Comment by Pastafarianist on A Less Mysterious Mindfulness Exercise · 2015-02-15T10:11:55.839Z · LW · GW

I tried this. My main problems were: 1) straying away from the exercise, 2) visualizing the parade (for some reason, my reaction to "visualizing a parade of soldiers" produces tiny 8-bit crude square drawings of soldiers on a black background, not marching but walking towards me in South Park style, which does not exactly correspond to the whole idea of "meditation, acceptance and mindfulness") and 3) quickly forgetting which soldier carries what, so I rapidly fall in anxiety mode, add that anxiety to the list of soldiers, which, of course, doesn't solve the problem of forgetting; then I take a short-cut and literally fill the view with hundreds of soldiers, each of whom corresponds to "anxiety, forgetting who carries what".

On the other hand, the two ideas stated at the beginning of the article can probably be summarized in a single one: detach from yourself and observe whatever happens to you as if you were a visitor from the future who relives a recording of yourself.

Gotta work on this more, I guess.

Comment by Pastafarianist on Rational Reading: Thoughts On Prioritizing Books · 2014-09-10T17:23:11.473Z · LW · GW

My experience with audiobooks is completely different. I found myself unable to get into the flow of listening, constantly getting distracted and losing track of what's going on. Besides, given that I already put myself under much cognitive load (reading, MOOCs, university), I decided to dedicate the time when I cannot read to reassessing and recalling everything in diffuse mode of thinking. So far, seems like there is no better option.

Comment by Pastafarianist on Meetup : Helsinki Book Blanket Meetup · 2014-08-14T20:28:24.234Z · LW · GW

Hello.

I am a beginner rationalist (slowly making my way through How to Actually Change Your Mind), I haven't read any field-specific books yet, but I happen to be in Helsinki on Aug 16th. As far as I understand, the event is specifically about exchanging reading recommendations. Would visiting be premature? Will I find anything interesting for me there?

Also, judging by the description, the attached map seems to be slightly off. OSM gives a better location: http://www.openstreetmap.org/way/110713493

Comment by Pastafarianist on The Affect Heuristic · 2014-07-23T16:54:54.546Z · LW · GW

Doing badly on written word problems can be explained by failure to comprehend linguistic concepts. Doing badly on math problems can be explained by failure to comprehend mathematical concepts.

You see, this explanation makes perfect sense.