Gwern: belief

Transcript context

…What is your most unusual but successful work habit? I think I get a lot more mileage out of arguing with people online than… pretty much any other writer does. [Patel laughs] Hey, I'm trying to give a genuine answer here, not some stupid thing about note-taking—a real answer! I get a lot more out of arguing with people than most people do. You need motivation to write and actually sit down, and crystallize something and do the harvest. After you tend your garden, you do have to do the harvest, and the harvest can be hard work. It's very tedious. There are many people I talk to who have many great ideas. But they don't want to harvest because it's tedious and boring. And it's very hot out there in the fields, reaping. You're getting dusty and sweaty. Why wouldn't you just be inside having lemonade? But motivation from arguing and being angry at people online is in plentiful supply. So I get a lot of mileage out of people being wrong on the Internet. What are the pitfalls of an isolated working process?…

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