Tag: embedded video

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Learning in Progress

Learning is a long and complex process, and usually involves asking far more questions than getting answers. Sometimes, having notes can shortcut the most difficult parts of learning (like reading a thick and detailed book). Of course, shortcuts come with downsides, like inaccuracy.

I’ve been publishing some of my notes in their raw form instead of trying to make a “perfect product” out of them, but these are not easy to find due to how they’ve been published, and I am disorganized.

I’ve thought of this blog as a place for well-thought-out posts only, but that basically means I don’t publish anything, and the exceptions rarely meet my own required quality. I think I can solve a lot of my issues here by being willing to post thoughts that haven’t been fully designed, like this mess (but legible and formatted based on the source of each thought):

Illegible notes based on Equality by Darrin M. McMahon.

Each of these posts will be prefixed by a quote to indicate that their contents aren’t made of fleshed out thoughts:

This is a Learning in Progress post. Contents are brief thoughts based on few sources, and have not been checked for accuracy or usefulness.

(Previously, this post was titled “Reading, Absorbing Ideas, Distillation” because I was trying to be clever with an acronym for these posts. That was stupid and confusing, which invalidates the intent of this. That’s also why the URL for this post is stupid and doesn’t match the title anymore. Cool URLs don’t change.)

Notetaking in Public

I’m stealing Nicole van der Hoeven’s idea: Post your messy in-progress notes in public.

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“Doing Nothing” is a Vital Part of Work

Recently, I saw a video of a construction worker hanging from a crane in Toronto. They’re okay, suffering minor injuries to a hand (though, no one talks about mental health, and I can imagine this was a rather terrifying experience). Their hand became stuck in a cable, which is how they ended up in this position, but I have to ask how there wasn’t another person with a radio present to command the crane operator to put this pallet back down immediately after it became apparent there was a problem (or even earlier, before it became dangerous).

No one has an answer to that question at the time of writing, but it brings my attention to an important part of construction work.. doing nothing. There is a trope of seeing construction workers standing around, apparently doing nothing, and this is often used to justify calling them lazy, and construction overpriced.

The beginning of the following video covers what’s actually going on in these situations very well, but the tl;dw of it is: Things don’t always go according to plan, everyone needs breaks, and looking out for problems is very important. Why wasn’t someone standing around to notice a stuck hand before it became dangerous?

While keeping a watch for safety is a specific job that is only employed for certain activities at certain times, everyone who is standing around is another set of eyes that can notice a problem before it becomes dangerous (or even just.. a problem that will hinder the construction effort), or who can respond in the event of an emergency.

Breaks are important, and supervising takes less effort than physical labor. People standing around to take a break are also supervising the work. They may not have the documents or job title to say they should be watching, but everyone with experience watching activity onsite is helpful.

The above was written in July, shortly after the publication of the embedded video. I have much more to say about work, but it has been half a year without publication. I feel it is important to not leave this draft lying around.

Updated 2024-10-02 to link to how to take a break.

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Nihilism, The Ubermensch, & Garfield

If you want the short version, skip to watching this video, or: Nihilism is the belief that life is meaningless. But why settle for that? If life is meaningless, then the only true meaning is what you bring to life. Do what you can to the fullest you possibly can. Embrace all of life, its good and bad, because it is all you have. The Ubermensch is an idealized future super-human who does this. While impossible to achieve, it is possibly the only escape from nihilism.

Garfield is horrifying once you realize the majority of the comic is about Jon suffering eternally. But that horror comes from within – or from a cosmic demon cat. It can be taken to represent a mental trap where one sits lost in their own suffering. I am very prone to nihilist feelings, but that video feels inspirational to me. While it wallows in hopelessness and otherworldly horror, to me it speaks only of the demons in my mind that I’ve lived with for as long as I can remember.

Every bit of horror displayed there just looks like a Tuesday to me. It also reminds me of the first video I linked to. I discovered it a few years ago, and keep coming back to it because it feels so significant to my personal issues:

I’ve felt lost and hopeless for a long time because my depression feels everlasting, because it feels like the only time I’ve ever be free of it is when I am dead, and because that feeling leads to wanting that death to come as soon as possible. I also fear death immensely, because I don’t believe in any kind of afterlife – I don’t want to not exist.

This idea gives me some hope and solace that while I may never escape my personal demons, I may be able to enjoy my life regardless.

I started writing this because I want you to know how Garfield is horrifying, and I want to share videos that are personally significant. Somehow these goals aligned with thinking about depression and how to keep living when life has a lot of pain in it. But, really, just.. watch this:

Edit: Oh, and I get the impression that Garfield is actually supposed to be much darker, but Jim Davis keeps being prevented from publishing the darker stuff: