Group Rationality Diary, October 1-15, plus frequency poll

therufs

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for October 1-15.

It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:

Established a useful new habit

Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief

Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations

Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior

Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something

Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life

Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you

Tried doing any of the above and failed

Or anything else interesting which you want to share, so that other people can think about it, and perhaps be inspired to take action themselves. Try to include enough details so that everyone can use each other's experiences to learn about what tends to work out, and what doesn't tend to work out.

New this month: If you have preferences about the future frequency of rationality diary posts, please express them in the poll below!

Thanks to cata for starting the Group Rationality Diary posts, and to commenters for participating.

Immediate past diary: September 16-30

Rationality diaries archive

This is the public group instrumental rationality diary for October 1-15.

It's a place to record and chat about it if you have done, or are actively doing, things like:

Established a useful new habit

Obtained new evidence that made you change your mind about some belief

Decided to behave in a different way in some set of situations

Optimized some part of a common routine or cached behavior

Consciously changed your emotions or affect with respect to something

Consciously pursued new valuable information about something that could make a big difference in your life

Learned something new about your beliefs, behavior, or life that surprised you

Tried doing any of the above and failed

Or anything else interesting which you want to share, so that other people can think about it, and perhaps be inspired to take action themselves. Try to include enough details so that everyone can use each other's experiences to learn about what tends to work out, and what doesn't tend to work out.

New this month: If you have preferences about the future frequency of rationality diary posts, please express them in the poll below!

Thanks to cata for starting the Group Rationality Diary posts, and to commenters for participating.

Immediate past diary: September 16-30

Rationality diaries archive

Similar experience here. When I was doing my grad research and hit a snag, my first reaction was to ask my supervisor if I was unable to make any progress for a few days. I did it a few times, and sometimes the feedback was unexpected and based on the experience, skills and knowledge I simply didn't have at the time. But quite often, to my embarrassment, the useful reply was well within my capabilities. That made me uncomfortable and the look I got from my supervisor didn't make me feel any better. So eventually I started imagining asking the question and getting a reply, as per my model of the interlocutor. That cut down on stupid questions significantly at the actual meetings, saved me time waiting for them, and (eventually) improved my supervisor's opinion of me.

I rarely face similarly challenging issues while writing software, so simply clearly writing down the issue I am facing tends to be enough to see possible solutions.