5 ms·

> make sure you’re playing the real game, not some more complicated game you’ve made up for yourself Life is full of games, an infinite number really. They're

> make sure you’re playing the real game, not some more complicated game you’ve made up for yourself Life is full of games, an infinite number really. They're all made up. Most of them have some kind of value. There is no single "real" game in my mind. People just get that idea because they ran into a game called Money or a game called Status or whatever it may be that seems all encompassing. Playing for the sake of play is often how you mine games for strategies that are useful for winning later. These strategies are hard to find if you don't have a commitment to goofing around.

Waterluvian 5y ago
I'm learning how to play the piano and I think I've experienced both sides of this philosophy: Side A) I took a piece of music that I really liked and I wrote out every single note on the sheet music, made countless notes about what to do and where, all to reduce the problem down to practice and memorization. And within 2 weeks of owning a piano I'm almost in tears at how beautiful I can make the instrument sound every night. This is the "remember why you're playing" part. Side B) Almost everything about how I approached Side A did NOT help me with learning the next piece. I still didn't have any practice with reading music. So I had to go back to the start and "do it properly". This is the "mine the game for useful strategies to win later". The conclusion I came to is that BOTH are important. A showed me that it's not magic, and I can do it. B equipped me with the tools to get good. And I think you need to balance doing both: you want to get better at a good rate, but you don't want to become miserable because you're "losing" all the time. I think I could apply this to lots of things: Just make your website or application even if the code is a nightmare. Build that garage cabinet even if you waste lumber and screw up the joinery. Get yourself excited. Teach yourself that you can do it. Give yourself the motivation and fuel to go back to Side B and learn all the secrets of your craft. P.S. I'm sure you didn't mean it this way, but for the overwhelming majority of people on this planet, money is NOT a game because eating and housing is not a game.
- f0e4c2f7 5y ago
  This maps to how I've learned a lot of things. The first time I learned how to make a webapp I did it with cgi-bin and bash or something even though even at that time there were much better ways of doing it. Being able to see the whole thing working end to end was really valuable for my mental models even if I had to sub out most parts of the model as I learned more. As an aside, I doubt this has any direct practical application to piano but one of my favorite posts on the internet is about learning piano in an unusual way (applies to learning generally): https://sive.rs/kimo https://sive.rs/kimo
- mrbonner 5y ago
  Ha! Are you me? I'm also learning to play the piano for the last 2 years. I play almost the easiest pieces of J.S.B like minuets or simpler arias and sarabande. Just like you, I printed the sheets out and annotate the heck out of it: notes, fingering. And just like you, every new piece is a relearn from scratch!. I think I can live with it. I am happy with what I could do now. It's better than the Synthesis (Guitar Hero of pianos) where I didn't know the notes at all. I'm forcing myself to read sheet now and it could be taking longer since I am not practicing hours a day. I find myself often phrase (F-A-C-E or All-Good-Boys-Deserved-Fudge). Overall, learning this new hobby is a changing my life. I just discovered the entire new universe of language that has been used for hundreds of years. The down side now is that it is pretty depressing to listen to any of the current pop culture music again.
  - Waterluvian 5y ago
    One thing that’s helping me a lot is spending five minutes many times a day with a $2 app called Piano Tutor. It’s a game simply presents a note on a staff and you need to press the right key. About an hour of it so far and I’m way way faster at reading music.
pessimizer 5y ago
> There is no single "real" game in my mind. This article is about different, individual games, and characterizes styles of play that are reflected across them. It isn't claiming that there is only one game.
- jakelazaroff 5y ago
  I think it's implicit in the article that "winning" the game of Business means making as much money as possible. The author briefly contemplates whether having empathy for your customers would make them a scrub, but then veers off into a tangent about maestros. GP is saying that there's not really a game of Business with a singular agreed-upon win condition. John Malone's strategy was maximizing his company's dominance, but it doesn't mean that anyone who doesn't is a scrub. They're just playing a different game. According to the article, Martine Rothblatt built a highly successful business in United Therapeutics and saved her daughter's life. Consider alternate realities in which only one of those events happened. Which do you think she would choose?
  - Fnoord 5y ago
    A game or competition like judo has a clear set of rules and outcome. With regards to business there is so much more than short term benefit. For example, these cable companies monopolies had low customer satisfaction, and I believe firmly it damages their reputation on the long term. But short term thinking doesn't care for that. So it becomes a kind of game like who's the best functioning psychopath. Good luck playing that game if you're not a psychopath (there's a reason these are highly represented in e.g. Wall Street). In my opinion the CEO of Qwest won. He stood for a principle, he decided with his heart. That's a winning move in a tough, heartless world. A noble sacrifice, like Obi Wan.
mcguire 5y ago
Life is a self-graded test.
- giantg2 5y ago
  Until you get married.

Waterluvian 5y ago

I'm learning how to play the piano and I think I've experienced both sides of this philosophy: Side A) I took a piece of music that I really liked and I wrote out every single note on the sheet music, made countless notes about what to do and where, all to reduce the problem down to practice and memorization. And within 2 weeks of owning a piano I'm almost in tears at how beautiful I can make the instrument sound every night. This is the "remember why you're playing" part. Side B) Almost everything about how I approached Side A did NOT help me with learning the next piece. I still didn't have any practice with reading music. So I had to go back to the start and "do it properly". This is the "mine the game for useful strategies to win later". The conclusion I came to is that BOTH are important. A showed me that it's not magic, and I can do it. B equipped me with the tools to get good. And I think you need to balance doing both: you want to get better at a good rate, but you don't want to become miserable because you're "losing" all the time. I think I could apply this to lots of things: Just make your website or application even if the code is a nightmare. Build that garage cabinet even if you waste lumber and screw up the joinery. Get yourself excited. Teach yourself that you can do it. Give yourself the motivation and fuel to go back to Side B and learn all the secrets of your craft. P.S. I'm sure you didn't mean it this way, but for the overwhelming majority of people on this planet, money is NOT a game because eating and housing is not a game.

f0e4c2f7 5y ago
This maps to how I've learned a lot of things. The first time I learned how to make a webapp I did it with cgi-bin and bash or something even though even at that time there were much better ways of doing it. Being able to see the whole thing working end to end was really valuable for my mental models even if I had to sub out most parts of the model as I learned more. As an aside, I doubt this has any direct practical application to piano but one of my favorite posts on the internet is about learning piano in an unusual way (applies to learning generally): https://sive.rs/kimo https://sive.rs/kimo
mrbonner 5y ago
Ha! Are you me? I'm also learning to play the piano for the last 2 years. I play almost the easiest pieces of J.S.B like minuets or simpler arias and sarabande. Just like you, I printed the sheets out and annotate the heck out of it: notes, fingering. And just like you, every new piece is a relearn from scratch!. I think I can live with it. I am happy with what I could do now. It's better than the Synthesis (Guitar Hero of pianos) where I didn't know the notes at all. I'm forcing myself to read sheet now and it could be taking longer since I am not practicing hours a day. I find myself often phrase (F-A-C-E or All-Good-Boys-Deserved-Fudge). Overall, learning this new hobby is a changing my life. I just discovered the entire new universe of language that has been used for hundreds of years. The down side now is that it is pretty depressing to listen to any of the current pop culture music again.
- Waterluvian 5y ago
  One thing that’s helping me a lot is spending five minutes many times a day with a $2 app called Piano Tutor. It’s a game simply presents a note on a staff and you need to press the right key. About an hour of it so far and I’m way way faster at reading music.

pessimizer 5y ago

> There is no single "real" game in my mind. This article is about different, individual games, and characterizes styles of play that are reflected across them. It isn't claiming that there is only one game.

jakelazaroff 5y ago
I think it's implicit in the article that "winning" the game of Business means making as much money as possible. The author briefly contemplates whether having empathy for your customers would make them a scrub, but then veers off into a tangent about maestros. GP is saying that there's not really a game of Business with a singular agreed-upon win condition. John Malone's strategy was maximizing his company's dominance, but it doesn't mean that anyone who doesn't is a scrub. They're just playing a different game. According to the article, Martine Rothblatt built a highly successful business in United Therapeutics and saved her daughter's life. Consider alternate realities in which only one of those events happened. Which do you think she would choose?
- Fnoord 5y ago
  A game or competition like judo has a clear set of rules and outcome. With regards to business there is so much more than short term benefit. For example, these cable companies monopolies had low customer satisfaction, and I believe firmly it damages their reputation on the long term. But short term thinking doesn't care for that. So it becomes a kind of game like who's the best functioning psychopath. Good luck playing that game if you're not a psychopath (there's a reason these are highly represented in e.g. Wall Street). In my opinion the CEO of Qwest won. He stood for a principle, he decided with his heart. That's a winning move in a tough, heartless world. A noble sacrifice, like Obi Wan.

mcguire 5y ago

Life is a self-graded test.

giantg2 5y ago
Until you get married.