RobinZ comments on For progress to be by accumulation and not by random walk, read great books - Less Wrong

35 Post author: MichaelVassar 02 March 2010 08:11AM

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Comment author: RobinZ 02 March 2010 12:49:43PM 13 points [-]

More relevant: many textbooks are straightforwardly badly written, to the point that the thirty-year-old conference papers in the citations are actually more accurate. Another factor which the classics-are-screened-off-by-moderns argument may miss is the degree to which poor work reduces the value of a reference.

Comment author: MichaelBishop 05 March 2010 03:21:27PM 0 points [-]

Is it that hard to pick the good ones?

Comment author: RobinZ 05 March 2010 03:24:59PM 0 points [-]

I've never had to pick - I couldn't tell you. My professors have done a mostly good job so far.