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Something from Andrej Karpathy on learning that stuck with me [0]: > Learning is not supposed to be fun. It doesn't have to be actively not fun either, but the

Something from Andrej Karpathy on learning that stuck with me [0]: > Learning is not supposed to be fun. It doesn't have to be actively not fun either, but the primary feeling should be that of effort. It should look a lot less like that "10 minute full body" workout from your local digital media creator and a lot more like a serious session at the gym. You want the mental equivalent of sweating. It's not that the quickie doesn't do anything, it's just that it is wildly suboptimal if you actually care to learn. [0] https://x.com/karpathy/status/1756380066580455557?lang=en https://x.com/karpathy/status/1756380066580455557?lang=en

cynicalsecurity 2y ago
Judging from his name, he has been struck with post-soviet spirit of doom and gloom.
- throw_pm23 2y ago
  Doesn't make it less true though.
- sofixa 2y ago
  He was born in '86 in Slovakia, so he probably doesn't remember much of the late communist and early post-communist times.
- danielmarkbruce 2y ago
  He's also been struck with 10-100s of millions of dollars, an insanely successful career, and a good nature.
cloverich 2y ago
A counter point, or maybe complementary point (b/c I agree w/ the quote). I killed myself trying to do more than 8 pull ups in a gym for ages; at times I'd be going to the gym 4x a week doing full body workouts, always working hard, always sweating, always gassed at the end; consistently doing pull ups to exhaustion on multiple sets. Yet 8 was a kind of ceiling. At some point I stopped working out, but got a pull up bar at home. I stuck it in my office doorway. I would do occasional pull ups -- never more than 2-3, usually only 1. But just casually a few times a day, nearly every day, when I walked by it. It was never hard, it never felt like work. It became more of a way to briefly relax, an alternative to the cigarettes I used to smoke. Well after a year of that when someone challenged me to a friendly pull up competition, I was shocked that I could do 15 in a row easily, I still had more in the tank even. That always stuck with me because it taught me that while hard work is important, consistency is _more_ important. Working "hard" as such is often not only not required, but perhaps often not actually the thing that will help.
- cjbgkagh 2y ago
  That’s a reasonably well known strategy to pull-ups. Start at one regularly and slowly build up once it becomes easy enough to do so. I think learning is more like growing plants, you don’t need to get everything perfect, or even one thing perfect, but a set of things to good enough. There are a lot of things that interfere with learning so the presence of those will inhibit learning regardless of effort.
- systems 2y ago
  how much weight did you loose during that time? you either lost significant weight, or added significant muscle .. no other way .. the end result here is more significant than how you reached it for pull up, loosing weight is usually far more important than adding muscle, so i am leaning toward you lost weight
  - cloverich 2y ago
    Oh, I'm pretty lightweight / lanky (hover around 165lb, BMI around 20-21). I didn't see any significant weight change at the time, perhaps I transferred muscle if that's a thing since I was doing less general muscle building at that point - just pushups and the casual pull up routine, running (sprints) to blow off steam. I can see weight loss being a significant factor for heavier people, esp. those that are heavy and strong. I am definitely neither (typical things like bench press / squat etc I used pretty light weights).
  - marginalia_nu 2y ago
    Eh, you can also improve your lifts by just not being exhausted every time you go to the gym. With lifting, more is not always more. Fatigue and failure to properly recover is a fairly common reason for plateaus, especially with full body pulls.
- nickburns 2y ago
  For anyone not familiar with this methodology, it's called 'greasing the groove.' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmOEgK5o2yg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmOEgK5o2yg
zer0tonin 2y ago
This is complete bs. I've learned 2 languages to fluency by mostly watching movies. I've learned the linux cli by setting up a minecraft server for my friends in high school. I've learned programming by making IRC (and later Discord) bots for communities I was part of. All of this was fun, and it worked better than staring at a textbook and hoping that my "effort" pays off.
- bityard 2y ago
  I think there is some conflation in this thread between "learning" and "practice" which are fairly different things. As an ADHD person, nothing shovels the dopamine into my neural receptors quite like going from zero to "knows enough to be dangerous" in a new hobby or field of knowledge. That's the fun part. But climbing the experience curve much further than that requires some amount of _deliberate_ study and beyond that deliberate _practice_ and experience in order to become something like an expert. Chasing questions down rabbit-holes is fast and entertaining but only takes you so far. Deliberate practice (studying) is mostly less fun, even when that thing is your life-long passion and/or career. But necessary if you want to be highly skilled in that area.
  - epiccoleman 2y ago
    > nothing shovels the dopamine into my neural receptors quite like going from zero to "knows enough to be dangerous" in a new hobby or field of knowledge. Man, this describes me to a T. I love that feeling of the "first 75%" (or whatever percentage it is). Then I tend to lose interest in the long tail.
    - tartoran 2y ago
      >Then I tend to lose interest in the long tail. What was your initial goal? Or maybe you didn't have a conscious one to begin with and had an attraction or something like a curiosity for the subject. Once you covered enough ground you satisfied your curiosity and your interest faded. I think this is a very natural outcome and depending how you approach your learning subject you can achieve different outcomes. Try learning in a class setting where there is a set curriculum and where you could approach your learning in regular and consistent chunks. It may be boring at first but it could get much deeper into the topic.
stopyellingatme 2y ago
Great quote. I often feel like the best learning occurs when I’m a little angry at the problem.

cynicalsecurity 2y ago

Judging from his name, he has been struck with post-soviet spirit of doom and gloom.

throw_pm23 2y ago
Doesn't make it less true though.
sofixa 2y ago
He was born in '86 in Slovakia, so he probably doesn't remember much of the late communist and early post-communist times.
danielmarkbruce 2y ago
He's also been struck with 10-100s of millions of dollars, an insanely successful career, and a good nature.

cloverich 2y ago

A counter point, or maybe complementary point (b/c I agree w/ the quote). I killed myself trying to do more than 8 pull ups in a gym for ages; at times I'd be going to the gym 4x a week doing full body workouts, always working hard, always sweating, always gassed at the end; consistently doing pull ups to exhaustion on multiple sets. Yet 8 was a kind of ceiling. At some point I stopped working out, but got a pull up bar at home. I stuck it in my office doorway. I would do occasional pull ups -- never more than 2-3, usually only 1. But just casually a few times a day, nearly every day, when I walked by it. It was never hard, it never felt like work. It became more of a way to briefly relax, an alternative to the cigarettes I used to smoke. Well after a year of that when someone challenged me to a friendly pull up competition, I was shocked that I could do 15 in a row easily, I still had more in the tank even. That always stuck with me because it taught me that while hard work is important, consistency is _more_ important. Working "hard" as such is often not only not required, but perhaps often not actually the thing that will help.

cjbgkagh 2y ago
That’s a reasonably well known strategy to pull-ups. Start at one regularly and slowly build up once it becomes easy enough to do so. I think learning is more like growing plants, you don’t need to get everything perfect, or even one thing perfect, but a set of things to good enough. There are a lot of things that interfere with learning so the presence of those will inhibit learning regardless of effort.
systems 2y ago
how much weight did you loose during that time? you either lost significant weight, or added significant muscle .. no other way .. the end result here is more significant than how you reached it for pull up, loosing weight is usually far more important than adding muscle, so i am leaning toward you lost weight
- cloverich 2y ago
  Oh, I'm pretty lightweight / lanky (hover around 165lb, BMI around 20-21). I didn't see any significant weight change at the time, perhaps I transferred muscle if that's a thing since I was doing less general muscle building at that point - just pushups and the casual pull up routine, running (sprints) to blow off steam. I can see weight loss being a significant factor for heavier people, esp. those that are heavy and strong. I am definitely neither (typical things like bench press / squat etc I used pretty light weights).
- marginalia_nu 2y ago
  Eh, you can also improve your lifts by just not being exhausted every time you go to the gym. With lifting, more is not always more. Fatigue and failure to properly recover is a fairly common reason for plateaus, especially with full body pulls.
nickburns 2y ago
For anyone not familiar with this methodology, it's called 'greasing the groove.' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmOEgK5o2yg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmOEgK5o2yg

zer0tonin 2y ago

This is complete bs. I've learned 2 languages to fluency by mostly watching movies. I've learned the linux cli by setting up a minecraft server for my friends in high school. I've learned programming by making IRC (and later Discord) bots for communities I was part of. All of this was fun, and it worked better than staring at a textbook and hoping that my "effort" pays off.

bityard 2y ago
I think there is some conflation in this thread between "learning" and "practice" which are fairly different things. As an ADHD person, nothing shovels the dopamine into my neural receptors quite like going from zero to "knows enough to be dangerous" in a new hobby or field of knowledge. That's the fun part. But climbing the experience curve much further than that requires some amount of _deliberate_ study and beyond that deliberate _practice_ and experience in order to become something like an expert. Chasing questions down rabbit-holes is fast and entertaining but only takes you so far. Deliberate practice (studying) is mostly less fun, even when that thing is your life-long passion and/or career. But necessary if you want to be highly skilled in that area.
- epiccoleman 2y ago
  > nothing shovels the dopamine into my neural receptors quite like going from zero to "knows enough to be dangerous" in a new hobby or field of knowledge. Man, this describes me to a T. I love that feeling of the "first 75%" (or whatever percentage it is). Then I tend to lose interest in the long tail.
  - tartoran 2y ago
    >Then I tend to lose interest in the long tail. What was your initial goal? Or maybe you didn't have a conscious one to begin with and had an attraction or something like a curiosity for the subject. Once you covered enough ground you satisfied your curiosity and your interest faded. I think this is a very natural outcome and depending how you approach your learning subject you can achieve different outcomes. Try learning in a class setting where there is a set curriculum and where you could approach your learning in regular and consistent chunks. It may be boring at first but it could get much deeper into the topic.

stopyellingatme 2y ago

Great quote. I often feel like the best learning occurs when I’m a little angry at the problem.