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utilitymonster comments on Scholarship: How to Do It Efficiently - Less Wrong
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How do you record your findings for future use, and how do you make sure you don't forget the important parts?
Summarizing the main ideas of the material you read in your own words, as Luke advises here and elsewhere, does appear to increase retention. After experimenting with several different note-taking software programs, I've reached the conclusion that WikidPad is the best option available. I also try to write one-sentence summaries of every article and book I read, for future reference. Here a citation-management application might help. Of the ones I tried, citeulike strikes me as the most useful.
Update: In case this is of use to anyone, I'm now using Springpad instead of WikidPad, and Diigo instead of citeulike.
My own brain understands what I've learned best when I write up something that looks similar to a post intended for Less Wrong. Other people's brains may work differently. At the very least, I write down sources where all the most important experiments and concepts are explained.
You mean, you can understand it when you try to explain it to someone else?
Certainly. That seems to be common. But also I understand new material better when I rewrite it in my own words even without the intent to share those words with others.
I don't know if this makes sense to anyone else, but one thing that I've started that seems to be useful to me is to write down a bunch of notes about the topic before, and while, researching. I think part of this is because I've become used to criticism, and I find I can criticize my own thoughts better after I have written them down, or while I'm writing them down. I just use a blank text editor (using org-mode) for this. It is also helpful dumping whatever preconceptions I might have about the subject matter, before I know what to search for. It also helps me clarify when and where the research is more, or less, superficial than my own understanding. Or maybe the research is only tangential to what I was actually looking for.
This is true for me also, and the primary reason I blog. If I weren't doing that, I'd be emailing a friend who'd be interested, or failing that, writing to my diary.
I haven't thought about this before, but it seems like in (pretending to) communicate your assessment of the evidence, that you risk amplifying consistency bias unless you cultivate "I update on new evidence and publicly admit (and diagnose post-mortem) when I was wrong" as a cherished part of your persona.