the label fm situations where recalling the concept has utility?
high-priority, since this is the only reason to bother making the label in the first place.
if you’re optimising for b, you might label your concept “distributed boiling-frog attack” (DBFA). someone cud prob generate the whole idea fm those words alone, so it scores on highly on the criterion.
it scores poorly on c, however. if i’m in a situation in which it is helpfwl for me to notice that someone or something is DBFAing me, there are few semiotic/associative paths fm what i notice now to the label itself.
if i reflect on what kinds of situations i want this thought to reappear in, i think of something like “something is consistently going wrong w a complex system and i’m not sure why but it smells like a targeted hostile force”.
i happen to call this “symptomatic nymation” in my notes, bc it’s about deriving new word from the effects/symptoms of the referent concept/phenomenon. a good label shud be a solution looking for a problem.
deriving concept fm label is high-priority if you want the concept to gain popularity, however. i usually jst make words for myself and use them in my notes, so i don’t hv to worry abt this.
Interesting. I think I have a different approach, which is closer to
Find the true name of the thing—a word that makes the situation more understandable, more recognizable, by clarifying the core structure of the thing.
True name doesn’t necessary mean a literal description of the core structure of the thing, though “sum-threshold” is such a literal description. “Anastomosis / anabranching (attack)” is metaphorical, but the point is, it’s a metaphor for the core structure of the thing.
i think that goes into optimising for b in my taxonomy above. how easy is it to recall the structure of the thing once you’ve recalled the word for the thing? these are just considerations, and the optimal naming strat varies by situs ig. 🍵
I think I have a couple other specific considerations:
By getting ahold of the structure better, the structure can be better analyzed on its own terms. Drawing out implications, resolving inconsistencies, refactoring, finding non-obvious structural analogies or examples that I wouldn’t find by ever actually being in the situation randomly.
By getting ahold of the structure better, the structure can be better used in the abstract within other thinking that wants to think in related regions (“at a similar level of abstraction”).
Values (goal-pursuits, etc.) tend to want to flow through elements in all regions; they aren’t just about the phenomenal presentation of situations. So I want to understand and name the real structure, so values can flow through the real structure more easily.
And a general consideration, which is like: I don’t have good reason to think I see all the sorts of considerations going into good words / concepts / language, and I’ve previously thought I had understood much of the reasons only to then discover further important ones. Therefore I should treat as Not Yet Replaceable the sense I have of “naming the core structure”, like how you want to write “elegant” code even without a specific reason. I want to step further into the inner regions of the Thing(s) at hand.
cool third point! i may hv oversold the point in my first comment. i too try to name things according to their thingness, but not exclusively.
to make a caricature of my research loop, i could describe it as
trying to find patterns that puzzle me (foraging),
distilling the pattern to its core structure and storing it in RemNote (catabolic pathway),
mentally trying to find new ways to apply the pattern
ie, propagating it, installing hooks (which I call isthmuses) into plausibly-related contexts such that new cryptically-related observations are more likely to trigger an insight (metaphor), allowing me to generalise further or discover smth i need to refactor
going abt business as usual, repeating 1-3 until unfolding branch meets unfolding branch from the other side, indicating i might hv found a profitable generalisation
an important consideration re keeping isthmuses alive enough to trigger connections: i don’t want to hv memorised this specific instantiation of the pattern so it’s crystal clear. if it fits neatly into a slot and it’s comfortable w its assigned niche, it’s unlikely to trigger in novel situations. imprecision/fuzziness is good when the concept is still in exploratory phase (and not primarily tool-stage).
fix everything
loop is often bottlenecked by the high cost of refactoring anything. i rly wish i could find a general algorithm/strategy for refactoring complex systems like this, or a clever approach to building that minimises/eliminates the need.
the optimal conlang isn’t a new set of words. it’s a new set of practices for naming things, unnaming things, generalising & specialising, communal decision-processes for resolving conflicts, neat meta-structures that minimise cost of refactoring (somehow), enabling eager contributors w minimal overhead & risk of degeneration, etc.
the optimal conlang isn’t a new set of words. it’s a new set of practices for naming things, unnaming things, generalising & specialising, communal decision-processes for resolving conflicts, neat meta-structures that minimise cost of refactoring (somehow), enabling eager contributors w minimal overhead & risk of degeneration, etc.
when making new words, i try to follow this principle:
the usefwlness of a label can be measured on multiple fronts:
how easy is it to recall (or regenerate):
the label just fm thinking abt the concept?
low-priority, since you already have the concept.
the concept just fm seeing the label?
mid-priority, since this is easy to practice.[2]
the label fm situations where recalling the concept has utility?
high-priority, since this is the only reason to bother making the label in the first place.
if you’re optimising for b, you might label your concept “distributed boiling-frog attack” (DBFA). someone cud prob generate the whole idea fm those words alone, so it scores on highly on the criterion.
it scores poorly on c, however. if i’m in a situation in which it is helpfwl for me to notice that someone or something is DBFAing me, there are few semiotic/associative paths fm what i notice now to the label itself.
if i reflect on what kinds of situations i want this thought to reappear in, i think of something like “something is consistently going wrong w a complex system and i’m not sure why but it smells like a targeted hostile force”.
maybe i’d call that the “invisible hand of malice” or “inimicus ex machina”.
i rly liked the post btw! thanks!
i happen to call this “symptomatic nymation” in my notes, bc it’s about deriving new word from the effects/symptoms of the referent concept/phenomenon. a good label shud be a solution looking for a problem.
deriving concept fm label is high-priority if you want the concept to gain popularity, however. i usually jst make words for myself and use them in my notes, so i don’t hv to worry abt this.
Interesting. I think I have a different approach, which is closer to
True name doesn’t necessary mean a literal description of the core structure of the thing, though “sum-threshold” is such a literal description. “Anastomosis / anabranching (attack)” is metaphorical, but the point is, it’s a metaphor for the core structure of the thing.
i think that goes into optimising for b in my taxonomy above. how easy is it to recall the structure of the thing once you’ve recalled the word for the thing? these are just considerations, and the optimal naming strat varies by situs ig. 🍵
I think I have a couple other specific considerations:
By getting ahold of the structure better, the structure can be better analyzed on its own terms. Drawing out implications, resolving inconsistencies, refactoring, finding non-obvious structural analogies or examples that I wouldn’t find by ever actually being in the situation randomly.
By getting ahold of the structure better, the structure can be better used in the abstract within other thinking that wants to think in related regions (“at a similar level of abstraction”).
Values (goal-pursuits, etc.) tend to want to flow through elements in all regions; they aren’t just about the phenomenal presentation of situations. So I want to understand and name the real structure, so values can flow through the real structure more easily.
And a general consideration, which is like: I don’t have good reason to think I see all the sorts of considerations going into good words / concepts / language, and I’ve previously thought I had understood much of the reasons only to then discover further important ones. Therefore I should treat as Not Yet Replaceable the sense I have of “naming the core structure”, like how you want to write “elegant” code even without a specific reason. I want to step further into the inner regions of the Thing(s) at hand.
cool third point! i may hv oversold the point in my first comment. i too try to name things according to their thingness, but not exclusively.
to make a caricature of my research loop, i could describe it as
trying to find patterns that puzzle me (foraging),
distilling the pattern to its core structure and storing it in RemNote (catabolic pathway),
mentally trying to find new ways to apply the pattern
ie, propagating it, installing hooks (which I call isthmuses) into plausibly-related contexts such that new cryptically-related observations are more likely to trigger an insight (metaphor), allowing me to generalise further or discover smth i need to refactor
going abt business as usual, repeating 1-3 until unfolding branch meets unfolding branch from the other side, indicating i might hv found a profitable generalisation
an important consideration re keeping isthmuses alive enough to trigger connections: i don’t want to hv memorised this specific instantiation of the pattern so it’s crystal clear. if it fits neatly into a slot and it’s comfortable w its assigned niche, it’s unlikely to trigger in novel situations. imprecision/fuzziness is good when the concept is still in exploratory phase (and not primarily tool-stage).
fix everything
loop is often bottlenecked by the high cost of refactoring anything. i rly wish i could find a general algorithm/strategy for refactoring complex systems like this, or a clever approach to building that minimises/eliminates the need.
the optimal conlang isn’t a new set of words. it’s a new set of practices for naming things, unnaming things, generalising & specialising, communal decision-processes for resolving conflicts, neat meta-structures that minimise cost of refactoring (somehow), enabling eager contributors w minimal overhead & risk of degeneration, etc.
Absolutely.
I really liked this comment! Please continue to make comments like it!
Thank you! : )
Please continue complimenting people (or express gratitude) for things you honestly appreciate.