194 - Abstraction and Utility - our inclination and ever increasing march towards mastering the art of abstraction comes from its utility in the world would be my guess. Over time we have seen an increase in IQ (Flynn Effect), with some thinking it in part has to do with our increasing amount of knowledge work that deals with manipulating abstract ideas.
I think we are inclined towards abstraction because it allows us to use new information in a wider context, therefore gaining utility. You can generalize from the specifics, then use that information as a rough estimation.
At the ground level of learning is the process of knowing (remembering), whereby you create the memory trace and pair it with a retrieval cue so that you can pull up the information when presented with the retrieval cue at a later date.
Understanding is when you connect the information (memory traces) with your wider body of knowledge, whereby it gains meaning from becoming useful. An example of knowing information without understanding would be memorizing the words of a foreign language without connecting it to the equivalent words in your native language. So if someone were to say the words to you, you’d be able to say them back, but would not be able to act on them because there is no understanding. When the words have no utility then they are meaningless. Further Reading.
The goal is to achieve a full understanding of a subject, such that you can make predictions around the subject and successfully apply the knowledge to situations in life (e.g. decision making & skills).
The purpose of knowledge in the world is for use, the utility of information is what makes it meaningful in my opinion. The mind isn’t built to randomly memorize information, instead its built for remembering information that gets a lot of utility and is meaningful. That is why it is important to acquire the memory traces on how to apply the information you learn.
Part of structure building process in learning involves analyzing a topic to understand how its organized and its various sub concepts. This is necessary step to create meaning out of information. Often times in school, this step is explicitly done for you on paper within textbooks. It is still a good skill to develop for when you leave school and have to learn on your own (I do a lot of that).
196 - Memory Trace is a connected set of neurons that get activated when you invoke a specific retrieval cue. They get strengthened on retrieval, hence why we do rote memorization, and get re-consolidated after we retrieve them.
n. the hypothetical memory trace that is stored in the brain. The nature of the engram, in terms of the exact physiological changes that occur to encode a memory, is as yet unknown. The term was introduced by German biologist Richard Semon (1859–1918) in the early 1900s and was popularized by Karl S. Lashley in his 1950 paper “In Search of the Engram.” Also called mneme; mnemonic trace; neurogram.
a neural circuit in which nerve impulses that were initially activated in response to stimuli are more or less continuously reactivated so that retrieval of information on demand is possible. A theory of reverberating circuits has been proposed to explain learning and memory processes. Although reverberating circuits have been demonstrated only in the autonomic nervous system, they are also believed to exist in the central nervous system. Also called reverberatory circuit.
a group of neurons that are repeatedly active at the same time and develop as a single functional unit, which may become active when any of its constituent neurons is stimulated. This enables, for example, a person to form a complete mental image of an object when only a portion is visible or to recall a memory from a partial cue. Cell assembly is influential in biological theories of learning and memory. [proposed in 1949 by Donald O. Hebb]
197 - Retrieval Cues are pieces of stimuli you encounter that trigger the retrieval of a memory. Many different stimuli can serve as retrieval cues. A very unique smell may take you back to a memorable episode where last encountered that smell. This can also happen if there was a very specific smell during a meaningful event in your life. Music can often do this, listening to certain songs that I haven’t heard in a very long time bring up emotions I had experienced during that period of my life.
The two most common retrieval cues that we use in everyday life are the spoken and written word. When people say someone elses name it will bring up a slew of associations if you know that person. When you read a term or concept on a page it can invoke associated concepts or the terms definition.
The word being defined serves as the retrieval cue for its actual definition. You don’t evoke a definition, instead the word that represents it
1. the activation of a memory, which involves the retrieval of a memory by a cue. A retrieval cue that matches information stored in memory results in access to that memory. Cues or conditions that were present when the memory was formed are stored with the memory; therefore, those same conditions need to be reinstated at retrieval to provoke ecphory.
2. the process in which a memory, emotion, or the like is revived in the mind by a stimulus. Also called ecphoria. [defined by German biologist Richard Semon (1859–1918)] —ecphoricadj.
the principle that retrieval of memory is optimal when the retrieval conditions (such as context or cues) duplicate the conditions that were present when the memory was formed. [proposed in 1983 by Endel Tulving]
198 - Should you include textbook structures in your notes when deconstructing them?
This is a question that I’m still trying to work out in my head. When picking apart a textbook and taking notes on it, what are the components you can take notes on?
Quotes
Excerpts
Your Own Reactions
Individual Concepts
Interconnected Concepts
Models (Set of Rules)
Summary of Book
Review of Book
Summary of each Chapter
Book’s Table of Contents
This means that your notes on a book could either be very short (say the note just includes bibliography information and links to a few quotes) or very long (include all of the above components).
I’m not entirely sure what is the right balance? If I frame it through the lens of utility, then I’d want to find what level of note taking do I get the most bang for my buck. The very long notes probably have the most utility but tend to be very time consuming to make. The short ones are quick, but you want to avoid having to reread the book down the line.
199 - Retrieval Practice is the act of repeatedly retrieving a memory from long-term storage in order to test yourself and increase the memories retrieval strength. This works by being presented with a retrieval cue (flash card) that has to pull up the right set of knowledge (memory traces) from memory.
200 - Data, Information, Knowledge are all along the same continuum in my mind.
Data - is a set of values of qualitative or quantitativevariables about one or more persons or objects, while a datum (singular of data) is a single value of a single variable.
Information is data that has been made meaningful through contextualization and understanding.
Knowledge is information that has become a memory or set of memories within an individual.
Further Reading & Integration
Respective Wikipedia Pages
Big Data: A Very Short Introduction
Information: A Very Short Introduction
Knowledge: A Very Short Introduction
The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood
Too Big to Know: Rethinking Knowledge…
Why Information Grows: The Evolution of Order, from Atoms to Economics
The Demon in the Machine: How Hidden Webs of Information Are Finally Solving the Mystery of Life
201 - ROI of Knowledge Work Tasks - you get different return on investments for the various tasks invovled in knowledge work. For example, while memorization is necessary, it has limited “ROI” because we tend to have easy access to information in 2020. Cognitive Skills, such as acquiring metacognitive knowledge will have a greater payback as it leads to your overall improvement and has a larger utility.
202 - Small World Network - is a type of mathematical graph in which most nodes are not neighbors of one another, but the neighbors of any given node are likely to be neighbors of each other and most nodes can be reached from every other node by a small number of hops or steps (Source: Wikipedia).
This is how the brain is connected, with good near and far connections, with every cell being more closely linked than a random or lattice network.
The point of reading a nonfiction book is to understand the knowledge of a topic the author is trying to communicate to you. Unfortunately in life, you do not come across all the relevant information on a topic at first glance. One important reason for this is because you just aren’t aware of all the best books on a subject matter, so you don’t read them all at once. Another significant reason is that all the important books on a subject matter don’t come out on the same day. You may read a great book about storytelling, then not read another book about storytelling until 3 years later. By then you’ll likely to have forgotten a lot of the important content in the first book. So you need some sort of long term memory of the ideas you come across in the book, especially when you can’t memorize everything you read.
The zettelkasten is a method/system devised to act as your long term memory. It means taking and structuring your notes in a particular way that you can iterate today on an idea you haven’t seen in 3 years. This allows you to build and connect ideas over a long period of time. As you take more notes and interconnect them, you continually build up a more complex picture of a subject matter and reality.
Building a complex picture of reality is important because it helps you see connections that others have missed. Not only can you bring value to the world by communicating these connections, but creating these connections is the very definition of understanding, which in turn helps you in making better decisions in the world.
While this may seem super obvious, most people go through life without deliberately connecting and intertwining what they read in an external system. People unintentionally connect what they read because of how the mind works, but only do so in an internal system. The problem with that is we can only deal with so much information in the mind and have a limited retrieval ability, leading to a lot of forgetting and wasted information processing. This is helpful because it allows us to forget what is unimportant and create easy to use/streamlined models, but in the process we lose the connections that allow for a deeper understanding.
Zettelkasten Requirements
At the heart of a zettelkasten is the idea that you can further develop knowledge by connecting ideas you come across (through reading, thinking, and discussion) to existing information (notes you’ve already taken). For a zettelkasten to work, you just need the ability to create new notes and add connections to existing ones. This means that you could technically create a zettelkasten within a single word document.
Development of knowledge, which the zettelkasten is all about, happens over both space and time. This means you need a system that keeps track of information spread out in between books (information spread over space) and time (books get released in different years).
Three Connections that aid in Development
Through linking you can develop your understanding of knowledge by providing more context, linking related concepts such that you get a better understanding of the overall picture when you come across a note.
The second type of development through connections is elaborating on ideas over time as you have new thoughts or come across new information. This typically takes the form of connecting notes in a sequence. With Luhmann this looks like “note 1, note 1a, note 1b, note 1c, note 1d, etc”. When there is a concept within one of those not directly related to the sequence (topic of note 1) that you want to elaborate on, then you create a new branch (e.g. note 1b, note 1b1, note 1b2, note 1b3, note 1b4, etc). So you can think of these branches as arbitrary and tangentially related.
The third type of connection you can create is to de-contextualize a piece of information from the original source, such that it leads to multiple context.This is an important ability in life because it allows a piece of information to gain more utility. This is in part what you are doing in the process of positive generalization, see Abstract Knowledge. Negative generalization is whereby the process leads to meaningless information because it is accompanied by a lack of understanding or application. For example, you exist in multiple contexts in your life. Luhmann describes this as multiple storage.
Perhaps the best method would be to take notes— not excerpts, but condensed reformulations of what has been read. The re-description of what has already been described leads almost automatically to a training of paying attention to “frames,” or schemata of observation, or even to noticing conditions which lead the text to offer some descriptions but not others.
Yes, I do realize the irony in this note. The other benefit of reformulations of what has been read is that it really forces you to understand what you are reading. In learning this promotes the process of elaboration.
Thoughts on existing ideas within a zettelkasten
Often, your thoughts on a topic won’t come to you when you first create a note on a concept. Over time, percolation will happen and you’ll come to an insight about an idea hours, days, or months after you’ve taken a note. For me, my thoughts on a topic usually come to me during my evening dog walk.
References within the normal flow of the note
7.2ldc living environment in mind also explains the lack of distinction between value and purpose. Both terms are constantly confusing, cf. eg in the definition above: “conditions and results”.
Incidentally, this “life-world” interpretation emphasizes Dewey’s only one possible aspect of his thoughts. It is thwarted by the instrumental and science-based definition of value as the result of intelligent action; see. 7.2m16 . It is difficult to combine both. So in the end it remains that the living environment only plays a role for the fact of enjoyment and that the value aspect only comes into play through science, and this explains Dewey, p. 265f. expressly with the fact that enjoyment as a mere natural is not really secured and therefore (!) not really valuable.
References here being the highlighted numbers, source.
References come at the end of the note
7.2l On the action- relatedness of the values
see. Parsons, p. 446: Critique of German Idealism. Values should not be thought of as ideas that apply in and for themselves (maW: like substances), but in their meaning for the structural structure of action, in their relativity to actions (maW: functional). 1
By contrast, the question of the systematic is part of certain values in an ideology together menhang, the question of the value hierarchy in its structure and its legitimacy, secondarily. But if, for example, Max Weber does research in this direction by name, it does not exclude those others, but assumes them. For example, Parsons, p. 652; see. also 17.17g4 / 5 ; 7.7e16b ; 7.2g4 ; 17.20 ; s. system. linkage 7,2b1.
206 - Luhmann on Arbitrary Branching in a Zettelkasten
Luhmann describes how his system of number sequencing allows for arbitrary branching
1. The possibility of arbitrary internal branching. We do not need to add notes at the end, but we can connect them anywhere—even to a particular word in the middle of a continuous text. A slip with number 57/12 can then be continued with 57/13, etc. At the same time it can be supplemented at a certain word or thought by 57/12a or 57/12b, etc. Internally, this slip can be complemented by 57/12a1, etc. On the page itself I use red letters or numbers in order to mark the place of connection. There can be several places of connection on a slip. In this way, a kind of internal growth ( Wachstum nach innen ) is made possible, depending on what kind of material for thought occurs. The disadvantage is that the originally continuous text is often broken up by hundreds of intermediate slips. But if we systematically number the papers, we can find the original textual whole easily.
Luhmann describes how a number sequence allows for linking between notes
2. Possibility of linking ( Verweisungsmöglichkeiten ). Since all papers have fixed numbers, you can add as many references to them as you may want. Central concepts can have many links which show on which other contexts we can find materials relevant for them. Through references, we can, without too work or paper, solve the problem of multiple storage. Given this technique, it is less important where we place a new note. If there are several possibilities, we can solve the problem as we wish and just record the connection by a link [or reference]. Often the context in which we are working suggests a multiplicity of links to other notes. This is especially the case when the card index is already voluminous. In such cases it is important to capture the connections radially, as it were, but at the same time also by right away recording back links in the slips that are being linked to. In this working procedure, the content that we take note of is usually also enriched
Having a number sequence allows for the creation of an index that facilitates note retrieval
3. Register. Considering the absence of a systematic order, we must regulate the process of rediscovery of notes, for we cannot rely on our memory of numbers. (The alternation of numbers and alphabetic characters in numbering the slips helps memory and is an optical aid when we search for them, but it is insufficient. Therefore we need a register of keywords that we constantly update. The [fixed] numbers of the particular slips is also indispensable for the register. Another complementary aid can be the bibliographical apparatus. Bibliographical notes which we extract from the literature, should be captured inside the card index. Books, articles, etc., which we have actually read, should be put on a separate slip with bibliographical information in a separate box. You will then not only be able to determine after some time what you actually read and what you only noted to prepare reading, but you can also add numbered links to the notes, which are based on this work or were suggested by it. This proves to be helpful because our own memory—others will have similar experiences to mine—works in part with key words and in part with author’s names.
What knowledge is worth developing? How much knowledge should you redevelop in the pursuit of knowledge development? What prior knowledge is worth making explicit in a zettelkasten? What existing developed knowledge is worth including in a zettelkasten?
Surprising & Utility Axis
A good way to think about this is through the suprisal & utility lens. The best information to develop, then turn into knowledge, is surprising and useful information. Surprising in this scenario would be presenting cutting edge research or new connections between topics that people haven’t considered. Useful means that it significantly improves their understanding of a topic such that they make better decisions. It could also be information that is actionable on using ones skills.
The second best type of information you can develop is unsurprising but useful information. This is the type of information the vast majority of people engage with. It is learning the concepts of a field and how they connect. The information is unsurprising because it is already well established. It may be surprising to you when you first start learning a subject. This type of information is useful because it helps you build a mental model (understanding) of a subject matter.
General & Specific Axis
Another way to think about information you are developing is how specific the knowledge is. Over time we have been further and further specializing with knowledge. Often this means the new knowledge loses applicability, except when it enables new highly useful technology. The ability to draw is broadly more useful than being able to draw in an ultra specific style.
210 - What is the goal with organization in notes?
I struggle with a bit around deciding what is the best way to organize my notes. What do I do for the bibliography? How much do I separate my content with folders? Should I completely forbid folders because they introduce a form of hierarchy?
The goal should be to organize them in such a way that allows for efficient retrieval of information and productive development. Efficient retrieval simply means you can find all the relevant information you have on a topic when you want to elaborate on it or use it. Productive development means organizing your notes in a way that leads to the further development of information, which goes one step beyond the typical storage/retrieval systems.
Efficient vs. inefficient Retrieval
When you go to retrieve information for writing, you want to .
Folgzettel translate to “follow-up slip” in english. It represents a note that is an elaboration on the note in front of it. If you had notes “1, 1a, 1b, 1c, 1d” then 1a, 1b, 1c, and 1d would be considered follow up slips. They can either be expanding on the note that comes before it (e.g. 1b expands on 1a) or it expands on the idea at the start of the sequence (e.g. 1d expands in a new way on the idea in 1 not 1c).
Luhmann allowed notes to branch off arbitrarily. So often times he would create a new sub sequence based off a keyword in a note. An example of this would be me branching off a new note from this sequence that talks about the concept of elaboration (e.g. creating a new note sequence starting with 1c, then 1c1, 1c2, 1c3, etc). It is arbitrary because it is not directly related to the original topic “folgzettel”. When you create an arbitrary branch, you also add a link to it in the index because you otherwise wouldn’t know where to look for it in the future.
Food Rules: An Easter’s Manual by Michael Pollan is a small 140 page book on how to eat healthy by a journalist who has been reporting on nutritional science. It is meant to be a “set of straightforward, memorable rules for eating wisely, one per page, accompanied by a concise explanation”.
Regardless of its validity (I know people love to argue about nutrition on the internet), it serves as a nice example of what an externalized model would look like. A model (set of rules) is meant to help guide you in decision making (what to eat) around a specific topic (food).
You could imagine a 20 note sequence, where the first note is an idea and the 19 subsequent notes are your running commentary on that idea over a 5 year period. Once that note sequence has reached long enough and you have a good feeling about it, you condense it down into one rule. This one rule than becomes part of a larger model.
Or you condense it down into one model, extracting the most important rules out of the 19 notes (say you are able to formulate 4 rules total).
The reason you want to make note sequences instead of creating just an ever growing wiki entry for each topic is because it lowers the barrier for entry of information and keeps you from wasting time on constant reformulation.
Imagine your notes looks like a wikipedia page for a topic such as knowledge. Every time you come across new information on the topic you have to figure out some way to integrate it into the existing page, which means you’d waste a lot of time on revising pages.
Instead, you can just connect the information to the end of the chain, while keeping it as its own note. This way you can be constantly be adding new information to your zettelkasten without worrying about how it exactly fits. It lowers the barrier to help encourage you to add new information, especially when you don’t know what information will be relevant when you go to decide to write on a topic.