Excellent contant David. I particularly liked the senate idea, where top management is not allowed. Putting people at the same level definite helps. No one is looking over their shoulders to parrot what ever the boss says. Yet another book atop my TBR pile.
Thanks for this Pete, and I really liked that idea too. It actually made me think back to my time at Sports Illustrated, when it was part of Time Warner. I think there was a desperate need for this sort of thing among mid-level managers, but it didn't exist as far as I could tell, and I think the culture really suffered for it. If the senate is an example of productively channeling the challenges managers face, I think what I saw was that with no productive channel, it can really lead to passive-aggressive culture. Or at least that's how I see it in retrospect — some really great people just didn't have a regular venue to step back for a second and put their heads together across the silos.
It reminds me of when I first entered the work force. One of my colleagues who was also just starting, an ex-military guy, responding to our senior management saying that we have a lot to learn from the experienced people in the company. He said: Do they have twenty years of useful experience or do they have one year of useful experience twenty times over?
There is also the exploration of the vast amount of knowledge that we are unaware of: the spaces occupied by I don't know what I know. You will never know unless you are able to recall that experience while trying out ideas while operating in the wicked environment.
Haha, wow, that "one year of useful experience twenty times over" is amazing. I'm mad I didn't think of that quip. ...This is a great comment overall, thanks for sharing it.
A really helpful interview and framing here, thank you! I had a lot of thoughts related to the practice of medicine, and especially the teaching that goes on during our residencies. Some of the kind v wicked characteristics are ingrained in the situation, and therefore harder to improve. For example:
"rules might change (if there are any)" - in medicine we are always trying to learn from evidence-based trials, observational studies, and the authoritative meta-analysis. Rules change a lot, and for good reason. But telling a practitioner to stop prescribing something that was once thought beneficial but not proven harmful leads to a lot of internal struggle. The ever-changing and expanding rules of good practice are often more than any one individual can keep up with, too. People fall back on their experience, especially older physicians.
"patterns don’t just repeat" - another inherent wicked part of the job. Postpartum bleeding might be mild uterine atony (treatable) or disseminated intravascular coagulation (a catastrophe). Chest pain might be too much pickleball, or an ongoing heart attack. Stress and uncertainty are constant.
"feedback can be delayed or inaccurate" - good feedback in medicine only occurs during residency training or in academic centers, if then, and when you're out in the world practicing, you're pretty much on your own, cramming in patients and maximizing productivity for your new business-oriented overlords. I would love to sit back once a week and examine, reflect upon, and learn from my experiences, getting clinical feedback from my colleagues. Instead we are cloistered in one small examining tomb, err "room," after another, and rarely come up for air. Maybe we get a monthly report on quality-of-care metrics like how often patients reported that we washed our hands. Great.
"and work next year might not look like work last year." - queue pandemic. Feeling like a coal miner going into the mines each day, strapped into a face mask and exposed to risks of disability, disease, and not to mention patient skepticism/disdain of your tools (vaccination, treatments, etc). The only constants are unmanageable workloads and the threat of malpractice. Ouch to write that.
Sorry, quite a tangent here, and not totally what the author is talking about, but somewhat therapeutic for me to write anyway! I'm not burned out myself, but apparently the majority of doctors are right now, signaling a systemic disease in our collective body. A doctor a day is committing suicide. And with healthcare consuming 18.3% of our GDP, fixing this problem is beyond the ability of any small band of physicians with self-preservation and systematic-improvement in mind. The MBA's have ascended to the drivers' seats, and the buses are run by insurers, administrators, and pharma.
Ryan, first of all, thank you for your work in absolutely bananas circumstances. Second, you can use this space for catharsis absolutely any time you want. I can't think of any better use for it, honestly.
This: "good feedback in medicine only occurs during residency training or in academic centers," is very troubling. This paper suggests that no only are the students learning at academic centers with a lot of teaching, but the teachers are also learning tremendously. (And it mentions curtailed "opportunities for reflection" as a major loss): https://pubsonline.informs.org/doi/10.1287/orsc.2017.1166. The learning curves lower in the paper are striking, and the idea that we abandon that engine of improvement for most of the careers of most doctors is just painful to think about. That paper implies that less of that reflective/feedback time leads to procedures having to be redone more often, so I can see a potentially nefarious cycle of volume taking precedence over feedback/reflection, which leads to more procedures needing to be redone, which means more volume, and around we go.
To me, it's an urgent crisis when arguably the most revered and meaningful professions is increasingly occupied by people who might not recommend it. I guess my hope would be that some of this devastation and top-down management might give way to entrepreneurial forces that drive new models. But given the unusual situation of the public/private balance of healthcare, that might be a lot more difficult than in other industries. Obviously I don't know what I'm talking about, but glad you shared this, and would be interested to hear a few of your thoughts one what you might change if you were suddenly emperor of US healthcare.
The excerpt about photographing taking away from an in-the-moment experience stuck out to me. In my attempt to not be black and white, I wonder where a middle ground is. Is it to take a minute or two to enjoy the experience prior to a picture? Or maybe a longer or shorter period? This may be answered in the studies you posted. I only read the abstracts. A brief aside: I once did a flyby of Europe with my brother where we went to tons of tourist locations. Because we were low on money and time, we hardly did more than take pictures of the outside of many buildings. Looking back, I'm saddened by the superficiality of how I experienced those historical landmarks. While I think taking pictures are a piece of the puzzle, I think learning the history and cultural context boosts appreciation as well. I would say this even applies to books. I recently read Moby-Dick (widely considered extremely boring), but I went into it with a bunch of research on Melville and whaling and other stuff, and I loved it. Not to go on too much of a tangent, but I think this can carry over to what you said about doing cardiac procedures without time to think. Running through experiences, books, etc., without time to think takes away from each one in my opinion. Anyways, thanks for the great post! It got me thinking!
Paul, this a great comment. As far as the middle ground, I definitely don't have an answer, but I did have an experience last year where I was in Edinburgh and so avid about photographing everything I might share (I shared none of it, in any case), that I did feel like I hadn't appropriately experienced some of it. As if I hadn't actually gone! And I regretted that. More recently, for some experiences I just decide I won't take photos, but then still allow myself to take the phone out if something is really striking. Mostly, though, I just try to make my first instinct to take it in with my own eyes. ...And I guess with some runs I've been going on, I purposely leave my phone, so sometimes I miss a potentially cool wildlife or nature photo. (I missed the only beaver I've ever seen in the wild;) ...As far as history and cultural context, I could not agree more. Now when I'm going to go to a new place, I pick up books about it, because doing some reading ahead of time just massively deepens the experience. I've actually transferred that to my own home, and I bought some walking tour and history books, and it changes the way I see my own neighborhood. For some of the books that have profoundly influenced me the last few years, it was really the book in combination with outside reading that did it. Ulysses immediately became either my favorite or one of my favorite books, and yet I can't imagine I would've even finished it if not for some prep reading along the way on modernist literature and Irish history and Homer and various other things. I think doing one of those deep reads, like you did with Moby-Dick, is probably a lot more powerful than reading a dozen books in the "normal" way.
That's so nice of you to say! It's my pleasure. I can't always get to the comments, but the messages below posts have been a major (and kind of unexpected) highlight of this entire newsletter endeavor.
David, would you say sports are a spectrum from "kind" to "wicked" learning environments? For example, would a target game like darts be kind and an invasion game like football be wicked? Would any sports fit into the wicked category or all they all considered kind because of the clarity of feedback?
Hey Joel, I definitely do think so. I think in the scope of all the things humans do, sports are toward the kinder end of the spectrum, simply because the rules don't change, or if they do, they change slowly, and because feedback is generally automatic, and reasonably accurate. That said, I definitely think the sports that involve so-called "anticipatory skills," where you have to judge what's coming in the future based on the movements of objects and bodies, are more wicked. They involve some guesswork, and human dynamics, and I think the feedback is not always as clear as something like darts. In the first chapter of my first book, I wrote about anticipatory skill, and it really is highly-developed guessing at the future, in a way, but has to be done because the action unfolds too quickly for our brains and reflexes to keep up if we're just reacting. So I think that makes those sports more on the wicked end, as sports go.
David, individual experience varies so widely that we may accurately say that individual variation in limitations cause, well, "wide ranges" of associations and comprehensions.
What may seem vagaries, trite, moot, incomprehensible, to one SURELY evokes deeply salient emotions in some others.
Prosody is the brain's evolved method of , as you prefer, associational comprehension , or narrative.
Specificity*, desirable in language, seems endowed by the analytical isolation of word meanings.
But word meanings vary, among individuals, as I hope to have implied.
Consider how different languages may have cognates, false cognates, and synonyms that are never quite completely synonymous
I get corrected by native French speakers, and the vastly different Athabaskan or Siouxian does not even comprehend relationships/associations in ways completely mutual to you or I.
Something having to do with curiosity being more important than presenting a self, drove and drives me to seek learning environments where I am the least knowledgeable in "class."
That means that , while direct challenges may cause me anxiety, the absorbing pleasure of sensory encounter with the knowledgeable is more rewarding than any other social experience.
Being criticized, for example, caused that peculiar playful process occurring in dreams and what is poorly defined as illumination upon awakening, of recognition that stasis is illusion. I cannot thank you enough for the critical evaluations.
* (and specificity is also shaped, improved, through prosody, as in interpreting the meaning of words through their usage)
Especially poignant to me is the concept of kind versus wicked learning environments. In the former, emotion has relatively little affect on rational thinking. Wicked learning environments especially related to trauma, have a disproportionately large enduring effect that can cloud reasonable judgement indefinitely. Another good article.
The intention was merely to add information about the ubiquity of creative response that occurs in individuals participating in skilled activities.
Fosbury DID escape the excessive conservative bent of rules-based activities; One would never desire that any of us would not explore outside of limits (even I have numerous injuries from such exploration).
Informed speculation, of course differs enormously from uninformed speculation, or unskilled imagination.
THERE is a subject for mental exploration!
(I am not at all sure that it is correct to presume critique, rather than attempt to add to the information. Newton's "shoulders of giants" refers to how human knowledge appears to increase: we are inspired by others, and even critique is a fundamental and necessary process through which learning and advancement occur.
Thanks for the initial article! Fosbury was, due to his innovative mind, a light in track and field.
The fiberglass pole vault tech , which may have occurred during the same period changed the style and technique, even opening the way for females, with their naturally reduced upper body strength, to develop at perhaps a higher ratio of altitude gain.
Well, I did find it very interesting, and certainly wide ranging, so fitting for this newsletter! And I like how you framed that — escaping the conservative bent of rules-based activities. Eloquent.
Great discussion, thanks! Interesting how, even in a kinder environment like medical procedures, reflection and articulation are critical for learning from experience. I saw this effect with managers and I was lucky to discover how a simple interview made them articulate and get a better grasp on something they learned a while ago.
Btw, can you please share which study you were referring to? Thanks a lot!
I loved this one. Thanks, David. So much of this reminded me of Range that I was surprised to see that this book came out after. First, I love the use of analogies (mixing strategies like the stock market, swimming in the ocean, or even the Tony Robbins example). Also, your note on social media/the internet being designed to direct your attention reminded me of a similar point Russ Roberts made about social media making it hard to "want what we want to want." I thought that was such a great way to put it.
Anyway, a question. Thanks for trying to elicit specific, science-based recommendations for readers. The authors mentioned a good one, but I noticed you said the book has a lot. Are there any others that stuck out to you that you'd like to share?
Lastly, this is random, but I find myself thinking much more about your effort you put in as an interviewer now. There were a few moments where I chuckled because you asked a question, didn't get an answer you quite liked, and then followed up with a bit more explanation to make sure the reader would understand. I thought it demonstrated your preparation, and I really appreciated it!
Matt, that is a great Russ quote. Do you happen to know what episode that was from, if it was an EconTalk?
The idea of prototyping isn't new but it stuck out to me in the book — that both individuals and organizations should work hard to find ways to prototypes things quickly, because in wicked environments prototypes start to force feedback when none is automatic. For myself, thinking about a new book project, I think I'll probably do a bit of prototyping (or, already am a little;) of ideas in this newsletter. I also liked a section they had about how systems or organizations can help make up for some individual judgment biases with "cognitive repairs." Here's a news version of a bit of the research they cited: https://davidepstein.substack.com/p/how-to-get-better-at-learning-from-experience/comments
There's also a lot on basically interrogating our reflex for cause and effect, and looking for or at least considering "what else might have caused this outcome?" They refer to it as being "story scientists." And also talk about forcing yourself to consider counterfactuals. A lot of the book amounts to the small ways that we can steal from scientific thinking: make a hypothesis, find a way to test it, evaluate objective, develop alternative hypotheses, repeat. Awareness of what Kahneman calls "WYSIATI": "What you see is all there is," meaning people take information given to them and assume it's what is available rather than seeking the information that would answer there question. There was also a section about creativity versus originality, which is a topic I'm really interested in right now, and about how most creativity is really recombination of existing things, not free creation of brainstorming.
Glad you appreciate my interview prep! I just did one the other day where I knew I'd have precisely one hour with the interviewee, and I had days worth of questions, so I spent a ton of time culling questions from different sources into my All-Star question roster, and then within those marked several as "must haves" in case time was running low and I hadn't gotten to them. I hope the interview went well (I often don't know until I transcribe), but either way I definitely put in the effort for that one. Maybe overboard, but gotta try when you get an interview that was a long time coming.
Yeah, prototyping rings true. I don't know if you've read Matthew Syed's Black Box Thinking, but it makes a similar point about trying as hard as you can to seek out feedback. He talks of how Silicon Valley companies do this well when they seek out minimum viable products. But now I can't help but try to piece together the theme of your book from looking at the breadcrumbs of your recent (and upcoming) newsletters. It might be an error on my end, but the link you left looks like it is a link to the comment section of this newsletter. If that was intentional, it would be a funny way to self cite.
That's a great reminder. I just read Thinking, Fast and Slow, and it makes a great point about WYSIATI. I haven't thought much about the distinction between creativity and originality. Would originality be more about generating truly new ideas rather than recombining other things?
Wow that sounds like such an intentional way to prepare. I'll steal that next time I have the chance!
Ya know, I haven't read Oliver's book, but I've read a ton of his newsletters, and I also recently took a four-hour virtual class he was offering over two days (and I'm taking another this weekend). Kind of weird I haven't read his book given that, but I'm a big fan, and have definitely consumed a ton of his thinking. I loved the class...I'm not even really sure the focus of this next class of his, but I just signed up as soon as he mentioned it during the first class. I've found some of the frames and tactics he provided extremely personally useful, especially as I set about trying for the first time to write a book while being a very engaged parent, and not letting other important things (exercise, keeping up with friends, reading fiction) slide away.
Ok, that link was a mistake by me! My excuse is that I was rushing to board a flight, and violated my best work (and maybe life?) "hack," which is to consciously do one thing at a time. Sounds trite, but it's big for me. ...This is the link I meant to leave: https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/not-beyond-repair
(If I ever self-cite like that on purpose without pointing it out explicitly, please stage an intervention;)
I have not read Syed's Black Box Thinking, but I definitely should. You just reminded me that he and I had a slightly testy exchange on BBC radio after my first book. I was kind of bothered by it, because it was one of the very first things I did after my first book, and I really didn't have a good understanding of what I was getting into at the time. I think his writing is really interesting, though, and I'm very interested in the idea you just mentioned and MVP. It jibes with a current interest. I appreciate you feeding me ideas!
Hahaha okay I'll definitely hold you accountable with self citing. I had a feeling it was a mistake. Wow, what was his class on? As it happens, I think Burkeman would strongly agree with doing one thing at a time. In the conclusion, he sums up his book by quoting Jung who says, "Do the next and most necessary thing."
I'd definitely recommend Black Box Thinking, and it's really cool to hear you disagreed! I have a feeling he probably responded with his work from Bounce (I read it right after Coyle's The Talent Code, which was pretty similar), and it was pretty heavy on 10,000 hours. I guess not every disagreement about that can go as smoothly as it does with Gladwell. Anyway, if you're interested in that, then BBT sounds right up your alley. If you read it I'd love to know what you think!
It was definitely about the 10,000 hours stuff. The part I took particular exception to was when he said that, although I was wrong about the existence of talent, even had I been right, it would've been the wrong message to send, and kids wouldn't learn math or something. My feeling was that it's presumptuous to declare the right message without understanding how the world really is. (In Japan, for example, some of the 10,000 hours thinking was disastrous for kids with various learning challenges.) In any case, my mantra is that we study individual differences to find out: a) what differences are real, not folklore; b) which matter for outcomes we care about, and c) how to use that info to try to get better outcomes for everyone. ...I can definitely see middle ground in retrospect, though, particularly in the idea that staking out values is crucial aside from the research. Frankly, I just had thinner skin at the time, and (perhaps naively) had not expected to be thrust into those kinds of situations with the book. I was quite overwhelmed in general. I think we'd have a more interesting conversation today, and I'd be happy to have it!
1. On speculation: Informed speculation differs so profoundly from uninformed (let's call it for the moment, "Dunning-Kreuger" speculation) as to be unrelated to valid review. Thus the word speculation in the discussion must be modified to reflect at least this abyssal gulf.
2. The conversation unfortunately degraded into the usual common hierarchical trap of attempting to be relevant by appeal to employee evaluation/hiring decisions. As we know, so-called "crystallized intelligence", the social product of adapting the essentially anecdotal individual experience, differs from the more adaptive use of logic and testing of modifiable tentative solution[s], commonly referred to as " fluid intelligence. The former is long-term memory, the latter involves ability to more widely abstract through using present cues to create effective and novel response to novel experience, evaluation, response.
Thus a massive gap exists between speculation and valid formation of falsifiable - testable - hypothesis, leading to accurate "knowledge."
The last is encased in quotation marks due to the absolute necessity to question either accepted reality (see physics and any concept of reality proposed and accepted ) or social niche theory, wherein our vulnerability to delusions arise from the eagerness of an obligate social animal to modify the (social) self to fit into desired ingroup[s].
Our susceptibility to ignore reality due to desire to fit into and attain social "heights" has been consistently proven, since the Asch and Milgram experiments of 70 years past, although evident for as long as social record existed.
(i look forward to belatedly reading Soyer/Hogarth's Myth of Experience, though it will become as filled with margin notes as any scribbled-up text or assertion since adolescence.
Our experience as animals does not differ substantially from that of any other brain, evaluating utility of familiar versus adventure into novel environments and systems.
Brains, after all, have only such utility as allows reasonably effective prediction of likelihood of sufficient reward -which, of course, is the reason that at least one brain in the interview, leapt toward profitability of "hiring" evaluation.
Good luck on selling; my experience evaluating "Master's" theses written by business and "leadership" aspirants, allows this crystalline, if acerbic observation: Those oriented toward sociofinancial "dominance" -- and my use of quotation marks indicate distaste at their delusory intent and consequent desire to strike them from functional language -- will, in their Machiavellian dissimulations, make them a profitable cohort to milk for profit.
I would urge those who tentatively toward manipulative utility for "hiring", to seek a wider view of trait differences than competitive rejection.
Each individual organism ever extant comprises an unigue and agilely changing life. Neither genes nor momentary or persistent epigenetic stasis, define destiny. Learning from experience includes mistakes and variations impossible to foresee.)
Hi Makuye, thanks for the comment. I must admit, I found it desultory to an extent that makes it hard to respond, but interesting nonetheless, and I appreciate you sharing your critique. As far as the word "speculation" requiring a modification, my guess is that not a single reader would be confused regarding the context in this post. Clearly, Hogarth is not advocating uninformed speculation, so I think a modification is unnecessary. I'm not certain that I'm right, and I assume you disagree, but that's my informed speculation based on interactions with readers of this newsletter;)
I learned very clearly how photographing steals the actual experience when I spent some time photographing exciting races at large track meets. After the winners finished I would have to find the closest bystander and ask them to tell me what happened in the race. You see the whole thing but comprehend so little. Taught me to photograph my children only rarely.
That's amazing — having to ask someone what happened. A really poignant example, Katie. Thanks for sharing, and it'll definitely stick in my brain when I'm constantly whipping out my phone to take photos of my toddler.
Excellent contant David. I particularly liked the senate idea, where top management is not allowed. Putting people at the same level definite helps. No one is looking over their shoulders to parrot what ever the boss says. Yet another book atop my TBR pile.
Thanks for this Pete, and I really liked that idea too. It actually made me think back to my time at Sports Illustrated, when it was part of Time Warner. I think there was a desperate need for this sort of thing among mid-level managers, but it didn't exist as far as I could tell, and I think the culture really suffered for it. If the senate is an example of productively channeling the challenges managers face, I think what I saw was that with no productive channel, it can really lead to passive-aggressive culture. Or at least that's how I see it in retrospect — some really great people just didn't have a regular venue to step back for a second and put their heads together across the silos.
It reminds me of when I first entered the work force. One of my colleagues who was also just starting, an ex-military guy, responding to our senior management saying that we have a lot to learn from the experienced people in the company. He said: Do they have twenty years of useful experience or do they have one year of useful experience twenty times over?
There is also the exploration of the vast amount of knowledge that we are unaware of: the spaces occupied by I don't know what I know. You will never know unless you are able to recall that experience while trying out ideas while operating in the wicked environment.
Haha, wow, that "one year of useful experience twenty times over" is amazing. I'm mad I didn't think of that quip. ...This is a great comment overall, thanks for sharing it.
A really helpful interview and framing here, thank you! I had a lot of thoughts related to the practice of medicine, and especially the teaching that goes on during our residencies. Some of the kind v wicked characteristics are ingrained in the situation, and therefore harder to improve. For example:
"rules might change (if there are any)" - in medicine we are always trying to learn from evidence-based trials, observational studies, and the authoritative meta-analysis. Rules change a lot, and for good reason. But telling a practitioner to stop prescribing something that was once thought beneficial but not proven harmful leads to a lot of internal struggle. The ever-changing and expanding rules of good practice are often more than any one individual can keep up with, too. People fall back on their experience, especially older physicians.
"patterns don’t just repeat" - another inherent wicked part of the job. Postpartum bleeding might be mild uterine atony (treatable) or disseminated intravascular coagulation (a catastrophe). Chest pain might be too much pickleball, or an ongoing heart attack. Stress and uncertainty are constant.
"feedback can be delayed or inaccurate" - good feedback in medicine only occurs during residency training or in academic centers, if then, and when you're out in the world practicing, you're pretty much on your own, cramming in patients and maximizing productivity for your new business-oriented overlords. I would love to sit back once a week and examine, reflect upon, and learn from my experiences, getting clinical feedback from my colleagues. Instead we are cloistered in one small examining tomb, err "room," after another, and rarely come up for air. Maybe we get a monthly report on quality-of-care metrics like how often patients reported that we washed our hands. Great.
"and work next year might not look like work last year." - queue pandemic. Feeling like a coal miner going into the mines each day, strapped into a face mask and exposed to risks of disability, disease, and not to mention patient skepticism/disdain of your tools (vaccination, treatments, etc). The only constants are unmanageable workloads and the threat of malpractice. Ouch to write that.
Sorry, quite a tangent here, and not totally what the author is talking about, but somewhat therapeutic for me to write anyway! I'm not burned out myself, but apparently the majority of doctors are right now, signaling a systemic disease in our collective body. A doctor a day is committing suicide. And with healthcare consuming 18.3% of our GDP, fixing this problem is beyond the ability of any small band of physicians with self-preservation and systematic-improvement in mind. The MBA's have ascended to the drivers' seats, and the buses are run by insurers, administrators, and pharma.
Ryan, first of all, thank you for your work in absolutely bananas circumstances. Second, you can use this space for catharsis absolutely any time you want. I can't think of any better use for it, honestly.
This: "good feedback in medicine only occurs during residency training or in academic centers," is very troubling. This paper suggests that no only are the students learning at academic centers with a lot of teaching, but the teachers are also learning tremendously. (And it mentions curtailed "opportunities for reflection" as a major loss): https://pubsonline.informs.org/doi/10.1287/orsc.2017.1166. The learning curves lower in the paper are striking, and the idea that we abandon that engine of improvement for most of the careers of most doctors is just painful to think about. That paper implies that less of that reflective/feedback time leads to procedures having to be redone more often, so I can see a potentially nefarious cycle of volume taking precedence over feedback/reflection, which leads to more procedures needing to be redone, which means more volume, and around we go.
To me, it's an urgent crisis when arguably the most revered and meaningful professions is increasingly occupied by people who might not recommend it. I guess my hope would be that some of this devastation and top-down management might give way to entrepreneurial forces that drive new models. But given the unusual situation of the public/private balance of healthcare, that might be a lot more difficult than in other industries. Obviously I don't know what I'm talking about, but glad you shared this, and would be interested to hear a few of your thoughts one what you might change if you were suddenly emperor of US healthcare.
The excerpt about photographing taking away from an in-the-moment experience stuck out to me. In my attempt to not be black and white, I wonder where a middle ground is. Is it to take a minute or two to enjoy the experience prior to a picture? Or maybe a longer or shorter period? This may be answered in the studies you posted. I only read the abstracts. A brief aside: I once did a flyby of Europe with my brother where we went to tons of tourist locations. Because we were low on money and time, we hardly did more than take pictures of the outside of many buildings. Looking back, I'm saddened by the superficiality of how I experienced those historical landmarks. While I think taking pictures are a piece of the puzzle, I think learning the history and cultural context boosts appreciation as well. I would say this even applies to books. I recently read Moby-Dick (widely considered extremely boring), but I went into it with a bunch of research on Melville and whaling and other stuff, and I loved it. Not to go on too much of a tangent, but I think this can carry over to what you said about doing cardiac procedures without time to think. Running through experiences, books, etc., without time to think takes away from each one in my opinion. Anyways, thanks for the great post! It got me thinking!
Paul, this a great comment. As far as the middle ground, I definitely don't have an answer, but I did have an experience last year where I was in Edinburgh and so avid about photographing everything I might share (I shared none of it, in any case), that I did feel like I hadn't appropriately experienced some of it. As if I hadn't actually gone! And I regretted that. More recently, for some experiences I just decide I won't take photos, but then still allow myself to take the phone out if something is really striking. Mostly, though, I just try to make my first instinct to take it in with my own eyes. ...And I guess with some runs I've been going on, I purposely leave my phone, so sometimes I miss a potentially cool wildlife or nature photo. (I missed the only beaver I've ever seen in the wild;) ...As far as history and cultural context, I could not agree more. Now when I'm going to go to a new place, I pick up books about it, because doing some reading ahead of time just massively deepens the experience. I've actually transferred that to my own home, and I bought some walking tour and history books, and it changes the way I see my own neighborhood. For some of the books that have profoundly influenced me the last few years, it was really the book in combination with outside reading that did it. Ulysses immediately became either my favorite or one of my favorite books, and yet I can't imagine I would've even finished it if not for some prep reading along the way on modernist literature and Irish history and Homer and various other things. I think doing one of those deep reads, like you did with Moby-Dick, is probably a lot more powerful than reading a dozen books in the "normal" way.
Sappy, I know, but I so appreciate your thoughtful and human responses! Thanks for taking the energy to connect. It made my day!
That's so nice of you to say! It's my pleasure. I can't always get to the comments, but the messages below posts have been a major (and kind of unexpected) highlight of this entire newsletter endeavor.
Love it Paul! The computer scientist and inventor Alan Kay once said, "Context is worth 80 IQ points".
Ha, hadn't heard that one. Great quote!
David, would you say sports are a spectrum from "kind" to "wicked" learning environments? For example, would a target game like darts be kind and an invasion game like football be wicked? Would any sports fit into the wicked category or all they all considered kind because of the clarity of feedback?
Hey Joel, I definitely do think so. I think in the scope of all the things humans do, sports are toward the kinder end of the spectrum, simply because the rules don't change, or if they do, they change slowly, and because feedback is generally automatic, and reasonably accurate. That said, I definitely think the sports that involve so-called "anticipatory skills," where you have to judge what's coming in the future based on the movements of objects and bodies, are more wicked. They involve some guesswork, and human dynamics, and I think the feedback is not always as clear as something like darts. In the first chapter of my first book, I wrote about anticipatory skill, and it really is highly-developed guessing at the future, in a way, but has to be done because the action unfolds too quickly for our brains and reflexes to keep up if we're just reacting. So I think that makes those sports more on the wicked end, as sports go.
David, individual experience varies so widely that we may accurately say that individual variation in limitations cause, well, "wide ranges" of associations and comprehensions.
What may seem vagaries, trite, moot, incomprehensible, to one SURELY evokes deeply salient emotions in some others.
Prosody is the brain's evolved method of , as you prefer, associational comprehension , or narrative.
Specificity*, desirable in language, seems endowed by the analytical isolation of word meanings.
But word meanings vary, among individuals, as I hope to have implied.
Consider how different languages may have cognates, false cognates, and synonyms that are never quite completely synonymous
I get corrected by native French speakers, and the vastly different Athabaskan or Siouxian does not even comprehend relationships/associations in ways completely mutual to you or I.
Something having to do with curiosity being more important than presenting a self, drove and drives me to seek learning environments where I am the least knowledgeable in "class."
That means that , while direct challenges may cause me anxiety, the absorbing pleasure of sensory encounter with the knowledgeable is more rewarding than any other social experience.
Being criticized, for example, caused that peculiar playful process occurring in dreams and what is poorly defined as illumination upon awakening, of recognition that stasis is illusion. I cannot thank you enough for the critical evaluations.
* (and specificity is also shaped, improved, through prosody, as in interpreting the meaning of words through their usage)
Especially poignant to me is the concept of kind versus wicked learning environments. In the former, emotion has relatively little affect on rational thinking. Wicked learning environments especially related to trauma, have a disproportionately large enduring effect that can cloud reasonable judgement indefinitely. Another good article.
The intention was merely to add information about the ubiquity of creative response that occurs in individuals participating in skilled activities.
Fosbury DID escape the excessive conservative bent of rules-based activities; One would never desire that any of us would not explore outside of limits (even I have numerous injuries from such exploration).
Informed speculation, of course differs enormously from uninformed speculation, or unskilled imagination.
THERE is a subject for mental exploration!
(I am not at all sure that it is correct to presume critique, rather than attempt to add to the information. Newton's "shoulders of giants" refers to how human knowledge appears to increase: we are inspired by others, and even critique is a fundamental and necessary process through which learning and advancement occur.
Thanks for the initial article! Fosbury was, due to his innovative mind, a light in track and field.
The fiberglass pole vault tech , which may have occurred during the same period changed the style and technique, even opening the way for females, with their naturally reduced upper body strength, to develop at perhaps a higher ratio of altitude gain.
Well, I did find it very interesting, and certainly wide ranging, so fitting for this newsletter! And I like how you framed that — escaping the conservative bent of rules-based activities. Eloquent.
Great discussion, thanks! Interesting how, even in a kinder environment like medical procedures, reflection and articulation are critical for learning from experience. I saw this effect with managers and I was lucky to discover how a simple interview made them articulate and get a better grasp on something they learned a while ago.
Btw, can you please share which study you were referring to? Thanks a lot!
I loved this one. Thanks, David. So much of this reminded me of Range that I was surprised to see that this book came out after. First, I love the use of analogies (mixing strategies like the stock market, swimming in the ocean, or even the Tony Robbins example). Also, your note on social media/the internet being designed to direct your attention reminded me of a similar point Russ Roberts made about social media making it hard to "want what we want to want." I thought that was such a great way to put it.
Anyway, a question. Thanks for trying to elicit specific, science-based recommendations for readers. The authors mentioned a good one, but I noticed you said the book has a lot. Are there any others that stuck out to you that you'd like to share?
Lastly, this is random, but I find myself thinking much more about your effort you put in as an interviewer now. There were a few moments where I chuckled because you asked a question, didn't get an answer you quite liked, and then followed up with a bit more explanation to make sure the reader would understand. I thought it demonstrated your preparation, and I really appreciated it!
Matt, that is a great Russ quote. Do you happen to know what episode that was from, if it was an EconTalk?
The idea of prototyping isn't new but it stuck out to me in the book — that both individuals and organizations should work hard to find ways to prototypes things quickly, because in wicked environments prototypes start to force feedback when none is automatic. For myself, thinking about a new book project, I think I'll probably do a bit of prototyping (or, already am a little;) of ideas in this newsletter. I also liked a section they had about how systems or organizations can help make up for some individual judgment biases with "cognitive repairs." Here's a news version of a bit of the research they cited: https://davidepstein.substack.com/p/how-to-get-better-at-learning-from-experience/comments
There's also a lot on basically interrogating our reflex for cause and effect, and looking for or at least considering "what else might have caused this outcome?" They refer to it as being "story scientists." And also talk about forcing yourself to consider counterfactuals. A lot of the book amounts to the small ways that we can steal from scientific thinking: make a hypothesis, find a way to test it, evaluate objective, develop alternative hypotheses, repeat. Awareness of what Kahneman calls "WYSIATI": "What you see is all there is," meaning people take information given to them and assume it's what is available rather than seeking the information that would answer there question. There was also a section about creativity versus originality, which is a topic I'm really interested in right now, and about how most creativity is really recombination of existing things, not free creation of brainstorming.
Glad you appreciate my interview prep! I just did one the other day where I knew I'd have precisely one hour with the interviewee, and I had days worth of questions, so I spent a ton of time culling questions from different sources into my All-Star question roster, and then within those marked several as "must haves" in case time was running low and I hadn't gotten to them. I hope the interview went well (I often don't know until I transcribe), but either way I definitely put in the effort for that one. Maybe overboard, but gotta try when you get an interview that was a long time coming.
Love this. I got the Roberts quote from Oliver Burkeman's terrific book "Four Thousand Weeks". Have you read it? He pulled from Roberts, and I just googled and it looks like it's from this essay: https://russroberts.medium.com/wanting-to-want-what-we-want-145b3bdeea6b
Yeah, prototyping rings true. I don't know if you've read Matthew Syed's Black Box Thinking, but it makes a similar point about trying as hard as you can to seek out feedback. He talks of how Silicon Valley companies do this well when they seek out minimum viable products. But now I can't help but try to piece together the theme of your book from looking at the breadcrumbs of your recent (and upcoming) newsletters. It might be an error on my end, but the link you left looks like it is a link to the comment section of this newsletter. If that was intentional, it would be a funny way to self cite.
That's a great reminder. I just read Thinking, Fast and Slow, and it makes a great point about WYSIATI. I haven't thought much about the distinction between creativity and originality. Would originality be more about generating truly new ideas rather than recombining other things?
Wow that sounds like such an intentional way to prepare. I'll steal that next time I have the chance!
Ya know, I haven't read Oliver's book, but I've read a ton of his newsletters, and I also recently took a four-hour virtual class he was offering over two days (and I'm taking another this weekend). Kind of weird I haven't read his book given that, but I'm a big fan, and have definitely consumed a ton of his thinking. I loved the class...I'm not even really sure the focus of this next class of his, but I just signed up as soon as he mentioned it during the first class. I've found some of the frames and tactics he provided extremely personally useful, especially as I set about trying for the first time to write a book while being a very engaged parent, and not letting other important things (exercise, keeping up with friends, reading fiction) slide away.
Ok, that link was a mistake by me! My excuse is that I was rushing to board a flight, and violated my best work (and maybe life?) "hack," which is to consciously do one thing at a time. Sounds trite, but it's big for me. ...This is the link I meant to leave: https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/not-beyond-repair
(If I ever self-cite like that on purpose without pointing it out explicitly, please stage an intervention;)
I have not read Syed's Black Box Thinking, but I definitely should. You just reminded me that he and I had a slightly testy exchange on BBC radio after my first book. I was kind of bothered by it, because it was one of the very first things I did after my first book, and I really didn't have a good understanding of what I was getting into at the time. I think his writing is really interesting, though, and I'm very interested in the idea you just mentioned and MVP. It jibes with a current interest. I appreciate you feeding me ideas!
Hahaha okay I'll definitely hold you accountable with self citing. I had a feeling it was a mistake. Wow, what was his class on? As it happens, I think Burkeman would strongly agree with doing one thing at a time. In the conclusion, he sums up his book by quoting Jung who says, "Do the next and most necessary thing."
I'd definitely recommend Black Box Thinking, and it's really cool to hear you disagreed! I have a feeling he probably responded with his work from Bounce (I read it right after Coyle's The Talent Code, which was pretty similar), and it was pretty heavy on 10,000 hours. I guess not every disagreement about that can go as smoothly as it does with Gladwell. Anyway, if you're interested in that, then BBT sounds right up your alley. If you read it I'd love to know what you think!
It was definitely about the 10,000 hours stuff. The part I took particular exception to was when he said that, although I was wrong about the existence of talent, even had I been right, it would've been the wrong message to send, and kids wouldn't learn math or something. My feeling was that it's presumptuous to declare the right message without understanding how the world really is. (In Japan, for example, some of the 10,000 hours thinking was disastrous for kids with various learning challenges.) In any case, my mantra is that we study individual differences to find out: a) what differences are real, not folklore; b) which matter for outcomes we care about, and c) how to use that info to try to get better outcomes for everyone. ...I can definitely see middle ground in retrospect, though, particularly in the idea that staking out values is crucial aside from the research. Frankly, I just had thinner skin at the time, and (perhaps naively) had not expected to be thrust into those kinds of situations with the book. I was quite overwhelmed in general. I think we'd have a more interesting conversation today, and I'd be happy to have it!
An observation or two:
1. On speculation: Informed speculation differs so profoundly from uninformed (let's call it for the moment, "Dunning-Kreuger" speculation) as to be unrelated to valid review. Thus the word speculation in the discussion must be modified to reflect at least this abyssal gulf.
2. The conversation unfortunately degraded into the usual common hierarchical trap of attempting to be relevant by appeal to employee evaluation/hiring decisions. As we know, so-called "crystallized intelligence", the social product of adapting the essentially anecdotal individual experience, differs from the more adaptive use of logic and testing of modifiable tentative solution[s], commonly referred to as " fluid intelligence. The former is long-term memory, the latter involves ability to more widely abstract through using present cues to create effective and novel response to novel experience, evaluation, response.
Thus a massive gap exists between speculation and valid formation of falsifiable - testable - hypothesis, leading to accurate "knowledge."
The last is encased in quotation marks due to the absolute necessity to question either accepted reality (see physics and any concept of reality proposed and accepted ) or social niche theory, wherein our vulnerability to delusions arise from the eagerness of an obligate social animal to modify the (social) self to fit into desired ingroup[s].
Our susceptibility to ignore reality due to desire to fit into and attain social "heights" has been consistently proven, since the Asch and Milgram experiments of 70 years past, although evident for as long as social record existed.
(i look forward to belatedly reading Soyer/Hogarth's Myth of Experience, though it will become as filled with margin notes as any scribbled-up text or assertion since adolescence.
Our experience as animals does not differ substantially from that of any other brain, evaluating utility of familiar versus adventure into novel environments and systems.
Brains, after all, have only such utility as allows reasonably effective prediction of likelihood of sufficient reward -which, of course, is the reason that at least one brain in the interview, leapt toward profitability of "hiring" evaluation.
Good luck on selling; my experience evaluating "Master's" theses written by business and "leadership" aspirants, allows this crystalline, if acerbic observation: Those oriented toward sociofinancial "dominance" -- and my use of quotation marks indicate distaste at their delusory intent and consequent desire to strike them from functional language -- will, in their Machiavellian dissimulations, make them a profitable cohort to milk for profit.
I would urge those who tentatively toward manipulative utility for "hiring", to seek a wider view of trait differences than competitive rejection.
Each individual organism ever extant comprises an unigue and agilely changing life. Neither genes nor momentary or persistent epigenetic stasis, define destiny. Learning from experience includes mistakes and variations impossible to foresee.)
Hi Makuye, thanks for the comment. I must admit, I found it desultory to an extent that makes it hard to respond, but interesting nonetheless, and I appreciate you sharing your critique. As far as the word "speculation" requiring a modification, my guess is that not a single reader would be confused regarding the context in this post. Clearly, Hogarth is not advocating uninformed speculation, so I think a modification is unnecessary. I'm not certain that I'm right, and I assume you disagree, but that's my informed speculation based on interactions with readers of this newsletter;)
I learned very clearly how photographing steals the actual experience when I spent some time photographing exciting races at large track meets. After the winners finished I would have to find the closest bystander and ask them to tell me what happened in the race. You see the whole thing but comprehend so little. Taught me to photograph my children only rarely.
That's amazing — having to ask someone what happened. A really poignant example, Katie. Thanks for sharing, and it'll definitely stick in my brain when I'm constantly whipping out my phone to take photos of my toddler.