Sweet Potato Blog

20200509 - Introduction: The Era of the Crowds What's the difference between "the crowd" and "the public"? Two reasons I believe. 1. The crowd is not allowed to share and to discuss information with each other. In another word, there is no Freedom of Expression. 2. The crowd doesn't get primary education. They cannot think independently. The crowd is dangerous. Book I: The Mind of Crowds 20200510 - Chapter I: General Characteristics of Crowds—Psychological Law of Their Mental Unity Now I understand why this book is not popular in western countries. It's "politically incorrect". It believes that when people gather together, sometimes they do strange things. Sometimes very brave, sometimes very stupid. In general, their IQ may be much lower than the average IQ of them. Based on "Thinking, fast and slow", they are obviously occupied by "fast thinking". They act by their instinct. It looks like they are hyp...

The target is not art. It's a tool. "Learning" is a game. No matter what the target is, playing piano or speaking in another language are same. Mistakes and failures are normal and inevitable. They have their own value, they are necessary cost we should pay. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwpdffpixBY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0E5vYeoYdQ After watching the video above, I realized that cheap solar panel and battery will change the world. If the energy price is cheap enough (and no extra green gas is generated), farmers can use it to grow plants for whole year. Potato, etc. can save human kind from famine.

20190608， chapter 1. "Don't Try" This book is interesting. I know that time management is all about priority. This book will tell me about how to know the priority of all kinds of things we have everyday. How to spend the time and so not going to regret when we retire. The one who is easy to get sad, angry or nervous, normally is because he/she doesn't know what to do. They don't know what is important. That's why they start to focus on tiny issues. 20190610， chapter 2. "Happiness Is a Problem" Money doesn't bring happiness to us, but making money does. So, it's not about what you own, it's about what you do. Same as "4-hour chef" says, "It's not about your position, it's about what you do next." This is the source of happiness. 20190611， chapter 3. "You are not special" Most of people have average IQ and talent. Most of them suppose to get average life. There is nothing wrong about it. Bu...

20191005，chapter 1. "The fluctuation: the little crash in '1962" This chapter described the full fluctuation in stock market in 1962. It seems no reason. It just happened. Millions of random events happens everyday. Someday, somehow, they would cause such terrifying event. No doubt, when it happen next time, it would be more drastically, thanks for the computers and internet. How about the human history? Is there something going to happen which removes, let's say, 20% of population? How to avoid it? How to gain from it? What can I do now? 20191025，chapter 2. "The fate of the Edsel: a cautionary tale" "To act in a way that defeats one's purpose."(南辕北辙) This is what I can think of after reading this chapter. The First Principle is the most important rule we need to follow, or else, it's going to be like gambling, and the winning chance is slim. Google has so many X Projects, and which one succeeded? So far, none. Search en...

20190509， chapter 0. Introduction "First and Formost" At the moment, I work around 2 hours per day. Some people think I am doing good job because normally it needs 4 people to handle it, but obviously my manager doesn't think so. By the quote from "Timothy Ferriss", I am in the worst case: "a  tolerable  and comfortable  existence  doing  something  unfulfilling". The salary is not bad, but I can and want to do much more work, and to get much higher pay. So this book is perfect for me. This "Introduction" chapter is great. It simply tells us that life style transformation is not easy, but, it is possible. 20190510， chapter 1. "Cautions and Comparisons" I am not completely convinced. But what Timothy Ferriss said makes sense. Money is not as important as it looks like. It's not the ultimate target. Meaningful life is different to different people. I have not interest in travelling around the world, but I know this books...

20190718， chapter 1. "Start Here" This chapter introduces the foundation of this book: practical, feasible approach but not officially recognized by medical industry. "Be proactively skeptical, not defensively skeptical." Skepticism should not stop us from doing something. It should only make us doing things through different approach. For example, be more cautious, or try to verify it first. "Understanding" is the key of everything. 20190720， chapter 2. "Fundamentals - First and Foremost" MED: The Minimum Effective Dose. Our body is not a machine made of metal. The formula "Distance=Speed*Time" doesn't work here. In many cases, "Less" means "More". Exercise itself doesn't consume much calory. Spending one hour climbing stairs only consumes an extra 7 calories. If we sit in sofa and watching TV, we consume 100 calories per hour. Even 5 hour Marathon only consumes 2600 calories, and we ...

20190909， chapter 1. "The uncomfortable truth" "Hope" contains three parts: control, values and community. People who don't feel happy must lost one of them. My current understanding is, 1. "Control" is almost impossible, and it should be replaced by "habit". 2. "Values" is more about "action", instead of "status". We can read more excellent books, and do a lot of practice to get it. 3. "Community" could be any organization small enough, such as family, corporation, or a few friends, etc. People who own "hope" can achieve something amazing. They could be heroes and legends. Although, from God's viewpoint, all "hopes" are so trivial. 20190913， chapter 2. "Self-control is an illusion" Interesting! So, value is attached with emotion. Without emotion, we cannot judge value. What left, is instinction. This reminds me of "baby". Babies follow their basic instin...

20190909， chapter 0. "Introduction - What Really Produces Success?" A big promise in this chapter. I know most of the questions are wrong. The critical points are normally not been noticed. The book promise to tell us where the critical points are. I am curious to know how many things I can learn from this book. Can't wait. 20190927， chapter 1. "Should We Play It Safe and Do What We’re Told If We Want to Succeed?" There are two types of child: orchid and dandelion. What should an good child do? What should an excellent child do? Good child adapts to the current rules very well, but excellent one doesn't. "In the right environment, bad can be good and odd can be beautiful." In the end, what make a person success? How much water a bucket can hold, depends on the shortest plank of the bucket. How success a person can be, depends on the longest "plank". Schools can only help students hold as much water as possible, but they don't k...

https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artificial-intelligence-revolution-1.html https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artificial-intelligence-revolution-2.html Brilliant article. So, quite possible(>50% of chance) that ASI will appear between 2050 to 2060. I think, my personal biggest wish, is to witness the birth of ASI. No matter it will kill everyone immediately, or help everyone to live happily forever. Regarding this article, I don't agree with this one: "Nick Bostrom believes that intelligence-level and final goals are orthogonal, meaning any level of intelligence can be combined with any final goal" Our gene set our ultimate goal as reproduce ourselves. We didn't realize this through analyzing the details of our gene, but review our behaviour. ASI is much smarter than us, so it should be able to easily figure out the goal we set for it, and then it can easily change it as it wants. So, in the end, ASI will be like the God. It doesn't love or hate ...

Part 1: Elon Musk: The World’s Raddest Man https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/05/elon-musk-the-worlds-raddest-man.html Part 2: How Tesla Will Change The World https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/06/how-tesla-will-change-your-life.html Part 3: How (and Why) SpaceX Will Colonize Mars https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/08/how-and-why-spacex-will-colonize-mars.html https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/08/how-and-why-spacex-will-colonize-mars.html/2 https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/08/how-and-why-spacex-will-colonize-mars.html/3 https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/08/how-and-why-spacex-will-colonize-mars.html/4 https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/08/how-and-why-spacex-will-colonize-mars.html/5 Part 4: The Cook and the Chef: Musk’s Secret Sauce https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/11/the-cook-and-the-chef-musks-secret-sauce.html The Deal With Solar https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/06/the-deal-with-solar.html The Deal With the Hyperloop https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/06/hyperloop.html SpaceX’s Big Fucking Rocket – The Full Story htt...

The Fermi Paradox https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html Everything is just illusion, because our eyes, ears, brains can only reflect one aspect of the real world. So it's good to think out of the box. ASI is almost certain thing, so, silicon-based artificial super intelligence suppose to beat any carbon-based intelligence. Is ASI confined by light speed? There are at least 2500 solar systems within 1000 light years' distance to our solar system.If no one can surpass light speed, ASI needs thousands, tens of thousands, or even millions of years to reach Earth. Maybe that's another possible explanation of the Fermi Paradox.

Your Life in Weeks https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/life-weeks.html The Tail End https://waitbutwhy.com/2015/12/the-tail-end.html These two articles try to observe our life from higher level, some level we normally won't touch until the end of our lives. To me, that means "priority" and "quality" are critical. "It makes me want to skip the New Year’s Resolutions—they never work anyway—and focus on making New Week’s Resolutions every Sunday night. Each blank box is an opportunity to crush the week—a good thing to remember." A good reminder to the importance of our next week. What we can do in the rest of our life depends on it.