1511 sats \ 0 replies \ @Coyote_Cosmico 29 Dec 2023 \ on: A request for non-correlated inputs mostly_harmless
This is specifically why I don't use Twitter. Maybe it's the algo showing me similar people, but the whole space seems like an intellectual circle jerk. Everybody reading and citing the same sources.
Your post instantly brought to mind one of my favorite books by computer scientist Gerald Weinberg - Weinberg on Writing: The Fieldstone Method.
He had a quirky obsession with building stone walls, and really milked that knowledge for use in programming and writing.
I found the book most useful in absorbing the way he thinks in this way - snatching insights from one craft to use in another. Writers on the internet now are obsessed with zettelkasten, but seems nobody reads this book which emphasizes an emotional element to deciding what information is worth capturing.
Personally I try to follow one interest into a related space that I normally wouldn't go.
I lived on the ocean last year and many mornings would walk 40 minutes to check the surf, only to get skunked regularly. That got me studying oceanography textbooks and math formulas of waves to make better predictions for ideal days to surf.
When I lived in the mountains I was hiking a lot and found myself in sketchy situations with relatively close lightning strikes. Scared the crap out of me. I ended up taking a meteorology course on Wondrium (The Great Courses company) which I found really enriching.
Recently went to the planetarium in Bogotá which got me jazzed about not only watching the sky but also mythologies and worldviews of different cultures. It's really interesting to see the same star patterns interpreted in different ways, with different stories attached.
I look for things that are all around me but I know little to nothing about and think "how much richer would my daily experience be if I understood even a little about this?"
Things like the weather, plants/ botany, architecture. I'm a complete dunce on those topics and it's like I'm waking around with blinders on now.
Hunting mushrooms became a favorite hobby of mine for a while too when I lived in a great area for that. It's really addicting, and you get a lot of time in the woods with your thoughts. Developing a visual habit of scanning/ noticing things definitely bled into other areas of my life.