Here is my interpretation. Carmack is saying learning something deeply, for example learning all features of a tool, helps in the long run, but in this approac

Here is my interpretation. Carmack is saying learning something deeply, for example learning all features of a tool, helps in the long run, but in this approach it takes a while to provide value. An alternate approach is to learn a subset that provides immediate values. In the case learning only the subset of features of the tool that are being used at that time. That's more tractable and allows you to provided immediate value. He is leaning towards the 2nd approach because first groups of people are opinionated without broad experience. Elon Musk said something very similar. He said, lets say you need to use a wrench, but if you start from the very basic it would be extraordinarily difficult to start working. Instead you can just starting learn about the wrench and go backward from there. This was you are providing immediate values to the work at hand.