark]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quark_(cheese)
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[Convict Conditioning]: http://www.dragondoor.com/b41/
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[Serotonin Syndrome]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serotonin_syndrome
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[Paleo]: http://www.paleonu.com/what-is-panu/
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[Wireheading]: http://www.wireheading.com/
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[Desirism]: http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=2982
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<!-- internal links -->
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[RSS]: /rss.xml
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@ -1,10 +1,15 @@
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% On Purpose
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---
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title: On Purpose
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date: 2011-03-11
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techne: :done
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episteme: :broken
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---
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Two reflections on purpose and two open questions.
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**Purpose cannot be created.**
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# Purpose cannot be created.
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I'll just let [Alonzo Fyfe] speak for me.
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I'll just let [Alonzo Fyfe][Fyfe Purpose] speak for me.
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> However, the common atheist response to the question of meaning and purpose in
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> life is almost as absurd.
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@ -28,11 +33,11 @@ I'll just let [Alonzo Fyfe] speak for me.
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> To live one's life as if this fictional purpose or meaning is real is to live
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> a lie.
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**Desire is not about content.**
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# Desire is not about content.
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Do desires exist? Has desire fulfillment value?
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According to [desirism], desire fulfillment itself has no value, but the
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According to [Desirism][], desire fulfillment itself has no value, but the
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existence of desires creates value within the agent that has them. In other
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words, if Bob wants to eat cheese, then eating cheese has value for Bob, but
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only because this attitude exists in Bob's mind. The important assertion of
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@ -47,17 +52,17 @@ happen to have desires.)
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Overall, this is not an esoteric claim. It follows quiet neatly from standard
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scientific models. But is it true?
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Think about wireheading. Why should I bother to fulfill a complex set of desires
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if I'm also able to self-modify? I could simply replace all my desires with a
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single trivial one, say "I desire 1+1 to equal 2". What would be the difference
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in this case?
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Think about [wireheading][Wireheading]. Why should I bother to fulfill a complex
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set of desires if I'm also able to self-modify? I could simply replace all my
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desires with a single trivial one, say "I desire 1+1 to equal 2". What would be
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the difference in this case?
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How do you identify desires? How do you *know* if a desire fulfilled?
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One possibility might be that desire is about a state the world should be in.
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Say, I might desire that every human has access to health care. But that seems
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weak. For example, economics is full of "as if" models built just around this
|
||||
assumption. A nice one is [rational addiction]. Regardless of their predictive
|
||||
assumption. A nice one is [Rational Addiction]. Regardless of their predictive
|
||||
power, they tend to be very different from the way people actually think.
|
||||
|
||||
Or maybe we are talking about "reasons for action". Essentially, every moment
|
||||
|
|
@ -76,21 +81,20 @@ cessation-of-aggravation that matters, not the content of the desire.
|
|||
|
||||
A content-of-desire model of purpose therefore fails.
|
||||
|
||||
[^1]:
|
||||
While trying to map this during vipassana, I noticed an additional stage
|
||||
[^1]: While trying to map this during vipassana, I noticed an additional stage
|
||||
right before the aggravation. Sometimes for a short moment a glimpse of
|
||||
"heaven" pops up, but the promise is never actually fulfilled. I haven't yet
|
||||
mustered the necessary concentration to check if it always occurs.
|
||||
mustered the necessary concentration to check if it always occurs.
|
||||
|
||||
**But why does this state of cessation exist in the first place?**
|
||||
# Why does this state of cessation exist at all?
|
||||
|
||||
It seems so unnecessary. Agents with preferences would work just fine without
|
||||
it. I can drop my free will, so to speak, yet still act and choose just fine. I
|
||||
do lose my ability to make complex conscious decisions, but why the difference?
|
||||
And why, if I don't drop it, do I have cessation-of-aggravation even for trivial
|
||||
things?
|
||||
things?
|
||||
|
||||
**How does one act if there is no purpose?**
|
||||
# How does one act if there is no purpose?
|
||||
|
||||
Maybe there really isn't any meaning to life. My brain is just broken, hoping to
|
||||
find any. But then what? There seem to be only two responses to this question.
|
||||
|
|
@ -117,8 +121,4 @@ fate* seems to be not too unusual.
|
|||
> different language games, and that to solve one is not to solve the other.
|
||||
> Thus, why wait to solve both before you can make headway on either one?
|
||||
>
|
||||
> -- [Robert M. Price](http://www.robertmprice.mindvendor.com/zara/april__2007.htm)
|
||||
|
||||
[Alonozo Fyfe]: http://atheistethicist.blogspot.com/2009/07/purpose-to-life-choosing-purpose.html
|
||||
[desirism]: http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=2982
|
||||
[rational addiction]: http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/7873033/
|
||||
> -- [Robert M. Price][Price Purpose]
|
||||
|
|
@ -1,2 +0,0 @@
|
|||
% Mapping the Christ Myth
|
||||
|
||||
|
|
@ -1,73 +0,0 @@
|
|||
% SRS - So you can be a cyborg, too!
|
||||
|
||||
Why I love my SRS
|
||||
=================
|
||||
|
||||
Say, you want to learn something. Something big, like, Japanese or Chinese.
|
||||
Japanese uses 4 different writing system, but the one that stands out are the 漢
|
||||
字, i.e. the thousands of funny symbols. To be literate in Japanese, you need to
|
||||
now about 3000 of those. How would you learn something that huge?
|
||||
|
||||
Memory
|
||||
------
|
||||
|
||||
To learn anything, you need three things. First, the information must be
|
||||
**sticky**. That means it must be represented in a form your brain can actually
|
||||
remember. What that means is: Ever tried remembering a long number? Like, 20
|
||||
digits long? Impossible, unless you break it down. But ever remembered the whole
|
||||
plot, including all scenes, of a great movie? Totally easy. Your brain can
|
||||
remember pictures and narratives (related things, both by time and cause)
|
||||
easily, but abstract information is very hard. So you need to transform the 漢字
|
||||
, or whatever your learning, into pictures and stories, aka mnemonics.
|
||||
Fortunately, they were designed with that in mind, [so that's very
|
||||
simple](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembering_the_Kanji).
|
||||
|
||||
Reviews
|
||||
-------
|
||||
|
||||
Second, you need to **review regularly**. Your memory is leaky and needs
|
||||
constant reinforcement. Fortunately, every time the memory is refreshed, it will
|
||||
stick around a lot longer - roughly 2-3 times as long if you review just on the
|
||||
brink of forgetting. If you know some math, you'll recognise this as an
|
||||
exponential progression. What does that mean? You only need to review about 7-8
|
||||
times and the memory will stay for decades! So, that's manageable.
|
||||
Unfortunately, the brain is a little faulty, so you will forget a few things
|
||||
anyway. The good thing is, though, that with very little effort, you can already
|
||||
reach a retention rate of 90-95%, so on average you only need around 10 reviews
|
||||
per fact to make sure you'll remember it for a very long time.
|
||||
|
||||
That sounds pretty nice already, but still, 3000 漢字? Isn't that a lot of work?
|
||||
No. That's 3000 facts, meaning about 30,000 reviews. A review takes 10 seconds,
|
||||
at most. On average, it will take only about 5, but let's assume 10. Worst case
|
||||
scenario, you know. In total, that's only about 3.5 days of work. If it were not
|
||||
spaced out so much, you could finish it *in a week*. Sweet!
|
||||
|
||||
Have a look at those graphs.
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
That's your work over 10 months. The first shows how much reviews you will be
|
||||
doing per month in total. Yellow is the amount of new (or unseen) facts, red are
|
||||
reviews (or reps) of old facts. Below that is the amount of reviews per day for
|
||||
each month. As you can see, the daily workload is at most 20 minutes and goes
|
||||
does down rapidly. After 5 months, you know all 漢字 and will only be
|
||||
refreshing. And that's only for a moderate amount of work with 20 new facts per
|
||||
day. You can easily do 50, or even 100 if you are determined. Pretty good,
|
||||
right?
|
||||
|
||||
Redundancy
|
||||
----------
|
||||
|
||||
Unfortunately, that's quite enough. To remember something well, you need a third
|
||||
thing: **redundancy**. Your brain is associative. The more connection a
|
||||
particular memory has, the stronger it is, no matter where the connection comes
|
||||
from. Fortunately, we can fix this problem rather easily: just add redundant
|
||||
information. If you add a specific piece of information, say a new word, only
|
||||
once to your deck, you will have a hard time learning it. Add it in 3 to 5
|
||||
different sentences, and suddenly it will be trivial.
|
||||
|
||||
A nice side effect is that added redundancy makes the individual cards easier,
|
||||
making reviews faster. The additional workload is only about 2, maybe 3 times.
|
||||
Still, seeing how ridiculously low it already is, this doesn't really matter at
|
||||
all.
|
||||
|
|
@ -1 +0,0 @@
|
|||
% On Anatta
|
||||
|
|
@ -1 +0,0 @@
|
|||
% On Anicca
|
||||
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Reference in New Issue