Mind ability = Improvable = 1. Knowledge level * 2. Thinking speed * 3. Synthesis ability
/By Duncan Anderson. To see all blogs click here.
Reading time: 6 mins
Summary:
Mind = Sum of upgrades done to it = Quantity * Quality of the upgrades done = Mind can be ‘trained’ / levelled up
Mind ability = 1. Knowledge level * 2. Thinking speed * 3. Synthesis ability
Jingle: You upgrade your phone, why not upgrade your mind too?
I used to think people were born smart or dumb… Now I think this is dumb, and that understanding you can level up your mind is smart!
L0: People are born smart or dumb, and that is your lot in life.
Paraphrasing Jo Boaler who is a Stanford Professor - 5-10% of people are born with a biological impediment that is hard to overcome such as hardcore dyslexia or ASD. For the other ~90%, the biological differences are effectively irrelevant vs the upgrades done to a mind.
Growth mindset = Your abilities are a product of the upgrades done to your mind by others and by yourself
Fixed mindset = You are born good / bad at something.
L1: You can add knowledge to your mind
You’ve likely read a book and learned something, or been in maths class and not been able to do algebra and then learned how to do algebra.
You can consume information and add knowledge to your mind through reading, podcasts, audiobooks, etc. Some people do a lot of this, others not much at all.
I’ve found one can consume and / or create new knowledge through these modalities: reading, thinking, talking, writing, building and user testing.
The more you know about something normally the more interesting it is. At 18 years old I knew very little about the world, so not much was interesting. Now I know much more about the world and it’s really quite interesting!
Knowledge level = 1. Number of ideas * 2. Interconnectedness of ideas.
Aside: this is often referred to as ‘background knowledge’ in academic research.
L2: L1 + You can increase the speed you think
You can train to lift heavier weights, you can train to run a marathon faster… and you can train to read faster AKA think faster.
No one is born able to talk let alone read. The average person reads at 200 words per minute with 60% comprehension. A top 1% reader does 1,000 words per minute at 85% comprehension. Yes, more words AND more comprehension. This is not skipping words. I’m confident 90% of people can get to 1,000 words a minute at 85% comprehension… if they put in the work to get there. 200 years ago ~10% of earth’s population could read, now ~90% can. 1% of readers can read at 1,000 words a minute today, I don’t see why you wouldn’t want to level up your brain to read / think faster. Get into the 1% ;)!
I constantly train my brain to comprehend information faster.
My fav methods of training are speeding up Youtube, Netflix, Podcasts, Audiobooks & having articles read to me. Details on how to do this here.
I started off at 1.25x speed and thought this was fast. Slowly I’ve increased the speeds, it’s so much fun!
Learning to read faster increases the speed at which you can think. This has many benefits:
I spend ~2 hours a day listening at 5x+ speed (at a frenetic pace). The rest of the day I spend speaking with people at 1x speed. Being able to think faster allows the rest of the day at 1x speed to be much calmer. Eg instead of having to spend all of my mental bandwidth to just keep up with what someone is saying at 1x speed, I can listen to what they are saying AND think about what they are saying. While they are speaking I can think:
‘Do I understand what they are saying?’
‘Should I ask a clarifying question?’
‘Ok, I think I understand what they are saying, how should I respond?’
Etc etc.
So listening to podcasts at a frenetic pace doesn’t make life more stressful, it makes life calmer!
Also, it allows you to think faster so when by yourself you can get more done = more improvement to the world, more value added, all else equal more pay.
L3: L2 + You can improve your synthesis ability
The best strategy I’m aware of to level up one’s ability to synthesise is to write about a problem.
The act of writing I find is problem solving.
I don’t know the solution and then write it out.
I have a problem I want to level up my solution to (ie do a unit of synthesis on), so I write and this is the act of synthesis.
Paul Graham put it this way: “A good writer doesn’t just think, and then write down what he thought, as a sort of transcript. A good writer will almost always discover new things in the process of writing.”
If you do problem solving writing all the time then I find you slowly get better at problem solving (synthesis). For me, this blog is an example of problem solving writing. I normally do problem solving writing 5-20 times a week. I believe I’m significantly better at this than I was 10 years ago.
Knowledge level = 1. Number of ideas * 2. Interconnectedness of ideas
I’ve talked about why in the past I think knowledge acquisition can be exponential - link.
As talked about in the blog link I think knowledge acquisition and knowledge interconnectedness are both exponential.
As a novice most things are boring. As a master almost everything is interesting!
One strategy for an interesting life: learn lots about lots!
Synthesis ability = 1. Speed * 2. Quality
Speed: I think speed ability isn’t exponential, but linear. Eg top 1% reader is 5x the speed of average. My goal in general is to level myself up at minimum to be top 1% at things, in some areas my goal is to be the best at what I do on earth.
Quality: I don’t think novices can problem solve at all, you give them something and nothing can happen… but I do think 90%+ of people can level up at problem solving. You have to start somewhere, and that is almost always a Level 0 (novice).
Getting better at quality is so important. Probably the most important thing. As above, my key strategy for this is to do ‘problem solving writing’ all the time!
If you only take away one thing: Your mind is your ultimate possession, your mind should be your ultimate creation.
You should go to the gym for your body, you should go to the gym for your mind.
I try to systematically add knowledge to my mind.
I try to systematically increase the speed my mind thinks.
I try to systematically improve my synthesis ability.
Done well, I find all of these things energising, not draining.
Upgrading your mind = Uplifting!
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Addendum - The dumbest words in the english language: smart and intelligent?
IMO ‘smart’ has deep fixed mindset connotations.
IMO someone is not smart or dumb.
Dumb = novice = someone is yet to cultivate themselves.
Smart = expert = has cultivated themselves to have high ability.
Jo Boaler (Stanford Education Professor): The biggest problem with maths education today is that people (teachers / students / parents) think that someone is either good or bad at maths. Ie maths in the west has a deep embedded fixed mindset culture.
We need the culture to shift from asking “How intelligent someone is?” to asking “ how much upgrading one has done to one's brain?”
IMO the traditional meaning of smart / intelligent implies that one cannot upgrade one’s brain.
I.e Intelligence = Ability they were born with
IMO we need to shift the meaning to Intelligence = Built not born.
In some respects ‘Intelligence = knowledge, skill and innovation ability you have cultivated’.
As per other blogs I’m trying not to use the words intelligent, smart, dumb, genius! This I like to think is ‘smart’.