From de2a5a65e286397e5bb8cf73498385d389a5cd8c Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Charles Sutton Date: Sun, 21 May 2017 18:27:52 +0100 Subject: [PATCH] early version --- ...8-04-converting-fahrenheit-into-celsius.md | 39 ++++++++++++++++++ .../2012-08-11-reflecting-on-new-computer.md | 25 +++++++++++ _posts/2012-08-12-software-i-like.md | 12 ++++++ .../2012-08-16-principles-of-research-code.md | 37 +++++++++++++++++ _posts/2012-08-18-lies-and-taxes.md | 16 +++++++ _posts/2012-08-24-spot-scot.md | 15 +++++++ _posts/2012-10-02-note-to-self.md | 11 +++++ .../2012-10-03-a-very-british-thanksgiving.md | 33 +++++++++++++++ _posts/2012-11-11-happy-pi-day-belated.md | 19 +++++++++ ...-08-about-to-graduate-with-your-phd-one.md | 18 ++++++++ _posts/2013-01-12-interaction-in-lectures.md | 18 ++++++++ _posts/2013-01-20-how-i-make-coffee.md | 30 ++++++++++++++ ...-25-the-first-rule-of-academic-politics.md | 16 +++++++ ...-09-my-new-favourite-pages-on-wikipedia.md | 19 +++++++++ _posts/2013-02-23-coffee-versus-beer.md | 13 ++++++ ...2013-03-21-the-cure-for-boring-meetings.md | 19 +++++++++ _posts/2013-04-27-jokes-in-lectures.md | 22 ++++++++++ _posts/2013-05-05-future-work.md | 22 ++++++++++ ...5-and-can-you-teach-me-how-to-talk-real.md | 26 ++++++++++++ ...3-proposal-writing-and-fuck-yeah-factor.md | 16 +++++++ _posts/2013-08-14-kitten.md | 14 +++++++ .../2013-08-17-academic-ranks-in-us-and-uk.md | 22 ++++++++++ ...09-28-ubiquitous-capture-and-ideas-file.md | 24 +++++++++++ ...-20-principal-component-model-of-coffee.md | 34 +++++++++++++++ ...2014-08-16-a-threat-to-british-monarchy.md | 33 +++++++++++++++ _posts/2014-11-01-business-cards-and-me.md | 19 +++++++++ ...05-mnemonic-poetry-and-guy-fawkes-night.md | 38 +++++++++++++++++ ...-12-06-taste-in-research-and-paradox-of.md | 22 ++++++++++ ...03-early-to-rise-early-to-read-research.md | 28 +++++++++++++ _posts/2015-04-11-viva-la-voce.md | 26 ++++++++++++ ...-05-28-my-top-conference-attendance-tip.md | 18 ++++++++ ...7-why-you-should-scrunch-your-face-when.md | 15 +++++++ ...21-gtd-made-simple-why-i-think-internet.md | 39 ++++++++++++++++++ .../2016-12-28-a-suggestion-for-scotland.md | 27 ++++++++++++ ...n-creating-companion-web-site-for-talks.md | 23 +++++++++++ images/xor.png | Bin 0 -> 6260 bytes 36 files changed, 808 insertions(+) create mode 100644 _posts/2012-08-04-converting-fahrenheit-into-celsius.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-08-11-reflecting-on-new-computer.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-08-12-software-i-like.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-08-16-principles-of-research-code.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-08-18-lies-and-taxes.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-08-24-spot-scot.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-10-02-note-to-self.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-10-03-a-very-british-thanksgiving.md create mode 100644 _posts/2012-11-11-happy-pi-day-belated.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-01-08-about-to-graduate-with-your-phd-one.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-01-12-interaction-in-lectures.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-01-20-how-i-make-coffee.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-01-25-the-first-rule-of-academic-politics.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-02-09-my-new-favourite-pages-on-wikipedia.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-02-23-coffee-versus-beer.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-03-21-the-cure-for-boring-meetings.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-04-27-jokes-in-lectures.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-05-05-future-work.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-06-25-and-can-you-teach-me-how-to-talk-real.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-07-23-proposal-writing-and-fuck-yeah-factor.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-08-14-kitten.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-08-17-academic-ranks-in-us-and-uk.md create mode 100644 _posts/2013-09-28-ubiquitous-capture-and-ideas-file.md create mode 100644 _posts/2014-07-20-principal-component-model-of-coffee.md create mode 100644 _posts/2014-08-16-a-threat-to-british-monarchy.md create mode 100644 _posts/2014-11-01-business-cards-and-me.md create mode 100644 _posts/2014-11-05-mnemonic-poetry-and-guy-fawkes-night.md create mode 100644 _posts/2014-12-06-taste-in-research-and-paradox-of.md create mode 100644 _posts/2015-01-03-early-to-rise-early-to-read-research.md create mode 100644 _posts/2015-04-11-viva-la-voce.md create mode 100644 _posts/2015-05-28-my-top-conference-attendance-tip.md create mode 100644 _posts/2015-09-27-why-you-should-scrunch-your-face-when.md create mode 100644 _posts/2015-11-21-gtd-made-simple-why-i-think-internet.md create mode 100644 _posts/2016-12-28-a-suggestion-for-scotland.md create mode 100644 _posts/2016-12-29-on-creating-companion-web-site-for-talks.md create mode 100644 images/xor.png diff --git a/_posts/2012-08-04-converting-fahrenheit-into-celsius.md b/_posts/2012-08-04-converting-fahrenheit-into-celsius.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..104b29e1f69fb --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-08-04-converting-fahrenheit-into-celsius.md @@ -0,0 +1,39 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Converting Fahrenheit into Celsius... The Smart Way +date: '2012-08-03T16:03:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- expat +modified_time: '2012-08-12T12:52:55.477-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-4184764928363237521 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/08/converting-fahrenheit-into-celsius.html +--- +*or, from small beginnings...* + +One of the minor challenges of moving from the US to the UK is temperature. People in the UK always discuss the weather, and when they do, they use Celsius. My brain still works in Fahrenheit, so I need to convert typical daily outdoor temperatures in my head, and quickly enough that I can carry on a conversation. + +You probably learned a formula in school for doing this. Completely useless. Forget all about it—but you already have, haven't you? You might remember, if you're clever, that the formula involves 9, 5, and 32 in some combination. But is it 9/5 or 5/9? Do you add 32, or do you subtract it? And do you do that before or after you multiply? And now people are wondering why you've been staring at them for two minutes when all they asked is how hot it was when you were in Seattle last week. + +The problem is that the equation to convert C to F is too similar to the equation for the reverse, and both equations are too difficult to compute mentally. What we need is a simpler equation, that is easy to remember, and easy to work out quickly in your head. + +So here's the trick. You memorise the following correspondences: + +| | | | +|-------|-----|-------| +| 0 °C | = | 32 °F | +| 10 °C | = | 50 °F | +| 20 °C | = | 68 °F | +| 30 °C | = | 86 °F | + +Then, to convert any temperature that is near these, approximate 1 °C = 2 °F. This will allow you to convert almost any naturally occurring outdoor temperature in the UK in either direction to within 1° accuracy. + +Let's try it. As I write the current temperature in Edinburgh is 14 °C. This is 10 °C plus 4° extra. From memory convert the 10 °C to 50 °F. Then convert 4 °C extra to 8 °F extra and add it back on. This gives you 14°C = 58°F. This is not exact, but close enough that you know to wear a jumper. The exact formula is + + 14 * 9 / 5 + 32 = 57 F + +Good luck doing that in your head. + +It tickles me that (maths alert) this is a piecewise linear approximation to a linear function. Mathematically, you would have to believe that a piecewise linear function would be more complicated, but mentally, it's not. Maybe there's a deep psychological principle here that scientists will figure out someday. + +Until then, quite chilly today, isn't it? diff --git a/_posts/2012-08-11-reflecting-on-new-computer.md b/_posts/2012-08-11-reflecting-on-new-computer.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..b06ab5bfca8d9 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-08-11-reflecting-on-new-computer.md @@ -0,0 +1,25 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Reflecting on a New Computer +date: '2012-08-11T04:07:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- electronic minutae +- geekery +modified_time: '2012-08-11T04:07:02.708-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-3335831454029917058 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/08/reflecting-on-new-computer.html +--- +Presently I am still enjoying the honeymoon phase of my new laptop. To avoid the slightest appearance of ostentation, I will refrain from going into details of exactly what laptop I got, except to say that it is of course a Mac, and it's REALLY REALLY cool! + +Apple provides a Migration Assistant that apparently will copy all of your files and settings from your old computer, so that your new Mac looks exactly like your old one. My feeling about this is: Why would anyone want that? For me, one of the pleasures of a new computer is that it's \*clean\*, unburdened with hundreds of files scattered around my home directory that I never use but are too important (or too numerous) to simply delete. + +So for years, whenever I get a new computer, I never copy my files over en masse. Instead, I copy over a small set of files that I know I need, and leave the rest on a backup. Then the next day, I find that I need a file on the backup that I didn't realize, go back and copy this over, etc. + +This process stabilizes after a week or so, and my electronic life feels much less cluttered. + +I suppose that I could just blow away my home directory every year for the same feeling, but somehow it is hard to convince myself to do this. + +I wish that I could use the same process for physical papers, but sadly paper information cannot be stored as compactly as its electronic equivalent. + +Super-Mac-Geek-Alert: For several years, I have been using [Keychain to store secure notes](http://www.macworld.com/article/1040403/workingmac.html) such as password hints for bank logins, etc. I thought I was very clever to avoid impressive but costly tools like [1Password](http://agilebits.com/onepassword). Then I tried to copy the Keychain to my new computer. Painful. I think from now on I'll keep these notes on a [small encrypted disk image](http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1578?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US). diff --git a/_posts/2012-08-12-software-i-like.md b/_posts/2012-08-12-software-i-like.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..3d9478e43698b --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-08-12-software-i-like.md @@ -0,0 +1,12 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Software I Like +date: '2012-08-12T05:54:00.003-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- software +modified_time: '2012-08-12T12:45:22.093-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-2977284254916724003 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/08/software-i-like.html +--- +I've just made an update to my list of [software I like](http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/csutton/software.html) motivated by my experiences setting up a new computer. diff --git a/_posts/2012-08-16-principles-of-research-code.md b/_posts/2012-08-16-principles-of-research-code.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..685c3806a2d87 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-08-16-principles-of-research-code.md @@ -0,0 +1,37 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Principles of Research Code +date: '2012-08-16T05:23:00.001-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- advice +modified_time: '2017-05-01T08:57:51.489-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-2459945294961582099 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/08/principles-of-research-code.html +--- +Ali Eslami has just writen a [terrific page](http://arkitus.com/PRML/) on organizing your experimental code and output. I pretty much agree with everything he says. I've thought quite a bit about this and would like to add some background. +Programming for research is very different than programming for industry. There are several reasons for this, which I will call Principles of Research Code. These principles underly all of the advice in Ali's post and in this post. These principles are: + +1. **As a researcher, your product is not code. Your product is knowledge.** Most of your research code you will completely forget once your paper is done. +2. **Unless you hit it big.** If your paper takes off, and lots of people read it, then people will start asking you for a copy of your code. You should give it to them, and best to be prepared for this in advance. +3. **You need to be able to trust your results.** You want to do enough testing that you do not, e.g., find a bug in your baselines after you publish. A small amount of paranoia comes in handy. +4. **You need a custom set of tools.** Do not be afraid to write infrastructure and scripts to help you run new experiments quickly. But don't go overboard with this. +5. **Reproducability.** Ideally, your system should be set up so that five years from now, when someone asks you about Figure 3, you can immediately find the command line, experimental parameters, and code that you used to generate it. + +Principle 1 implies that the primary thing that you need to optimise for in research code is your own time. You want to generate as much knowledge as possible as quickly as possible. Sometimes being able to write fast code gives you a competitive advantage in research, because you can run on larger problems. But don't spend time optimising unless you're in a situation like this. +Also, I have some more practical suggestions to augment what Ali has said. These are + +1. *Version control:* Ali doesn't mention this, probably because it is second nature to him, but you need to keep all of your experimental code under version control. To not do this is courting disaster. Good version control systems include SVN, git, or Mercurial, etc. I now use Mercurial, but it doesn't really matter what you use. Always commit all of your code before you run an experiment. This way you can reproduce your experimental results by checking out the version of your code form the time that you ran an experiment. +2. *Random seeds:* Definitely take Ali's advice to take the random seed as a parameter to your methods. Usually what I do is pick a large number of random seeds, save them to disk, and use them over and over again. Otherwise debugging is a nightmare. +3. *Parallel option sweeps:* It takes some effort to get set up on a cluster like ECDF, but if you invest this, you get some nice benefits like the ability to run a parameter sweep in parallel. +4. *Directory trees:* It is good to have your working directory in a different part of the directory space from your code, because then you don't get annoying messages from your version control system asking you why you haven't committed your experimental results. So I end up with a directory structure like + + ~/hg/projects/loopy_crf/code/synth_experiment.py + ~/results/loopy_crf/synth_experiment/dimensions_20_iterations_300 + + Notice how I match the directory names to help me remember what script generated the results. + +5. *Figures list.* The day after I submit a paper, I add enough information to my notebook to meet Principle 5. That is, for every figure in the paper, I make a note of which output directory and which data file contains the results that made that figure. Then for those output directories, I make sure to have a note of which script and options generated those results. +6. *Data preprocessing.* Lots of times we have some complicated steps to do data cleaning, feature extraction, etc. It's good to save these intermediate results to disk. It's also good to use a text format rather than binary, so that you can do a quick visual check for problems. One tip that I use to make sure I keep track of what data cleaning I do is to use Makefiles to run the data cleaning step. I have a different Makefile target for each intermediate result, which gives me instant documentation. + +If you want to read even more about this, I gave a guest lecture last year on a similar topic ([slides](http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/csutton/talks/principles-rse/), [podcast](http://podcast.is.ed.ac.uk:8080/Podcasts/inf_lectures/2011-09-29/Informatics_Research_Methodology__Charles_Sutton__27th_Septermber_2011-video.mp4)). diff --git a/_posts/2012-08-18-lies-and-taxes.md b/_posts/2012-08-18-lies-and-taxes.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..ba3d9602e84a4 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-08-18-lies-and-taxes.md @@ -0,0 +1,16 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Lies and Taxes +date: '2012-08-18T07:02:00.001-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- politics +modified_time: '2012-08-18T07:02:18.585-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-1263532390565512681 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/08/lies-and-taxes.html +--- +No matter one's political persuasion, it is hard not to think, as [Willard Foxton argues in an interesting essay](http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/voices/2012/06/tax-avoidance-isnt-left-or-right-issue-its-cancer-eating-our-democracy) that the income tax code in the UK (and in the US too, for that matter) is too complex. In a more cynical mood I would be tempted to say that the tax law is so complex, because complex tax laws benefit the rich, and the rich make the laws. + +In the UK there have been several scandals on tax avoidance, perhaps most notably, one of the two biggest Scottish football teams [blowing up due to an offshore tax evasion scheme](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Administration_and_liquidation_of_Rangers_F.C._plc). At first I was unable to understand in the news reports why other football teams, and their fans, seemed so rabidly angry at the Rangers. But of course: football does not have a salary cap, so if a team unfairly spend less money on tax, it can spend more money on players. By cheating at their taxes, the Rangers were also cheating *at football*. + +Taxes are political footballs as well, especially in the US. In the US there is an additional crazy phenomenon that creating a new program makes you an irresponsible tax and spend liberal that is taking money out of the pockets of working families, while cutting taxes makes you a deficit hawk. (I mean, uh, not to get too overtly political or anything?) Therefore if you are an American politician---of either party---and you want to create a new program for a noble goal, e.g., to pay for college scholarships for middle class families, why not make it a tax credit? That way, you get the noble program, and you can say that you're cutting taxes too! diff --git a/_posts/2012-08-24-spot-scot.md b/_posts/2012-08-24-spot-scot.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..9d3781c060e18 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-08-24-spot-scot.md @@ -0,0 +1,15 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Spot the Scot +date: '2012-08-24T08:47:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +modified_time: '2012-08-24T08:48:38.196-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-5522267775899592911 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/08/spot-scot.html +--- +This is the final weekend of the [Edinburgh Fringe Festival](en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edinburgh_Festival_Fringe), an enormous and insane annual event which draws around half a million people to a city of around half a million people. Walking round the city this week, I thought of a game to pass the time when stuck in a Festival crowd. + +The game is called "Spot the Scot". To play, start by walking down the streets of Edinburgh. Then, pick a group of people coming toward you on the street, not too distant, but far enough that you can't hear them. Give them a good look over, and guess whether they are actually Scottish or not. As they pass you, eavesdrop to find out if you were right. + +I have found this game thoroughly enjoyable, and I highly recommend it. Feel free to post strategies or high scores in the comments. diff --git a/_posts/2012-10-02-note-to-self.md b/_posts/2012-10-02-note-to-self.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..d6a2c36e79ccd --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-10-02-note-to-self.md @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Note to Self +date: '2012-10-02T09:22:00.002-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +modified_time: '2012-10-02T09:22:47.822-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-9112931227763268308 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/10/note-to-self.html +--- +Probably best not to attempt using the phrase "posterior analysis" as a term of art. Fortunately I caught this before attempting to send it to anyone else... diff --git a/_posts/2012-10-03-a-very-british-thanksgiving.md b/_posts/2012-10-03-a-very-british-thanksgiving.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..2b465ce0f1195 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-10-03-a-very-british-thanksgiving.md @@ -0,0 +1,33 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: A Very British Thanksgiving +date: '2012-10-03T14:44:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- britain +- modest proposals +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:55:02.480-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-3558573721290937738 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/10/a-very-british-thanksgiving.html +--- +*A humble note to the great British nation:* + +It has become cliche to say that the UK and the US enjoy a special relationship. Despite the obvious differences in language, size of automobiles, average waist circumference, availability of socialized medicine, and so on, it is undeniable that the two cultures are more similar than they are different. But these two sister countries are still divided by a cultural chasm, one that prevents us from truly having common ground, a chasm deeper than politics, football, or religion. This chasm is nothing less than the holiday of Thanksgiving. + +Although you will no doubt be familiar with the holiday from your exposure to American books, films, and television, it is impossible to truly understand the spirit of Thanksgiving without having experienced it. The time has come for a new social movement to celebrate the goals of peace, cultural understanding, and consuming a seven kilogram turkey in one sitting. The time has come for the British people to finally adopt Thanksgiving as a national holiday. + +Thanksgiving is an exceedingly simple holiday, celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November. Here's what you do: On Thursday, you prepare a large roast and serve it to your family. On Friday, you skive off work. That's it. First you eat a big roast, then you skive off work. I ask you, can you imagine a holiday more intrinsically suited to British culture? Frankly, I'm disappointed that you people didn't think of it first. + +Now, as you become more experienced at celebrating Thanksgiving, there are many ways in which you can make the celebration more elaborate, if you prefer a more authentically American experience. For example, for Thanksgiving dinner, it is common to invite members of one's extended family, some of whom travel long distances to attend. This tradition will no doubt yield the same hilarious results in the UK as it does in the US. + +Or you might like to try your hand at the American custom of "Black Friday". On the Friday after Thanksgiving---the skive day, remember---some people like to spend the day shopping, for their Christmas presents, ostensibly. The shops accommodate this by opening their doors early in the morning and advertising a range of one-day-only special offers, for which people---yes! Americans!---queue as early as 4 or 5 o'clock in the morning. Now, as much as you may welcome the opportunity of queueing, I do not recommend that you attempt to follow this tradition *literally* in the UK, as at 5am Friday on a British high street, you are likely to find yourself lonely. And, most probably, wet. Instead, I recommend that you wake up at a more reasonable hour, like noon, and do your shopping then. + +Whichever of these more advanced Thanksgiving traditions you choose to adopt, it is important to emphasize that whilst all of these traditions can make be a fun way to add spice to the holiday, none of them are essential to the true spirit of Thanksgiving. Anyone to whom these enhanced traditions appear onerous should simply content themselves with the roast, the long lie in, and the knowledge that they are doing their part to increase cultural understanding across the Atlantic. + +This year, why not start the festive season off right, with a very British Thanksgiving. Remember: Thursday, you make a roast. Friday, you skive. That's all there is to it. + +In fact, why don't you try it out **this** Thursday? You know, for practice. + +### Notes + +1 Thanksgiving would more properly be termed a North American holiday, as it is celebrated in Canada as well. However, I understand from my reading of Wikipedia that in Canada Thanksgiving is celebrated on a Monday rather than a Thursday. This makes no sense at all. For this reason I have made the decision to ignore the existence of Canadian Thanksgiving for the purposes of this essay. diff --git a/_posts/2012-11-11-happy-pi-day-belated.md b/_posts/2012-11-11-happy-pi-day-belated.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..95e1d65030888 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2012-11-11-happy-pi-day-belated.md @@ -0,0 +1,19 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Happy Pi Day! (belated) +date: '2012-11-10T16:06:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +modified_time: '2012-11-10T16:06:43.795-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-291864211440351721 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2012/11/happy-pi-day-belated.html +--- +[Pi Day](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pi_Day) is an international holiday celebrating the mathematical constant π. It is celebrated on March 14, i.e., 3/14 in month/day notation. It is typically celebrated by telling everyone you know, "Hey, it's Pi Day!" More enterprising people bake lots of pies, take pictures of them, and then post the pictures on the Internet. + +After moving to the UK, where the date would be written 14/3, that choice for Pi Day seemed wrong, reeking of American cultural hegemony. There had to be a better way. + +So I came up with one. Why not celebrate Pi Day on the 314th day of the year. In most years, this is **November 10**. This should be easy for everyone to remember, because it is the day after my birthday. In leap years, like 2012, Pi Day occurs a day earlier, on November 9. + +Happy belated Pi Day! + +(Those amused by the juxtaposition of this post with the preceding one on this blog are welcome to their amusement.) diff --git a/_posts/2013-01-08-about-to-graduate-with-your-phd-one.md b/_posts/2013-01-08-about-to-graduate-with-your-phd-one.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..ef28164765483 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-01-08-about-to-graduate-with-your-phd-one.md @@ -0,0 +1,18 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: About to graduate with your PhD? One more tip. +date: '2013-01-08T10:42:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- advice +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:54:38.269-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-8775510742575201504 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/01/about-to-graduate-with-your-phd-one.html +--- +A rite of passage for US PhD students is the title page of their dissertation. The way that faculty indicate their approval of the final dissertation is by signing the title page, and students are required to leave space on the title page for this purpose. It's up to the student to run around to all their committee members (mine had 5) and get them to sign. Holding the final title page, with all the signatures, this bland sheet of acid-free paper that signifies that your hard work has come to something... it's a heady feeling. + +Often people go to a bookbinder to get bound copies made as gifts for their parents and PhD supervisors. I had a copy bound for myself as well (boy was that a mistake). So here's my tip: Keep a photocopy of your signed title page. Then, when you get your thesis bound, you can include the signed title page with all the bound copies. This looks much nicer than a title page with blank signature lines, which gives the faint impression that you're trying to pull something over on someone. + +Congratulations! + + diff --git a/_posts/2013-01-12-interaction-in-lectures.md b/_posts/2013-01-12-interaction-in-lectures.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..0467f729cca74 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-01-12-interaction-in-lectures.md @@ -0,0 +1,18 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: A simple trick to encourage lecture participation +date: '2013-01-12T14:16:00.001-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- lecturing +- advice +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:54:27.436-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-8752270248629406352 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/01/interaction-in-lectures.html +--- +It's the time of year when teaching is very much on my mind. In an [essay about his teaching style](http://hdl.handle.net/1802/3021), [Michael Scott](http://www.cs.rochester.edu/~scott/) says something about encouraging student participation that stuck with me: + +> I’ve found that the very first class period sets the tone for the whole semester. If I don’t get students to participate on day one, they probably won’t participate at all, and the course ends up dreadfully dull. My first lecture in any class thus begins with a brainstorming exercise, in which I get as many different students as possible to voice a suggestion or opinion.  + +Last year I tried something like this in my undergraduate machine learning class. I don't want to go into details in case I use it again, but it wasn't a brainstorming exercise (I couldn't think of one), but a simple quiz question that introduced part of the material. I had the students vote on the correct answer---and everyone voted wrong, because it was of course a trick question. +To my delight, I found that year's class asked many more questions than the one before, even though it was significantly larger. This may be due to random variation, or to the fact that I was better at teaching the course the second time, but it's enough that I'll keep trying it. diff --git a/_posts/2013-01-20-how-i-make-coffee.md b/_posts/2013-01-20-how-i-make-coffee.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..3d8694de53efc --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-01-20-how-i-make-coffee.md @@ -0,0 +1,30 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: How I Make Coffee +date: '2013-01-19T16:41:00.001-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- coffee +- hobbies +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:54:09.776-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-715124220373481529 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/01/how-i-make-coffee.html +--- +Pourover is a trendy and delicious way of making coffee. It is possible to make excellent coffee this way. [This video by Matt Perger](http://vimeo.com/46612013) has a great technique for the Hario V60, which the one that I have been playing with since receiving it for my birthday. + +Here's a summary of the video. You will probably need to watch the vide for this to make sense: + +12g coffee +200g water +brewing time 2:20 total + +1. Add 50g water. Stir. Let bloom. +2. At 0:30, add 50g water in outward spiral. Make sure no grounds are above water line +3. At 1:00, add remaining 100g water in spiral pattern, again washing the grounds down the edges. +4. Around 1:30 or so reseat dripper to even out bed of grounds + +How do you know it's 50g of water? Place your mug on top of a digital scale before pouring. + +What kind of kettle do you pour the water from? Unfortunately, this really does matter. It's important that the grounds be completely saturated with water, and that you pour the water slowly. Otherwise, you will create channels through the grounds through which most of the water will pass, causing part of the grounds to be overextracted and bitter. I am told that the Hario kettle is excellent, because it has a narrow swan neck which allows the water to poured slowly and precisely. But it also costs 50 pounds! It is difficult to find a similar kettle that is reasonably priced, but I have just gotten [this Tiamo kettle](http://www.homeloo.com/shop/product_info.php?products_id=933¤cy=GBP) and so far, so good. + +\[h/t: [Artisan Roast](http://www.artisanroast.co.uk/)\] diff --git a/_posts/2013-01-25-the-first-rule-of-academic-politics.md b/_posts/2013-01-25-the-first-rule-of-academic-politics.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..d6d713f8e19f0 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-01-25-the-first-rule-of-academic-politics.md @@ -0,0 +1,16 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: The first rule of academic politics +date: '2013-01-25T15:58:00.002-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- academic customs +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:53:57.123-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-7049362897230180350 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/01/the-first-rule-of-academic-politics.html +--- +"Don't talk about academic politics"? Ha! I wish. Academic politics is nothing but talking. I guess that's true for most all kinds of politics, really. + +The First Rule of Academic Politics is: No matter what happens, you have to live with these people afterwards. + +Another, perhaps dated, way to say this is that an academic department is like an episode of "Survivor", except that instead of voting people off of the island, you vote them ON. To stay. diff --git a/_posts/2013-02-09-my-new-favourite-pages-on-wikipedia.md b/_posts/2013-02-09-my-new-favourite-pages-on-wikipedia.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..036dfe145dc2e --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-02-09-my-new-favourite-pages-on-wikipedia.md @@ -0,0 +1,19 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: My new favourite pages on Wikipedia +date: '2013-02-09T13:52:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- silly +modified_time: '2014-11-02T07:22:21.366-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-5225724406026242489 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/02/my-new-favourite-pages-on-wikipedia.html +--- +I have several new favourite pages on Wikipedia: + +- [A list of films that most frequently use the word "fuck"](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_that_most_frequently_use_the_word_%22fuck%22). Apparently there are people who count these things. Unsurprisingly, the winner is a documentary about the use of the word "fuck". +- [List of lists of lists](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lists_of_lists). There many pages on Wikipedia that are lists of lists, e.g., every country has a list of lakes in that country. So there is a page that lists all of the "Lists of lakes in Country X". But this page is only one of the many lists of lists on Wikipedia. This list of all such pages is the Lists of Lists of Lists. \[h/t: Daniel Renshaw\] + +Previously, my favourite page on Wikipedia hd been a description of the seven different forms of lightsaber combat. (Apparently, Samuel L Jackson's character had developed a form to himself. That's how he was able to beat the Emperor.) Sadly this page has since been deleted from Wikipedia, and it is impossible to retrieve deleted pages. There is a page on this topic on Wookiepedia, but it contains a scary level of detail that in my opinion renders it much less readable than the old Wikipedia page. + +Related to the "fuck" list, I also like the study [Delete Expletives?](http://www.ofcom.org.uk/static/archive/itc/uploads/Delete_Expletives.pdf), which is a British study of people's attitudes towards obscenity, particularly on television. One of the excellent features of this study is a ranked list of swear words in British English, based on a survey of over 1000 respondents. diff --git a/_posts/2013-02-23-coffee-versus-beer.md b/_posts/2013-02-23-coffee-versus-beer.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..9d85865ce8b3f --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-02-23-coffee-versus-beer.md @@ -0,0 +1,13 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Coffee versus beer +date: '2013-02-23T14:26:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +modified_time: '2013-02-23T14:26:11.487-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-7993746544616161331 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/02/coffee-versus-beer.html +--- +If you ask yourself, "Should I have one more beer?," well, if you had to stop yourself and ask, you probably shouldn't. + +If you ask yourself, "Do I need another cup of coffee?," well, if you had to stop and ask, you probably need it. diff --git a/_posts/2013-03-21-the-cure-for-boring-meetings.md b/_posts/2013-03-21-the-cure-for-boring-meetings.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..3a17b0ed34945 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-03-21-the-cure-for-boring-meetings.md @@ -0,0 +1,19 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: The cure for boring meetings +date: '2013-03-20T17:00:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +modified_time: '2013-03-20T17:00:56.640-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-3357907395134960543 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/03/the-cure-for-boring-meetings.html +--- +I have recently discovered the best thing to do during long (>1 hr) boring meetings. Obviously you want to avoid these, but sometimes you can't. The common solution is to pull out your laptop and start sending email. For me this works for about an hour, after which I start to suffer from "email fatigue", the gooey minded state that results from sending too many emails too quickly. What to do then? + +The answer: Cat photos. Whenever someone says something that is breathtaking in its shortsighted preoccupation with pointless minutiae—I'm not saying that this happened in my meeting, of course—don't check your email. Check your cat photos. Whenever the discussion comes back to the same old argument that people have been hashing out for years—again, this did not happen—cat photos. Never fails. + +In time, you may come to like these meetings because of the unconscious association with cute photos. If that happens, you may want to lay off this strategy for a while. + +If you have trouble finding cat photos on the Internet, just let me know and I'll be happy to send you some. + +(Response that I got from a certain someone: "Not pictures of your girlfriend?" My answer: "Well, you were in some of them.") diff --git a/_posts/2013-04-27-jokes-in-lectures.md b/_posts/2013-04-27-jokes-in-lectures.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..870d5543bfd54 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-04-27-jokes-in-lectures.md @@ -0,0 +1,22 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Jokes in lectures +date: '2013-04-27T05:29:00.001-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- lecturing +modified_time: '2016-08-29T02:22:14.870-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-3945295142837495472 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/04/jokes-in-lectures.html +--- +I enjoy using humour when I lecture. Lectures aren't built for people's natural attention spans, and even after long experience, it is almost impossible for a person to focus on a lecture for 50 minutes straight. Humour provides a break for the audience, but more than that, the best jokes are \*memorable\*, making a hook that the lecture material can hang off of in the students' minds. Perhaps most grandiosely, humour requires empathy; you can't tell a funny joke to your students unless you understand what they find funny, which means that however briefly you were able to see things from their perspective. This is perhaps why humorous lecturers are popular. + +The point behind this philosophy is that when you tell a joke in class, you want to tell it for good reason. If your only goal is to give the class a bit of a rest---perhaps the weakest reason, but still fine---then there's no need to tell the joke in the first 10 minutes. Whereas if you're using humour to provide a hook for new material, then that's exactly where you would put it. + +Perhaps the first rule of lecture comedy is: Your mileage will vary. It's hard to predict how a class will react to a particular joke. For example, more than once, I have walked into a room of teenagers and said, "Right, so today class, we're going to do PCP." (The Post Correspondence Problem, of course.) One time the class immediately broke out laughing, and another time they sat in bemused (I think) silence. Do not be discouraged by the silence. + +For this reason, make your jokes offhand. Make them an aside to your lecture rather than a detour. Then, if they don't work, you simply go on with your lecture as normal and you don't look (so) bad. + +The ideal joke is one that makes a serious point. An example is the classic pair of sentences that illustrate syntactic ambiguity: Time flies like an arrow / Fruit flies like a banana. This example has the additional merit of being part of the folklore of the field. Stories like this acculturate students to an intellectual area, which is part of the reason they spend the money on University rather than taking a correspondence course. + +All of this said, you have to be natural. Humour is subtle enough that if you force yourself to tell jokes you don't believe in, they won't work. Your lecture style needs to arise naturally from your personality, so what works for me might not work for you. That said, it's not as if you're doing stand up: the standards are much lower for lectures, so even a mildly amusing attempt might get a positive (and perhaps relieved!) response from your students. diff --git a/_posts/2013-05-05-future-work.md b/_posts/2013-05-05-future-work.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..7a4c0a97e3978 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-05-05-future-work.md @@ -0,0 +1,22 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Future Work +date: '2013-05-05T04:00:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- advice +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:53:30.886-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-2104003859400219905 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/05/future-work.html +--- +It seems customary for computer science research papers to list directions for future work at the end. This custom is immensely strange. If your idea for future work is really good, the last thing you want to do is tell everyone about it. Literally the last thing: right after you've done the research and written it up! On other hand, if the idea for future work is bad, why do you want other people to see it? + +My belief is that the "future work" discussions are not in fact lists of future work. In fact, it is perhaps safest if beginning students ignore these sections altogether. But they do serve a purpose, or rather, one of several: + +1 Delimit the scope of current work. You have to stop somewhere, so listing an obvious idea for future work is a way of saying, "Yes, we know that this is an obvious extension, but we didn't have time for it, and its not as interesting as the stuff we did do." These are the research ideas that you want to stay far away from; if they were that interesting, the authors would have written that paper instead. + +2 Stake an early claim. You've written a good, coherent paper, but there's another idea that's an obvious but still exciting follow on from what you did. It's a bad idea to put too much in one paper, so you mention the follow on to acknowledge that it's obvious, in case somebody else gets to the follow on first. + +As an aside, if someone else does the follow on, don't feel bad. They'll be citing your paper prominently, which is very good both for your career, but more important intellectually: the point of you doing the work was for other people to use it.  + +3 Convince readers that the work is useful. If you've built machinery (whether code or a proof technique) that you want other people to use, you might give some potential directions to encourage people to build on your work. diff --git a/_posts/2013-06-25-and-can-you-teach-me-how-to-talk-real.md b/_posts/2013-06-25-and-can-you-teach-me-how-to-talk-real.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..1a6a81427e7c2 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-06-25-and-can-you-teach-me-how-to-talk-real.md @@ -0,0 +1,26 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: And can you teach me how to talk real slow? +date: '2013-06-25T15:48:00.001-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- lecturing +- advice +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:53:18.241-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-7959900858822712359 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/06/and-can-you-teach-me-how-to-talk-real.html +--- +A switch flipped in my head at the beginning of my lectures last spring. At that point I had lectured something like 5 full university courses and maybe something like 50 research seminars. I was an experienced speaker. + +But I was fast. + +You'llnoticethisifyouaskmeaboutsomethingresearchrelatedthatI'llstarttogetexcitedandtalkfaster. In my personal life, I'm much more laid back, but at work, I talk fast. It is what it is, I suppose, but it's not the best attribute for an effective lecturer. + +And then last term something happened. I walked into class and started speaking twice as slow as I ordinarily did. I liked it. I felt that I still had the amount of energy that I should have, just... slower. I don't know what I did, so I couldn't tell you how to do it if you wanted to, but now I can turn on the slow mode whenever I want. + +Actually, I just thought of a theory about what I might have been doing. In every sentence when you're speaking, there are few key words that you emphasize. When you get to those---and you should try to anticipate those words before you say them---exaggerate your emphasis and focus on slowing those words down. Then the other words in the sentence, and the length of your pauses, will follow. That might be how I learned to switch, maybe. Let me know if you try this and it works for you. + +Another nice thing about speaking slower is that it gives me more time to plan my sentences. This reduces the number of times that I get halfway through the sentence, think of a better way to say the sentence, and start the whole thing over from the beginning---a bad habit of mine. + +It's nice to know that you always have more to learn. This change sure messed up my lecture plans for that term---everything took longer than I expected---but overall a positive change, I think. + diff --git a/_posts/2013-07-23-proposal-writing-and-fuck-yeah-factor.md b/_posts/2013-07-23-proposal-writing-and-fuck-yeah-factor.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..69b67b1a4b1ba --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-07-23-proposal-writing-and-fuck-yeah-factor.md @@ -0,0 +1,16 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Proposal Writing and the "Fuck Yeah" Factor +date: '2013-07-23T11:44:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +modified_time: '2013-07-23T11:44:30.734-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-1093440389780365957 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/07/proposal-writing-and-fuck-yeah-factor.html +--- +I have almost recovered from submitting a grant proposal last week. When I was revising it, I realized that there's actually an easy way to tell how good one of your proposals is. + +Nobody's going to believe your sales pitch unless you do. So, when you finish reading the introduction, do you get excited? Do you feel like pumping your fist and shouting "fuck yeah!" If so, then your proposal has the "fuck yeah" factor. + +It's possible to get a proposal funded without the "fuck yeah" factor, e.g., maybe the competition is weak for that particular call, or maybe for once you draw a set of sympathetic reviewers. But why risk it? + diff --git a/_posts/2013-08-14-kitten.md b/_posts/2013-08-14-kitten.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..be43351110eb7 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-08-14-kitten.md @@ -0,0 +1,14 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Kitten +date: '2013-08-14T14:37:00.002-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- hobbies +- cats +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:53:06.261-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-7968355361497892305 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/08/kitten.html +--- +Imagine that, by some puckish magic, overnight you gained all the strength and skill of a professional acrobat. Yesterday, you'd trip walking down the street; today, you can skip across a tightrope. All your friends are bewildered at your transformation. You're bewildered, too, most of all because you no longer know your body, how fast you can run, how much you can lift, how high you can jump. +This is what it is to be a kitten. Every day our kitten performs all kinds of preposterous stunts---leaping over the other cat in mid stride, using a wooden drying rack as a jungle gym---simply because she doesn't know that she can't. diff --git a/_posts/2013-08-17-academic-ranks-in-us-and-uk.md b/_posts/2013-08-17-academic-ranks-in-us-and-uk.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..8811edb176a12 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-08-17-academic-ranks-in-us-and-uk.md @@ -0,0 +1,22 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Academic ranks in the US and UK +date: '2013-08-17T08:08:00.003-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- academic customs +- us v uk academia +modified_time: '2014-11-02T07:21:34.664-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-323098517740663009 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/08/academic-ranks-in-us-and-uk.html +--- +The US and the UK both have a series of ranks for academics, but the names of the job titles are somewhat different. + +American universities hire "professors" to do teaching and research. In your first job, you get the title of "assistant professor," which indicates that you are an independent scholar expected to teach undergraduate and graduate courses and lead an independent research program. After a few years, if you are doing well, you can be promoted to "associate professor." (Second prize is [you're fired](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_or_out).) Later on, if you are sufficiently eminent, you can finally be promoted to "Professor" (informally referred to as "full professor"). Students don't usually understand academic ranks, as they have better things to do than to learn these games, and so will generically refer to the "professor" of their course. Professors are addressed with a special title before their name, for example, Prof. Smith. + +British universities, on the other hand, hire "academic staff" to do teaching and research. In your first job, you get the title of "lecturer", which indicates that you are an independent scholar expected to teach undergraduate and postgraduate courses and lead an independent research programme. After a few years, if you are doing well, you can be promoted to "Reader". Later on, if you are sufficiently eminent, you can finally be promoted to "Professor". You'll have to ask someone else to explain what a "Senior Lecturer" is. Students don't usually understand academic ranks, as they have better things to do than to learn these games, and so will generically refer to the "lecturer" of their course. Academics are addressed with a special title before their name, but this varies according to rank. Lecturers and readers are formally referred to as Dr Smith. Only upon receiving the highest rank of professor are they referred to as Prof Smith. + +I have to say that I have a soft spot for the British titles. The American job titles don't make much sense, as assistant professors aren't really anyone's assistants, and associate professors are not required to associate with all that many people. Especially in computer science. The British titles are better overall, except for the fact that "Reader" is a bit silly. Really, now, you ought to have read about your subject \*before\* you lecture in it, shouldn't you? + +Of course this is all just silly plumage. But we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that titles are symbols. What does it symbolize in the US that lecturing is the main mode of instruction in the University, but "lecturer" is typically a title reserved for lower-status, teaching-only staff? What does it symbolize in the UK that academic staff of a higher rank go so far as to have a different form of address? + diff --git a/_posts/2013-09-28-ubiquitous-capture-and-ideas-file.md b/_posts/2013-09-28-ubiquitous-capture-and-ideas-file.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..4fd2671357c5d --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2013-09-28-ubiquitous-capture-and-ideas-file.md @@ -0,0 +1,24 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Ubiquitous capture and the ideas file +date: '2013-09-28T08:40:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- advice +- productivity +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:52:39.389-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-6383396531447851698 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2013/09/ubiquitous-capture-and-ideas-file.html +--- +[Ubiquitous capture](http://zenhabits.net/tips-for-gtds-ubiquitous-capture/) is a great term from [Getting Things Done](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Getting_Things_Done). Like the best ideas from GTD, it is simple, obvious in retrospect, but changes everything. Ubiquitous capture means: When you think of something, you should write it down, right away, in some place where you will check it later. + +This is especially good for keeping track of ideas for new research projects. I tend to find ideas for new projects while I'm walking to work, when I'm sitting in a talk, or when I'm working intensely for a paper deadline. Hardly ever can I work on them right away, but I know that I will need them later. So, whenever I have an idea for a new project, I stop whatever I'm doing and write in down in my ideas list. If I have to stop in the street or pause a one-on-one meeting to pull out my phone, well, a benefit of being an academic is that you get to be eccentric. + +I keep my ideas list in [Evernote](https://evernote.com), but it doesn't matter what you use, as long as *all* your ideas are on *one* list. + +Later, usually many months later, a student will ask me for suggestions for an undergraduate, master's, or PhD project. I go back to my ideas list and look. I also tag each idea "ug", "msc", or "phd", if I think it would work well for one of those degrees. + +I also look back through the list periodically to pull out ones that are especially exciting. Every idea is exciting when you first have it; the ones that are still exciting a week later are the ones to keep. + +Of course I use a similar system for blog ideas. + diff --git a/_posts/2014-07-20-principal-component-model-of-coffee.md b/_posts/2014-07-20-principal-component-model-of-coffee.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..ab469c81b8874 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2014-07-20-principal-component-model-of-coffee.md @@ -0,0 +1,34 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Principal Component Model of Coffee Shops +date: '2014-07-20T12:21:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- coffee +- hobbies +modified_time: '2014-07-20T12:21:39.201-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-6955315026262263903 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2014/07/principal-component-model-of-coffee.html +--- +I spend a lot of time in coffee shops. I'm [writing in Amsterdam](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannabis_coffee_shop), so let me clarify that I do mean **coffee**. I like coffee shops because: a) I like coffee, b) I find them relaxing, and c) and it is a way to be around people without the awkwardness of being obligated to talk to them. + +It's very important to choose coffee shops wisely. Before I go on vacation, I always do careful research about where the best coffee shops are (again: for **coffee**). But "best" is complicated. You need to think about what aspects of the coffee shop experience are most important for your trip: + +A) Quality of the coffee. The presence of single estate beans or fancy hipster brewing methods is a good sign, but it doesn't matter what equipment they have if they don't know how to use it. + +B) Ambiance. How easy is it to relax? Or to concentrate? There's one place I used to go to often — closed now — awful coffee, but near me, and really cool decor. + +C) Quality of food. Pastries only? Sandwiches? Hot food? How good? + +D) Location, location, location. + +E) Work friendly or people friendly? Some cafés you go to with a laptop, some you go with a group of friends. A book is usually always OK. Interestingly a tablet feels more to me like a book in terms of social acceptability than a laptop but maybe I'm biased. + +I know one cafe where 24/7 there was always a row of six people staring at laptop screens. Nothing wrong with that, as long as you're bringing a laptop too. + +F) Attractiveness of clientele. I never go to cafés specifically to pick people up, but it's always nice to be around people who seem interesting. + +G) Staff. This is complicated because while nice banter will always make me smile, I am also happy to be left alone. + +Happy to hear if there are important criteria that I am leaving out. + diff --git a/_posts/2014-08-16-a-threat-to-british-monarchy.md b/_posts/2014-08-16-a-threat-to-british-monarchy.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..a6f76c68cf02b --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2014-08-16-a-threat-to-british-monarchy.md @@ -0,0 +1,33 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: A Threat to the British Monarchy +date: '2014-08-16T10:00:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- britain +- history +modified_time: '2014-08-16T10:00:00.621-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-4500263537431780916 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2014/08/a-threat-to-british-monarchy.html +--- +I’d like to talk frankly about a real threat to the British monarchy. + +First, monarchs like to emphasize continuity and tradition by reusing names from previous monarchs. This is understandable as, in a constitutional monarchy, continuity and tradition are the monarchy's main assets. Perhaps for this reason, a British king hasn’t taken on a previously unused name since George I in 1714. + +However, this bumps up against a contradictory historical tendency, namely that British monarchs have had what might be described as a rich and varied history. British kings aren’t eager to remind people of their more colourful predecessors. Many names are therefore out of bounds. + +The result is that the British monarchy is rapidly running out of names in the male line. For example: + +- **Henry** — It is difficult to imagine the king who would want to be Henry IX, and even more difficult to imagine the woman who would want to marry him. + +- **Richard** — Who wants to be the successor of the King in the Car Park? And there was the business with the Princes in the Tower. + +- **Edward** — Although the abdication of Edward VIII might be viewed more romantically by modern eyes, the Nazi sympathies, not so much. + +- **John** — The Magna Carta was written to protect people *from him*. + +- **James** [is right out](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobitism). + +Once you factor in this history, there are very few names left. Charles is still OK. Charles II granted the charter of the Royal Society; perhaps a future Charles III could also take an interest in science. William and George are unimpeachable. Albert is a possibility, although the famous Albert was only a consort, making the name a bit of a risk: the last prospective King Albert decided at the crucial moment to become a George instead. + +This is shaping into a crisis. One can imagine a time, in the coming centuries, when the only choices left to British kings are Charles, George, and Cnut. diff --git a/_posts/2014-11-01-business-cards-and-me.md b/_posts/2014-11-01-business-cards-and-me.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..c1eea74cda4d7 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2014-11-01-business-cards-and-me.md @@ -0,0 +1,19 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Business Cards and Me +date: '2014-11-01T07:41:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- academic customs +modified_time: '2014-11-01T07:41:21.148-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-9042662253982450738 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2014/11/business-cards-and-me.html +--- +Just before I went to my first conference, I thought, "Hey, I guess I should be professional now!" and printed out business cards on the best card stock that I could find at Staples. Apparently, of the hundreds of people who attended NIPS that year, I was the only one who had done this. I handed out one card, received none, and assumed that everyone must just Google each other after the conference. + +From an objective standpoint, from the perspective of maximizing the efficiency of scholarly communication, this is of course ridiculous. The only explanation that I can imagine is reverse snobbery, the same reason we would never wear a suit and tie to work. But at the time, I didn't worry about this. I just did what everyone else did. + +I'm eleven years older now, and my memory is much worse. At the last conference I attended, I thought, "Hey, wouldn't it be great if next time, I could go home with a list of every new person that I met, perhaps on a durable but unobtrusive slip of paper?" I do worry about people giving me funny looks, but I can't very well pretend to myself that I am creative and iconoclastic if I always do what my friends do. + +So if I meet you at NIPS this year, do not be surprised if you receive an unobtrusive slip of paper from me. I hope that you enjoy the word cloud on the back. + diff --git a/_posts/2014-11-05-mnemonic-poetry-and-guy-fawkes-night.md b/_posts/2014-11-05-mnemonic-poetry-and-guy-fawkes-night.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..3eb12273bbfa2 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2014-11-05-mnemonic-poetry-and-guy-fawkes-night.md @@ -0,0 +1,38 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Mnemonic poetry and Guy Fawkes night +date: '2014-11-05T12:55:00.001-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- britain +- uk customs +- silly +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:52:26.881-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-6735108038342046344 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2014/11/mnemonic-poetry-and-guy-fawkes-night.html +--- +I walked home past several people setting off sparklers and fireworks in the meadows. In Edinburgh celebrations of Guy Fawkes night are not elaborate, but you can smell the gunpowder. + +A good thing, because otherwise I can never remember what night it is. The traditional rhyme + +>      Remember, remember, the fifth of November + +is about the worst possible mnemonic that I could think of. It fits the meter just as well to say + +>      Remember, remember, the FOURTH of November + +but you aren't meant to remember that one. Personally I prefer + +>      Remember, remember, the ninth of November, + +because that happens also to be my birthday. + +Much more sensible to base the rhyme on the part that's easiest to confuse. +Instead, how about: + +> Let the memory survive +>       That the king was still alive +>           On November five. + +Now you won't forget. + diff --git a/_posts/2014-12-06-taste-in-research-and-paradox-of.md b/_posts/2014-12-06-taste-in-research-and-paradox-of.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..c34a705082d40 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2014-12-06-taste-in-research-and-paradox-of.md @@ -0,0 +1,22 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Taste in research, and the paradox of deciding what not to work on +date: '2014-12-06T10:00:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- advice +- meta-research +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:51:52.099-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-8251426721361572599 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2014/12/taste-in-research-and-paradox-of.html +--- +A large part of taste in research is deciding what *not* to work on. You might choose not to apply method X, even though you don't really understand it, because it has a reputation for being fiddly and difficult to get right. You might choose not to work on topic Y because you think that even though there's a lot of people writing papers about it, its goals are too ambitious to ever be met. This extends all the way to entire fields of research. I could name a few popular fields within computer science — with active research communities, large amounts of external research funding, leading researchers with fancy prestigious awards — that I suspect are being investigated in entirely the wrong way, and that I personally think are currently pointless. + +I *could* name them. Will I? No. + +Why not? To protect my career? If I am honest, probably in part yes. But what I tell myself is different. The real answer, I think, is that my opinion of these areas is poorly informed. Because I think these areas are uninteresting, I haven't studied them carefully, and so I don't know how they've attempted to address my naive objections. It would be arrogant and professionally irresponsible to publicly denigrate the hard work of many people without having even bothered to read it. + +This leads to a paradox. It's impossible *by definition* for me to become better informed about these areas, unless I decide to actually start researching them. In order to be fully confident that an area is uninteresting, you need to study it — and that study itself is part of doing research! But you can't do careful reading on every research area that seems bogus at first impression, because then you would do nothing else. Instead, you have to take intellectual shortcuts, and do the best you can with limited time to think. Those research areas that smell a bit off, you ignore them until either they die out, or a major success forces you to reevaluate. Part of taste in research is deciding what to study, and what to ignore. + +This is the paradox of taste in research. Your decision of what not to work on is, by definition, always ill-informed. + diff --git a/_posts/2015-01-03-early-to-rise-early-to-read-research.md b/_posts/2015-01-03-early-to-rise-early-to-read-research.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..50bd48785e8eb --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2015-01-03-early-to-rise-early-to-read-research.md @@ -0,0 +1,28 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Early to rise, early to read research papers +date: '2015-01-03T12:00:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- productivity +modified_time: '2015-01-03T12:00:00.486-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-207822458103940153 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2015/01/early-to-rise-early-to-read-research.html +--- +Due to a recent bout of jet lag,[1](#fn-1) I have found myself this week waking up at 5am. +So I am experimenting with reading a paper first thing in the morning. + +I am hoping that starting off the day with an intellectual task will help me to avoid +"administrator brain", which [FSP describes in an excellent post](http://science-professor.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/this-is-your-brain-on-administration.html). + +So far (well, two days in) it has been really fun. It helps me to stay motivated, because after writing 50 emails in a day, your mind gets lost in minutiae, and you forget that you came to this job to learn, to help people, and to be creative. + +Can't promise that I'll keep waking up at 5am, though. + +------------------------------------------------------------------------ + +1. + + I have begin scheduling posts well in advance, so this bout will no longer be recent when you read this. ↩ + + diff --git a/_posts/2015-04-11-viva-la-voce.md b/_posts/2015-04-11-viva-la-voce.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..2482d1805f013 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2015-04-11-viva-la-voce.md @@ -0,0 +1,26 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Viva la voce +date: '2015-04-11T05:39:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- britain +- advice +- academic customs +modified_time: '2015-04-11T05:48:48.170-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-3828697239579815603 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2015/04/viva-la-voce.html +--- +One of my favourite aspects of academia in the UK is the final oral examination for the PhD --- formally called a *viva voce*, which everyone seems to call a *viva* (VEYE-vah). The viva is an oral examination that typically consists of the student and two examiners, one from within the University (the internal examiner), and one from outwith the university (the external examiner). +Both examiners read the thesis carefully, and ask the student detailed questions. The traditional way to do this is that all three have a paper copy of the thesis, and the examiners go through the thesis page by page with their questions. Some questions are high level ("Why did you choose technique X rather than technique Y?") and some can be very detailed ("In your proof of Theorem 4.3 on page 176, I'm not sure that the third step is correct. What if the matrix A is non-singular?"). +This discussion commonly takes 2-3 hours. Longer and shorter vivas are not unheard of, though if you ask me, a one-hour viva is a bit of a rip-off for the student, and a five-hour viva isn't kind, unless the length is caused by the student being exceptionally argumentative or loquacious. +At the end of the viva, the student is asked to wait outside, and the examiners decide whether the student should be awarded a PhD, and if so what corrections to the thesis are required. The most common outcome is a pass subject to minor corrections, which the student is allowed a few months to complete. +Essentially, in my experience a viva is a detailed technical discussion of the content of the thesis. Most students start out nervous, sometimes exceedingly so, but relax after a few questions as they realize that this is just a technical discussion of the sort that they have had many times before. That said, even if your research career is long, it is rare that a trusted colleague will provide you with several hours of detailed feedback on your work. To be part of a discussion like this, on either side of the table, is a privilege: most work is ignored, so any criticism is a compliment. +I am sure that the process is more tense if the examiners believe that the quality of the thesis is borderline --- fortunately, I haven't yet been asked to examine a thesis like that. If portions of your thesis have already been published in prestigious venues, and whether this is possible at all varies greatly across disciplines, then you can be fairly sure that your thesis is not near the borderline. +A colleague suggested to me once that a viva is like a negotiation. If your thesis represents a sufficient amount of research of acceptable quality (and if it was indeed you that wrote it), then you will pass. The negotiation is over which corrections will be required. Responsible examiners do not want to require additional experiments that will require months of work, if the thesis as submitted is of excellent quality. But they also don't want a thesis to be passed with gaping holes in its argumentation. The purpose of the discussion is to sort out which potential concerns are which, and your voice in this discussion matters --- you wrote the thesis, so you are the expert in the room. +Sometimes an examiner asks a question with an eye to a correction being required. Maybe you think, "yeah, that's a good point, I should add a paragraph on that" --- in this case, don't hesitate to say so. On the other hand, if providing a good answer to the examiner's question would require months of additional research, politely explain why, while also giving the best answer you can given what you do know. What you don't want to do is argue every point strongly, even when the examiners are clearly right... that is not good negotiation strategy. +A bit more about who attends the viva. The internal examiner is *not* the supervisor, in fact, they will not have been involved with the thesis research at all. It is not unusual for the internal examiner to be a bit of generalist with respect to the thesis topic, although when I have served as internal, I have usually been able to make out the thesis reasonably well. Presumably this is because the School of Informatics is large enough that there are many theses in machine learning and natural language processing that need to be examined. +The external examiner is chosen specifically for their expertise in the subject matter, and to serve as an external is generally seen as a minor indicator of prestige. A certain amount of deference is paid to the external in the culture of the process. Even so, I have the sense that part of the role of the internal is to be accountable to the University (for following correct procedures) and to the student and the supervisor (to make sure that the examination is fair to the student). I have read and heard horror stories of aggressive external examiners but never witnessed one; to the contrary, the examiners who I have witnessed have all gone out of their way to be kind to the student. +The role of the supervisor in the viva, I think that this may vary slightly across institutions. At Edinburgh, the supervisor is allowed to attend the viva, if the student permits, but not to participate in any way. In my experience as internal examiner, the supervisor has attended about half the time. One supervisor silently took notes to share with the student, which I think is quite a kind thing to do. +Finally, although the description is written for a US audience, British academia also fetaures [the snake fight portion of your viva](http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/faq-the-snake-fight-portion-of-your-thesis-defense). +(Written in honour of my first PhD student graduating. Congratulations Yichuan!) diff --git a/_posts/2015-05-28-my-top-conference-attendance-tip.md b/_posts/2015-05-28-my-top-conference-attendance-tip.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..59f6b9a9dd951 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2015-05-28-my-top-conference-attendance-tip.md @@ -0,0 +1,18 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: My Top Conference Attendance Tip +date: '2015-05-28T06:11:00.001-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- advice +modified_time: '2015-09-27T06:34:28.475-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-8515673636402127447 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2015/05/my-top-conference-attendance-tip.html +--- +One of my PhD students is on his way to his first academic conference. Conferences are one of my favourite parts of research: I've met so many interesting people and started so many fun collaborations that way. + +Just today I saw this great advice [from Michael Ernst about attending conferences](https://homes.cs.washington.edu/~mernst/advice/conference-attendance.html). His advice is so good, that I've only got one thing to add. + +Here's my tip. When a big group students from the same institution go to the same conference, they'll often hang out together all the time: at meals, coffee breaks, etc. This isn't a great strategy on their part, but you can exploit this. Once you make friends with one person in the group, now you can go with your new friend to lunch with everyone else in the group. Voila, now you have a network! + +This is a general principle of networking (horrible name, but incredibly important if done honestly and well): Cool people will help you to meet other cool people. And once you've been around long enough, you can return the favour! diff --git a/_posts/2015-09-27-why-you-should-scrunch-your-face-when.md b/_posts/2015-09-27-why-you-should-scrunch-your-face-when.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..b77239f76eb07 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2015-09-27-why-you-should-scrunch-your-face-when.md @@ -0,0 +1,15 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: Why you should scrunch your face when you think +date: '2015-09-27T06:37:00.000-07:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- stupid brain tricks +modified_time: '2015-09-27T06:37:09.663-07:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-1654114391544828909 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2015/09/why-you-should-scrunch-your-face-when.html +--- +An important skill in any type of creative work is to observe and reflect on your own habits of thought and discover a way of working that suits them. A simple example is the old advice to notice the time of day when you have the most energy, and reserve that time for the most creative aspects of your work. But there are many more examples of this, if you look for them. It helps to be a bit self absorbed. + +One habit that I've just recently reflected on is that sometimes I close my eyes and scrunch my face into an "I'm thinking hard" face when I'm trying to think hard. In some sense this is an affectation. But I like to think that the goal is more noble, to harness the cognitive dissonance that would result if I make the scrunchy face without thinking hard. To escape this dissonance, the only option for my subconscious is to actually start thinking hard. It feels like this helps, at least sometimes, but I haven't kept careful records. And at least everyone else can see how hard I'm thinking. + diff --git a/_posts/2015-11-21-gtd-made-simple-why-i-think-internet.md b/_posts/2015-11-21-gtd-made-simple-why-i-think-internet.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..832229e3d87f7 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2015-11-21-gtd-made-simple-why-i-think-internet.md @@ -0,0 +1,39 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: 'GTD Made Simple: Why I think the Internet needs one more blog post about "Getting + Things Done"' +date: '2015-11-21T09:28:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- productivity +modified_time: '2015-11-21T09:28:19.257-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-6431285502286704420 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2015/11/gtd-made-simple-why-i-think-internet.html +--- +I'm naturally disorganised, but I have so much stuff to do that out of necessity I get organized. (Then more stuff comes and I get disorganised again.) The way I get organized is by attempting to follow a system called GTD. GTD comes from a book by David Allen called [Getting Things Done](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Getting-Things-Done-Stress-free-Productivity/dp/0349408947). The book is an unusual read, a mix of management-speak, Zen-speak, and tips for organizing your filing cabinet. But for all that, it's a good book. +GTD has become popular with many different types of people. It is especially popular with tech people on the Internet. It's a bit of [a geek cult](http://www.wired.com/2007/09/ff-allen/), which is strange. Why are computer programmers singing praises for a management consultant? Indeed, why are university professors? +Lots of people on the Internet have been writing about GTD. It can be hard to get started. For one, the book itself, the writing isn't always succinct. Also, cleaning up your to do list and blogging about it is a good way to procrastinate. So, there are lots of blog posts out there about GTD. Lots. +I have been trying to figure out a way to explain GTD that makes clear how simple it is. +Look, you need a to do list. It will clear your head so that you can concentrate on your work. That's it. That's GTD. +But you've tried this already. It helped for a little bit, but then it stopped helping. This is where GTD gets interesting. It's based on an extraordinarily perceptive understanding of why to do lists stop working. They can stop working because: + +1. *You haven't written everything down.* To do lists become way better when they contain literally everything that you have to do in life. If they don't, then deep down in your mind, you will always know that you've got stuff to do that isn't written down, so you spend mental focus trying to remember those things. It's like if you tried to keep a calendar but only wrote down half of your appointments in it. +2. *Your list is too vague.* If you write down something like "Dentist" on your to do list, every time you see it, you need a little mental energy to work out what that meant and plan what you need to do about it. But after you've done that planning, you don't *do* anything about it, because you were just scanning your to do list and right now you need to do something else instead. This makes you anxious. And if you read "Dentist" without taking that effort, then you still feel anxious because it reminds you that there's something you need to do and you're not sure what it is. +3. *Your list is too long.* When you're not sure what to do, you need to be able to scan your list quickly to decide what to do next. +4. *You can't find items right when you need them.* If you're about to drive past the hardware store, you need to be able to stop in the parking lot and quickly find the list of stuff that you'd been meaning to buy. +5. *You can't write down items right when you think of them.* When you notice you're running low on toilet paper, you're not usually in the grocery store at the time. But you still want to record this right then, so you don't have to remember it until you're walking past the shop the next day. +6. *Your list doesn't keep up with your life.* Gradually you get more and more things to do that just don't make it on to your list. +7. *You don't compare your list to your bigger goals.* Urgent things aren't always important, and it's easy to let days slip by you. You need to think about what's most important in your career and your life, and your to do list needs to contain actions that help make the important things happen. + +GTD is a system for keeping lists that is designed to avoid these problems. GTD doesn't care where you keep your lists or how you store them --- this is why geeks love GTD, so that they can keep arguing about what software is best. But you don't need software. Paper works fine. What you need are principles to guide you. +The main principles of GTD are: + +- *Record everything.* Everything that you need to do. +- *Record everywhere.* No matter where you are, you need a way to write things down so that they will end up on your list. +- *Organize by context.* You want multiple to do lists, organized so that when you scan a list, it contains only things that you could do right then, if you decided to. You might have a list of people you need to call, a list of things to do at a computer, a list of things to do at home, etc. +- *Specific measurable actions.* This the caveat to "record everything". If it goes on your list, it needs to be something specific, that you could do right away, finish, and tick off. Instead of writing "Dentist", you should write, "Email Morag to ask for dentist recommendations". When you read an item on your list, you don't want to think "Oh, what was that?" --- you want to think "Ah, I can do that!" +- *Small specific projects.* A project is anything that takes multiple specific actions to accomplish, even if it's only 2 or 3. +- *Plan naturally.* For any project, work out what you need to do on the sheet of paper, and add to your list the actions that you can do right away. Actions that you need to do later down the line, they don't go on your list. +- *Review weekly.* Check your calendar and your notes to see if there's anything that you need to do that you haven't written down yet. Think about your longer term projects and goals and make sure your lists have actions that help with them. + +How you organise a set of lists, and supporting files, to meet these principles, that's what the book is about. It may not always seem so from the surface, but the book is full of clever little tricks. That's another reason why the book can be deceptive: It's easy to admire the tricks but not understand the system. But if you really understand the principles, then the practice becomes much more clear. diff --git a/_posts/2016-12-28-a-suggestion-for-scotland.md b/_posts/2016-12-28-a-suggestion-for-scotland.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..5cee5355f4f7c --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2016-12-28-a-suggestion-for-scotland.md @@ -0,0 +1,27 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: A Suggestion for Scotland +date: '2016-12-28T04:52:00.000-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- britain +- modest proposals +modified_time: '2016-12-28T04:55:29.339-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-7100784160260999482 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2014/02/a-suggestion-for-scotland.html +--- +This will be a big year for the United Kingdom. In September, Scotland will hold a referendum to decide whether to remain in the UK or to become an independent country. For several years, support for independence has remained steady at around 33%, but [some polls have shown](http://whatscotlandthinks.org/topics/referendum-voting-intention) that support for independence may be increasing. For my American friends, I personally think that [this op-ed](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/feb/07/scot-vote-yes-independence-scotland) is a good primer. + +As a foreigner, I cannot vote in the referendum, and rightly so. But I would like to humbly propose a third option for Scotland, just as a suggestion. A middle ground between the risks of complete independence, and the current reality of being yoked to Westminster. + +I suggest that come September, Scotland should secede from the United Kingdom and join the United States as the 51st state. + +This would be welcomed all throughout the US, I guarantee it. **Americans love Scotland.** We really, really love Scotland, even if we can’t find it on a map. There are more people of [Scottish ancestry in America](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_American) than there are in Scotland. We have [Scottish festivals](http://www.vascottishgames.org) all over the country, with kilts, bagpipes, Highland dance — the whole works, except only for haggis (which is actually [illegal to import](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21128089)) and Irn Bru (that stuff’s minging). My point is, Americans really, really like Scotland. Maybe [the EU would dither](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-25856657) about accepting an independent Scotland, but the US would accept Scotland in a New York minute. + +Polls show that Scots are concerned about their economic future. **Joining the US would be great for Scotland’s economy.** By joining into a single trading area with the United States, it would be easier for American tourists to come to Scotland, and for Scottish haggis to come to the US (I love that stuff). Also, you need to consider the film industry. We spent $70 million making a movie about [the last time Scotland won independence](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112573/). Don’t think we won’t do it again. We put [a Scot into outer space](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_Scott). Heck, we even made up [a Scottish smurf](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0472181/)! The fact is, over the past 50 years, Hollywood has done more for Scotland than London has. Join with us, and we can do more, together. + +Now, some might argue that my suggestion is impractical. After all, **Scotland is a long way from the US**. (Americans: you might need a map for this part.)  But with modern telecommunications, there’s no reason this should be an issue. In fact, Washington, DC, is actually 1000 miles [closer to Edinburgh](https://www.google.com/search?q=distance+washington+dc+to+edinburgh) than it is [to Honolulu](https://www.google.com/search?q=distance+washington+dc+to+honolulu+hi). + +I can understand that **some Scots might be concerned about this proposal**. After all, Washington DC has been pretty dysfunctional lately. Some might ask: Are these really the people you want to join your political future with? First, it’s important to point out that the US Congress makes up only 0.000017% of the population. Most Americans are more sensible. Second, and most important, **this is why we need your help**. It’s true that there are a lot of perfectly nice people in the US whose political views are batshit crazy. But it’s also true that the country is deeply divided. The crazy people are really only about 49.8% of the population. Even though Scotland’s population is small, in a politically polarised country, it’s enough to tip the balance. Think about it: The US State of Scotland would probably receive 9 electoral votes. The US presidential election of 2000 was decided by only 5. Just think about the good that Scotland could have done for the entire world. + +Clearly, this is one of the most difficult and important political issues in Scotland’s history. Honest people of good intentions will come to different opinions. But I hope that I’ve convinced you that this third option is one that’s worthy of serious consideration. diff --git a/_posts/2016-12-29-on-creating-companion-web-site-for-talks.md b/_posts/2016-12-29-on-creating-companion-web-site-for-talks.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000..50d16698fd67e --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/2016-12-29-on-creating-companion-web-site-for-talks.md @@ -0,0 +1,23 @@ +--- +layout: post +title: On creating a "companion web site" for talks +date: '2016-12-29T11:31:00.002-08:00' +author: Charles Sutton +tags: +- philosophy of powerpoint +- presenting +modified_time: '2016-12-29T11:31:36.333-08:00' +blogger_id: tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4651184076703138844.post-711468618090429490 +blogger_orig_url: http://www.theexclusive.org/2016/12/on-creating-companion-web-site-for-talks.html +--- +My last research talk, I tried an experiment during the talk. I created a "companion web site" for the talk, which is an online handout including slides, code, links to papers, and a bullet-point abstract. Here's my [first try at an online handout.](http://homepages.inf.ed.ac.uk/csutton/talks/nampi2016-talk-sutton/) +The inspiration was [Tufte's quixotic diatribe against Powerpoint](https://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/powerpoint), which recommends written handouts instead of slides. The web site is an attempt to adapt his idea to an all-open all-Internet all-the-time age. Seeing as I have no intention of printing out several hundred paper copies of a handout and carrying them thousands of miles to a research meeting, and that most people have laptops anyway. +Why the handout? Lectures are limited because speech is linear. If we are conversing, when I haven't understood what you have said, I can ask you to go back. When you lecture, I cannot do that. If I stop a moment to think more deeply about something that you have said, I run the risk of missing your next point. +The handout is designed to help with this. By giving you a written summary, and also my slides, you can "go back" and re-read a point that you may have missed. A second role for the online handout is to help you find more details after the talk, to find exactly which papers, which code, and so on, I was referring to. +If the handout really helps, then it raises an even more interesting question. Why the slides? +Tufte argues vehemently against slides as a replacement for written text. Slides have low resolution, which encourages poor statistical graphics, and encourages hiding details which are vital to assessing an argument in science and engineering. Also, most arguments do not fit into bullet points, because bullet points can convey only linear relationships and nesting. The narrative that you are trying to convey in your talk is likely to be more complex. +In research conferences, we already have a handout for each of our talks, the research paper. So maybe we be presenting scientific talks with no slides at all? If not, why not? Sometimes at a conference, I'll skim the paper during the talk if I am starting to get confused. Sometimes that helps. But papers are information dense, with long sentences full of qualifying statements designed to forestall potential reviewer criticisms. It can be hard to read dense text while also remaining aware about what the speaker is currently saying. Sometimes I think this a blind spot of Tufte's, that he leans too heavily on information density as a measure of the quality of a display. +We can think of the sequence \[ slides, audio of talk, online handout, paper \] as attempting to convey the same information at different levels of density. This allows the reader/viewer to choose the appropriate level. But slides and audio are both low density. Do we really need two low density ways of conveying the information? +Another way of asking the question is: What are slides good for, when they are good? Tufte does seem to accept that good slides are possible. He admits that perhaps the top 10% of presenters aren't harmed by Powerpoint's cognitive style, as their own presenting style is strongly enough developed that they impose it on the software, affordances be damned. +In the past couple of years, I've been experimenting with different slide designs. I may even starting to understand what principles I am aiming at in my slide designs. But I think that's a topic for another day. + diff --git a/images/xor.png b/images/xor.png new file mode 100644 index 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000..09409ed44d5c38b246ee3cd95add437eec389264 GIT binary patch literal 6260 zcmY+I3p~@`|M=geo1#(_DpIKo+iW&Nh0Sg@+ibR3Dr0xH+08C0N;j3Fd#UKAiz1~6 zACym0QK85!A?b=Dx5!WW{=fg<@BMh3_c`y^d7bBZz24`%U$4h`CsG4(W~Mf#005W~ z@R*>9I_yuGF>T`Bep2f(QJDyR$-V%Pb7Taf zfdIhgFaYp82>=VD&lJ$SCpu9lL zchyOwC$s^;Tjx2^l=9VFdz~~&rt;LSb(qxfoM`_MgB|QARn(Dd9oS^5JzB2h+q=8M zT_FzZOzrLMy_GzHXAlPapWzcvYaK*tb+jiKtkr5=wJ=w?QV52kP$)3O4eaLTGNIw3 z(#zCbor_Gh{4eDHaWH&Ugi;)>7RzP!f4JOmxkkO#!QszD|Goa&$=8Yh|4cH~f83gI z5d5bH40VNo|I3~j>itLR8LZ+f(Q>JjFH^7c_4UP4WfCrr8N_4w>6loII}EAhMv;g# zKTu>~G#XA;VOeSt7Qx`LluR@oAq^lAgLol0EJqFF$sCvKe7%r*cLqlq;YNn>wR$bb zfDEA!#S9!S&>w~pvm!;(C~hFwfD81XM{os9KLJZBgn$$TolX@JB0*zulMn%qjMTWP z)r@dAhMuD{ASE!FfWnVJLf~SBo65}ttcfA`Mj@FBC8V#L8Prr1pv zp@2f!L@0v=MHqNmF^j61guuBmaIO-8ivr`IF;oLOTB!^~F*R=CQnlP2>(1Bm1iFAI zWFP_@$%>IfU=e5*oq!2v28NI+3Iyjbgr&ierCbJvfg>X%ESj1wArNH|A$lSXDh~*T zL@|i8V1|f@gTshSp+dyqMyMeY3QYus;UfY?P|~C&(JU-NC}Co_beI}OVXECg5CKNc z#Ysf^2s9xizz-70k*f)QZhT%00!(8=p~xtK8=dCQMMWSV!UF|Y1?w>!oH#N7 zOGK*ug0uoDSco_H(=on~V33%I#42G(Br+N~VQ&B@nj?)SMS2AI5_lSHgzqE-0}n^w zgE{_eE*@=A1^6lD7;S()n&gLc!}Enm7+X!oB5-hNG=YIpkfBNtj>E^f3&2u;F;@{y z5luq;#44dUJRGUg>sdryID<)qQKBL};DMrGC?nb*BB3dRbSwkjL(bM1#B#MZniw3c z2#I3L$8^{8QHyv`7A{&q3h>~tLh!-C1Pw7* zj?j>?fg%lE$Bc}YM}ZWizuR8q?-xwh1%_bREIP|SC`zb^gmFmzJYA$#f>dw`8mJ!` z78EXGl42q_d^}1ZfXVP0jM89$5dy(z#H1yWEVP^n4bpKY)+7=W5sVkXgZPo+a5BXU7n5kwHo zXRz7CAcY}9fYu5nWFCPXfN&2NNr-TnLFy03g}X&-kRrJ}8jFa8O+upB;V~E<**}s3 zr()IkAcKZU1z|&if+Z?VL`(>QtU^)!f)#W+N?b` z#X)EWMM*)1Yk2|Tk_Zh1ii?4eco8_FA5HF$K#<*~8m)#ckdQQ-2`4xTGC?oKa1~-a zM=iwuU7aAbZ-5^*-(WC0*x-wg2Kho{1gs2>iGt%*NDLk98xZ5Gh|#*o zXakj63>Jjt@qIl&lMoRdEcBOYi7*d>UWxXlDk6zch2O-7;|qs~6a=|QM34&+;XwqD zChBMxiS!CPlo>g6XgGsIK07svdRC-E`L+kq;w*8tuyro|2Ge= zGp*g4k_!NHa|sw5jl6s9ESZ!j*VGj_1yVJ0dP|XrM6j-{mogR z5X$BZyemb=jGr1F6MR6H3~$wT-R-lFpS2E7rVpo$s$RZ+#yXe3VX#&{n>@0LT%M6= zFa(?>>Yw_XR!2&` zUBZ;?cba9XQn_TtV8?~6ySJ>F8 zbHGuHKQi+RPMfhR)ciHE%2he=ZZ~OV;l%r`7=L~?NtCbhV%B81GH2|pFXAVzv1_}1 zhOD&#uG{85PSRQ&oRX07dgLs0BsV9aqYE^@Bwn7Eo@YMYClJBt-Ug1lO6^!Yc6`9e zGk+x~wou~LAaR(l)9-tc%eqK^o@aA&%J#FyKK*I64mVz(aQpU!KlOppCg^whoEFO5 z%+p^Vcg*>;8VJ3%2Io3$BPvA&wW#X zi-%*jUH$4>-gSK0${)kogPE@_GV9~juH(g29nkz6C>6V%5K@mqgas1&<+Hr+Jsbv(an5(m3o;~)HvN8oS*71$lCyX^ zU^7m>T;tGXU5W9&tc$u!{D(q)-r{`NDPB}bpseb5^S90#X>hvmj_Ornvd3t~{)6{B zwnqZaK4Tfpv`+Y*~=4_IAUn%2E(v*jVv?ebzz zoT=>w*wY>qqr99SGA$MCYkah@$aW{^JQ>)u9j$(X#1X06nd#r$>{ zT|v(62;uSe%?}P9sY`0M$OF)8N(>|K)l;q1f0%TrQG>Zu#z?N9es zE4opU&t7eV0sG3P3oaPnjh|8V6&jcS^0rsnVY4{L?V!7yDI8|2`xKw%g2iP?b3dYc z-q&0xiLk2JG$xtpxwg&dWBakK*4He6`a!(e&-2aB+r0dr-dU7ri|+U08L`dW5C0&_ zY&5iQwzFLlosG6BWiv#^7rXdnTg}@$NV8rRm!))i)_<GggR5--v8L`c^2xi z!kPImo)$kzS}}4~Xp~6_b7eIi(vps>6wTRd>pbGsWb8(~9(ih3xEsCV0Ket@bjF^L z-40J;7d=}^_%yUIW#Dd6-6DU5`)liKiE09&r=$1QY>F&?*6^vMM%;^q2ivm7U>hnn z{iOEPy51OE6c<;vVR%)F`Jo15!#o;|wqxK!!Q5$w4mef*7F;ql@Q8I}({`65p%zBE zy?f&bwqimCpxYt$jiC(q065d%`r<9y<4nfkMifV=w!Am+<1>lN-596}|(B)?Qg;u>) zGQ9cp^J4-?>H>=<>w?opf2Fq;X(H~|Y+4Ln>vTTHx`2Lc)AIZjOi7=!{UgD-DV9E~ zmff;0$aE)H2-}Ok#^$fk9X~u9`e5voFfq61DlBx{qa}3bzw3&rTlk>)THHQJ9c+Hu zVK2I1OIg)J66oZ)WRHL<_kHt6KLm`kA6VA59uaMt;W8XML$R>sgR2p))eOh{shq#> zcMQje-g0}<{uGFGuk#*7YT3jc%E| zc=O0CyE;IqVD&1?FeM#UkS(We9+3U#jTi>DBnf~Y$4ZJym&}{;#$?M`OX#^&e1Bf6 z@zB%0^Tlc>&`oOqI6;EnA6{^WRPHiVlfNrq|L=i`K(np)SQnH+v%6K(Jq1`J8M>3` zd_)o1-%WDgS$SMp=3fGtb@GrjWKa1k<3kM%>u(oX0k>II9!X5}3hF8sAC3%>^3gOG z@P3>0@ZhlZ7fN<#hRi7b+U|a~{NqEjhD|xp52v3&$9I@r`~I;qW9q-MrvV*AJpjBf zD7iQD%eJR&thuh;$z2@MRlBU0y`|<}pL)a<2^Tl><{*uI1gmKY@+md5eXpzE z7<-^68DtB*O{*;o+OHvGy1%8VpWJ>cY^UGAeXD|o2qS`*YB}xglzj^UM-MO5vYG2a!|G!=qpizL&$0~mnU8;2 zJ(5>E>iT}gyaw04)-LP(S7YGuRQNFCRYY?IkR0~famkNyz^vy!qYo9(*fcBOD)~s` z)2m5)Zs&V9%k6+gFp%+u{eWnY#~#dfXVa4JN8DPIZ2NMxmbJ)!EEB)npP+aNbJ) zc4*dcy(Mzboa^O$Z`1w@otar}Ne-&gw#qjLf|hm8HvwRNhy(iX`p__9%C(~QiVeOV zC0AZ@d*S*~i&>~^ndqUwS`N`(-nHf!vnh7LyOmZ> z+NpP5U8)7bOuC{dBvJc)-}b0uckT7x+Ls*Uy=`g7+FhFw-c3~H(H7gRC)MHb7x%By ze4G_F-!2}B@7+!fraa0HnfHC=nYGdrq0C}XLG_bQs+*7Vm~X5qOw))KS2!ToI;#dX*Frrz7YaZCnVRz%m5q{=2)EAvSRG#584(NivP`@->zQ8k3x;j_;`%+KyYYB4snrxn^KjmR|8&*Gh{VHAkgjxUl z3Xqxly4UIL>dQ44QDm}y$vx7YHo`;OdqR6*X%6?B;;b=n%)ZR4>Po<4Y3r3*%z-F8KhT6EDZ!cASes|;7PS`&Az(3LI7lMl! z8LvB$^QY5NptghjoZ*SH(*l4!HF$Vs@4De4M9-0)4npTx_`~Fz+1ML}D@+a?1WH4N zzxBTdZWW{kKasY$^mGc=yiM`^zH6X)q^dF9C68_t2BY9nz0ED4w7By6^c)4dzBb9p z{A*Xq;N|3;RoIBMjPX?Mn7-QJP(`bC561W@X9_T)%)f9eT}RnVI%Qj|v;XqVT!mgY{OK_7c! zWT5-!>yKQtllkVNzM}gh;f}UxA<`m2b*x11a$9z~z3ikQq zv)=dK-``%nk*i}4x=xL+Qh!N-`PNgGHb|@Mn?^^49qO}@MrBiqBI=6Qs^f%A_kpK< zR3Pja%IH_qs(as3^_e4|9UI?xq;zWU1ua#sqvYM zrj&Pm9wppmJv;t6*Gx5Y`t>zgi?@|b9nu-zPc<8;Vk3IKPaIC8MpxOz-FAIfFdNW? zSo>tzfj(=;e#y%}cE1X&Lw