产品沉思录

Conor White-Sullivan on Twitter

  1. We form complicated beliefs about how the world works, through observations, abstractions (like defining words), model building, and inductive and deductive reasoning 我们通过观察、抽象(如定义词等)、建立模型、归纳推理和演绎推理等方式,形成了关于世界如何运作的复杂信念
  2. Our beliefs and observations come together in a non-linear way The observation you make today influences your belief about Premise A (I can trust person X to know about Y) That update cascades to flip decisions or reasoning chains you've formed long in the past (Z is true) 我们的信念和观察是以非线性的方式形成的 你今天的观察,影响了你对前提A的信念(我可以信任的人X知道Y的情况) 但是随着新的信息输入和连接,将会颠覆你在过去很久以来形成的决策或推理链(Z是真实的)。
  3. That's how things work in your brain -- There is a structure between the thoughts -- the structure resembles something like a graph of nodes and edges with probabilistic weights. 这就是你大脑中的工作原理 —— 思维之间有一个结构 —— 这个结构类似于一个由节点和边组成的图(Graph),还附带概率权重。
  4. We don't put numerical weights on things -- we use words like -- Maybe, Definitely, Probably -- and we feel in our gut something like our probability score for the belief 我们不对事物进行数字加权 -- -- 我们用 "可能"、"肯定"、"可能 "等词,在我们的直觉中,我们会感觉到类似于我们对这一信念的概率得分
  5. As William James says "Belief is the willingness to take irrevocable action" -- when you make a big decision -- marriage or divorce, moving to a city or country, taking or leaving a job -- you feel some resonance around how much you believe you are doing "the right thing" 正如威廉 · 詹姆斯所言,"信仰就是愿意采取不可改变的行动" —— 当你做一个重大的决定时 —— 结婚或离婚,搬到一个城市或国家,接受或离开一份工作 —— 你会感觉到你有多相信自己在做 "正确的事情",从而产生某种共鸣
  6. The thing is, if you want to take those thoughts out of your head, basic human I/O says you have to turn the graph into a stream. You can only speak or write one word at a time. 问题是,如果你想把这些想法从脑子里拿出来,基于人类现在的I/O接口,你必须把图(Graph)变成一个流(Flow)。因为你一次只能说或写一个字。
  7. For others (including your future self) to absorb, effectively criticize, and build upon your thoughts, they have to take that stream of words/ideas, and rebuild the original graph in their own heads. 要想让别人(包括你未来的自己)吸收、有效地批判并建立在你的思想基础上,他们必须把那一串话语/想法,在自己的脑海中重建原图。
  8. Good communicators make this process easier -- this is why speakers, teachers, and salespeople will often follow the formula of
  1. For really important ideas though, this is hard. Because some ideas or model aren't going to make sense when you've only heard one piece of them, or they look counterintuitive when you've just heard the scaffold 不过对于真正重要的想法,这是很难的。因为有些想法或模型在你只听了一个片段的时候是没有意义的,或者当你只听了一个脚手架的时候,这些想法或模型看起来很反直觉。
    1. An example -- A sociologist I trust was recently raving to me about Niklas Luhmann, who he claimed "has the best model of society that exists" but it doesn't make any sense until you've read about 600 pages of his writing. His ideas are like a foreign language. 一个例子 -- -- 我信任的一位社会学家最近对我大谈尼克拉斯·卢曼,他声称他 "拥有现存的最好的社会模式",但在你还未读过他大约600页的著作之前,这没有任何意义。他的观点就像一门外语(你完全不知道他在说什么)
    2. A foreign language you don't learn by mastering a single word (though you do need to learn one word at a time), but through immersion, seeing more and more words together in context, until things start to click. 一门外语不是通过掌握一个单词就能学会的(虽然你确实需要一次学会一个单词),而是通过沉浸式的学习,在上下文中看到越来越多的单词在一起,直到事情开始有了眉目。
  2. The problem with our note taking systems is this -- even if we have to eventually present our thoughts in a linear sequence -- writing isn't just a tool for communication. First and foremost, writing is a tool for thinking, it is a way of expressing our thoughts to ourselves 我们的笔记系统的问题是这样的 —— 即使我们最终要把我们的想法以线性的顺序呈现出来 —— 写作不仅仅是一种交流的工具。首先,写作是一种思考的工具,它是一种向自己表达思想的方式。
  3. The kind of thinking I'm talking about, the kind where you are carefully thinking about the structure of your beliefs, is incredibly exhausting, and rare. Kahnemann calls it "System 2" -- its also essential if you want to do things like launch rockets and cure disease. 我说的那种思维,就是你仔细思考你的信念结构的那种思维,是令人难以置信的疲惫,也是很难得的。卡尼曼称其为 "系统2" —— 如果你想做火箭发射和治疗疾病等事情,它也是必不可少的。
  4. System 2 thinking is exhausting because it requires holding so much in your head -- the relationships between complex beliefs, the models you've built from years of experience and observation, 2nd and 3rd order effects of actions you might take. 系统2思维是很累人的,因为它需要在你的脑海中保留很多东西 —— 复杂的信念之间的关系,你从多年的经验和观察中建立的模型,你可能需要二阶和三阶思维才能采取的行动。
  5. To do that kind of thinking, we can't be limited to the 7+-2 slots of working memory available to us, we need to get things "out of our head," To quote Neil Levy "Notes... do not make contemporary physics (etc) easier, they make it possible." 要做到这种思维方式,我们不能局限于工作记忆的7+2槽的工作记忆,我们需要把事情 "从脑海中 "剥离出来," 引用Neil Levy的话说:"笔记...........并不能让现代物理学(等)变得更容易,而是让它成为可能。"
  6. The problem with existing notes systems is that they're locked into metaphors from when everything was analog. Files go in folders, and can get tags. At best, they add in the capacity for links to other files-- since links are now something everyone will be familiar with. 现有的笔记系统的问题是,它们被锁定在一切都是模拟的时候的隐喻中。文件都在文件夹里,而且可以得到标签。充其量,它们增加了链接到其他文件的能力——因为链接现在每个人都会熟悉的东西。
  7. For one example —— you're trying to answer a hard question -- an open question like "Why did X happen?" or "What should I do to make Y more likely". One thing you may want to do is generate a large number of sub-questions to pursue —— folders right? tags? 举个例子 —— 你想回答一个难的问题 —— 一个开放性的问题,比如 "为什么X会发生?"或者 "我应该怎么做才能让Y更有可能"。你可能想做的一件事就是生成大量的子问题来追问——文件夹对吗? 标签?
  8. You may want to collect a bunch of resources (build on other people's thoughts) -- like journal articles, essays, you may read a bunch of books... But then, you will quickly find that each paper may be relevant to many of the questions you're considering. 你可能想收集一堆资源(建立在别人的思想基础上)----比如期刊文章、论文,你可能会看一堆书...... 但是这样一来,你会很快发现,每一篇论文可能都和你考虑的很多问题有关。
  9. Well now you're in a bind -- the nice thing about folders (or a Workflowy Tree) is that it let you take a high level question and focus on smaller pieces -- but now each of those articles you read has claims that it makes that fit in different places in your hierarchy 现在你陷入了困境 —— 文件夹(或Workflowy Tree)的好处是,它可以让你把一个高层次的问题放在较小的部分上,但现在你读到的每一篇文章都有它的主张,这些主张在你的层次结构中的不同位置上都有。