Some software developers are eager to get home from work and pick up a programming side project: exploring new technology, learning skills, or just messing around and making things. I was never one of these developers. I have a few half-hearted attempts: an out-of-date personal website with a gray and blue color scheme and a … Continue reading The Gas and Brakes Model of Behavior
Month: January 2021
The Acceleration of Experience
Paul Graham wrote about the acceleration of addictiveness as a product of technological progress: our ability to create more concentrated versions of substances means we will create more potentially addictive substances, and this poses some risks to society unless we get better at dealing with them. I’ve been reading Peak, a book about expertise by … Continue reading The Acceleration of Experience
Setting Targets to Maintain Motivation
For years, I’ve struggled to maintain motivation and reach definitive endpoints for my projects and pastimes. One of the most demoralizing factors was that I could never tell whether or not an hour or two of work was getting me any closer to where I wanted to be. I couldn’t tell if I was making … Continue reading Setting Targets to Maintain Motivation
The Secret Ingredient to To-Do Lists is Priority
When I imagine a to-do list, what comes to mind is a list of everything I want to do. These to-do lists suck. Within a week or two, they become intimidatingly long and a chore to even look at. So, I stop looking at them. This is a real problem: my memory is not good … Continue reading The Secret Ingredient to To-Do Lists is Priority
Top 5 Books of 2020
1. Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener: When a book shakes your identity to its foundation, it deserves the best book of the year slot. Uncanny Valley is a memoir of Anna Wiener’s plunge from the NYC literary world into the Silicon Valley tech world. She manages to reveal the deep flaws of tech culture without … Continue reading Top 5 Books of 2020
The Pragmatic Philosopher 