The Best Tacit Knowledge Videos on Every Subject

Parker Conley31 Mar 2024 17:14 UTC
375 points
143 comments16 min readLW link

TL;DR

Tacit knowledge is extremely valuable. Unfortunately, developing tacit knowledge is usually bottlenecked by apprentice-master relationships. Tacit Knowledge Videos could widen this bottleneck. This post is a Schelling point for aggregating these videos—aiming to be The Best Textbooks on Every Subject for Tacit Knowledge Videos. Scroll down to the list if that’s what you’re here for. Post videos that highlight tacit knowledge in the comments and I’ll add them to the post. Experts in the videos include Stephen Wolfram, Holden Karnofsky, Andy Matuschak, Jonathan Blow, Tyler Cowen, George Hotz, and others.

What are Tacit Knowledge Videos?

Samo Burja claims YouTube has opened the gates for a revolution in tacit knowledge transfer. Burja defines tacit knowledge as follows:

Tacit knowledge is knowledge that can’t properly be transmitted via verbal or written instruction, like the ability to create great art or assess a startup. This tacit knowledge is a form of intellectual dark matter, pervading society in a million ways, some of them trivial, some of them vital. Examples include woodworking, metalworking, housekeeping, cooking, dancing, amateur public speaking, assembly line oversight, rapid problem-solving, and heart surgery.

In my observation, domains like housekeeping and cooking have already seen many benefits from this revolution. Could tacit knowledge in domains like research, programming, mathematics, and business be next? I’m not sure, but maybe this post will help push the needle forward.

For the purpose of this post, a Tacit Knowledge Video is any video that communicates “knowledge that can’t properly be transmitted via verbal or written instruction”. Here are some examples:

  • Neel Nanda, who leads the Google DeepMind mechanistic interpretability team, has a playlist of “Research Walkthroughs”. AI Safety research is discussed a lot around here. Watching research videos could help instantiate what AI research really looks and feels like.

  • GiveWell has public audio recordings of its Board Meetings from 2007–2020. Participants include Elie Hassenfeld, Holden Karnofsky, Timothy Ogden, Rob Reich, Tom Rutledge, Brigid Slipka, Cari Tuna, Julia Wise, and others. Influential business meetings are not usually made public. I feel I have learned some about business communication and business operations, among other things, by listening to these recordings.

  • Andy Matuschak recorded himself studying Quantum Mechanics with Dwarkesh Patel and doing research. Andy Matuschak “helped build iOS at Apple and led R&D at Khan Academy”. I found it interesting to have a peek into Matuschak’s spaced repetition practice and various studying heuristics and habits, as well as his process of digesting and taking notes on papers.

For information on how to best use these videos, Cedric Chin and Jacob Steinhardt have some potentially relevant practical advice. Andy Matuschak also has some working notes about this idea generally. @Jared Peterson, who “researches and trains tacit knowledge” recommends the book Working Minds “which teaches how to do Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA) which is a major interviewing technique for uncovering tacit knowledge.”

How to Submit

Share links to Tacit Knowledge Videos below! Share them frivolously! These videos are uncommon—the bottleneck to the YouTube knowledge transfer revolution is quantity, not quality. I will add the shared videos to the post. Here are the loose rules:

  1. Recall a video that you’ve seen that communicates tacit knowledge—“knowledge that can’t properly be transmitted via verbal or written instruction”. A rule of thumb for sharing: could a reader find this video through one or two undirected YouTube searches? If not, share it.

  2. Post the title and the URL of the video.

  3. Provide information indicating why the expert in the video is credible. (However, don’t let this last rule stop you from sharing a video! Again—quantity, not quality.)[1]

To make the comments easy to navigate, please format your comment as follows:[2]

Domain: Programming, Game Development

Link: Programming livestream VODs

Person: Jonathan Blow

Background: Creator of Braid and The Witness.

Why: Blow livestreams himself coding games and creating a programming language. I imagine people who do similar things would find his livestreams interesting.

List of Tacit Knowledge Videos

(last updated 08-25-2024)

To receive ~monthly updates with lists of new videos, subscribe to the ‘Tacit Knowledge Video Updates’ Substack.

Software Engineering

Machine Learning

  • Andrej Karpathy, Neural Networks: Zero to Hero.

    • 10+ years: Stanford PhD, research scientist at OpenAI & Tesla. (Website)

  • Jeremy Howard, fast.ai live coding & tutorials.

    • “He is the co-founder of fast.ai, where he teaches introductory courses, develops software, and conducts research in the area of deep learning. Previously he founded and led Fastmail, Optimal Decisions Group, and Enlitic. He was President and Chief Scientist of Kaggle” (Wikipedia).

Competitive Programming

Game Development

Web Development

Other

Research, Studying, & Problem Solving

Research

Studying

Problem Solving

Business & Business Communication

  • Elie Hassenfeld, Holden Karnofsky, Timothy Ogden, Rob Reich, Tom Rutledge, Brigid Slipka, Cari Tuna, Julia Wise: GiveWell’s Public Board Meetings (2007–2020 have audio).

    • Holden Karnofsky. “Director of AI Strategy (formerly CEO) of Open Philanthropy and Co-Founder of GiveWell” (Website).

    • Elie Hassenfeld. Co-Founder and CEO of GiveWell (LinkedIn).

    • Timothy Ogden. Chief Knowledge Officer at Geneva Global, Inc.; founding editor of Gartner Press; founder of Sona Partners; chairman of GiveWell (Aspen Institute).

    • Rob Reich. Political Science professor at Stanford for 26 years (Stanford).

    • Tom Rutledge. Has worked in finance since 1989 (LinkedIn).

    • Brigid Sliplka. Director of Philanthropy at ACLU (LinkedIn).

    • Cari Tuna. President at Open Philanthropy and Good Ventures (Wikipedia).

    • Julia Wise. Community Liaison at Centre for Effective Altruism (LinkedIn).

  • Stephen Wolfram, “Live CEOing”.

    • “Fellow of the American Mathematical Society. […] founder and CEO of the software company Wolfram Research where he works as chief designer of Mathematica and the Wolfram Alpha answer engine.” (Wikipedia).

  • Sam Altman, Paul Graham, others; live Y Combinator office hours.

    • Sam Altman. CEO of OpenAI; former President of Y Combinator (Wikipedia).

    • Paul Graham. Co-founder of Y Combinator (Wikipedia).

    • Other YC employees.

  • Ray Dalio, “case study” recordings of business meetings and interviews with employees at Bridgewater on App Store app Principles In Action; I do not know of a way to access these through a web browser.

    • Founder of Bridgewater Associates.

  • Tegus, a library of expert interviews for finance professionals. Unfortunately, its price seems to start at $20-25,000 per user and year.

  • Misha Glouberman, Recorded Coaching Session. (h/​t @Misha Glouberman)

    • “Consultant, Business Coach, and Co-Author of The Chairs Are Where The People Go.”

    • Testimonials: Mark Surman, President of Mozilla; Shenda Tanchak, Registrar & CEO of Ontario College of Pharmacists; Michael Bungay Stanier, Author of The Coaching Habit; others (Website).

Construction & Craftsmanship

Cooking

Engineering & Machining

Farming

Finance

Disclaimer, copy-pasting a comment from @Max Entropy:

[...] I’m skeptical of your recommendations (DeepFuckingValue and Martin Shkreli). The former made his money pumping-and-dumping meme stocks, and I get the impression the latter has been selected for fame (like recommending Neil deGrasse Tyson to learn physics).

In general, I think finding good resources in finance requires a much stronger epistemic immune system than nearly any other field! There’s so much adverse selection, and charlatans can hide behind noisy returns and flashy slide decks for a very long time. I’ve worked at a top quant trader long enough to spot BS, and the KL-divergence between what competent looking YouTubers say and what actually works is extreme.

  • Martin Shkreli, Finance Lessons.

    • “American financial criminal and businessman. Shkreli is the co-founder of the hedge funds Elea Capital, MSMB Capital Management, and MSMB Healthcare, the co-founder and former CEO of pharmaceutical firms Retrophin and Turing Pharmaceuticals, and the former CEO of start-up software company Gödel Systems, which he founded in August 2016. [...] In 2017, Shkreli was charged and convicted in federal court on two counts of securities fraud and one count of conspiracy for activity unrelated to the Daraprim controversy. He was sentenced to seven years in prison and up to $7.4 million in fines.” (Wikipedia).

    • Anecdote from an experienced finance friend: “I haven’t watched his videos, but remember a couple of (reasonable) people expressing surprise that they’re legit introductions to financial modeling.”

  • Aswath Damodaran, “Reading a 10K”.

    • “Professor of Finance at the Stern School of Business at New York University, where he teaches corporate finance and equity valuation. [...] Damodaran is best known as the author of several widely used academic and practitioner texts on Valuation, Corporate Finance and Investment Management as well as provider of comprehensive data for valuation purposes” (Wikipedia).

    • Anecdote from an experienced finance friend: “Damodaran is an NYU prof who’s super credible and well regarded for his practical tutorials on valuations and corporate finance, I used to refer to his blog often.”

  • Roaring Kitty (DeepFuckingValue), trading livestreams.

    • Held a $53,000 investment that turned into a $50 million in Gamestop. Seems he got into some regulatory trouble. I’m not sure about the specifics of this (Wikipedia).

Housekeeping & Parenting

Media & Arts

Design

  • Various skilled CAD users and instructors, CAD vs. CAD Speedrunning Tournament. (h/​t @zookini)

    • “Watch some of the best SOLIDWORKS, OnShape, Fusion 360 and Inventor users Speedrun some challenging models while going head to head and sharing their screens” (YouTube).

  • Sofia Bue, SFX Sculpting. (h/​t @Freyja)

    • “Sofia Bue is a professional SFX sculptor; she works at Weta Workshop which is the most well-known special FX company in the world; they were responsible for SFX on Lord of the Rings. She also won the SFX category at the world Bodypainting championships at least once so I think she’s pretty indisputably world-class at it.”

  • MDS, live UI design.

    • Here’s his Dribble.

  • Andy Matuschak, live design stream on his Patreon (paywalled).

    • Crowdfunded researcher. “[H]elped build iOS at Apple and led R&D at Khan Academy” (Website).

Filmmaking

Music

  • Jacob Collier, music composition, arrangement, production. (h/​t @bertrand russet)

    • “6-time (at 29 yo) Grammy-winning multi-instrumentalist.”

  • Philip Quast, masterclass in singing Les Mis (full interview). (h/​t @Yoav Ravid)

    • “He has won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical three times, making him the first actor to have three wins in that category. He is perhaps best known for his role as Inspector Javert in the stage musical Les Misérables and in the Les Misérables: The Dream Cast in Concert” (Wikipedia).

  • Seymour Bernstein, teaching piano. (h/​t @lfrymire)

    • “Pianist and composer, performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Adjunct Associate Professor of Music and Music Education at New York University.”

    • “Tonebase (a paid music learning service) recorded a number of free to watch conversations with Bernstein while he plays through or teaches a piece. Bernstein is about 90 years old at the time of recording and shares an incredible amount of tacit knowledge, especially about body mechanics when playing piano.”

  • Zane Carney; composing, recording, and producing music live.

    • Guitarist who has contributed to albums like Thundercat’s “Drunk” and John Mayer’s “Paradise Valley.” Has toured with Jonny Land and John Mayer (Website).

  • BNYX, Olswelm, and other indie (?) music producers; music production livestream VODs.

    • Unsure of credibility. A friend into music production recommended some of the videos on this channel. He specifically liked BYNX and olswel.

Productivity

Sports & Games

Therapy

  • Carl Rogers, Frederick Perls, Albert Ellis, Everett Shostrom, Arnold Lazurus, Aaron Beck: Three Approaches to Psychotherapy—recorded therapy sessions.

    • Carl Rogers. Founder of person-centered psychotherapy; one of the founders of humanistic psychology (Wikipedia).

    • Frederick Perls. Developed Gestalt therapy with his wife, Laura Perls (Wikipedia).

    • Albert Ellis. Founder of rational emotive behavior therapy (REBT) (Wikipedia).

    • Everett Shostrom. Put together the film. “He also produced well known tests and inventories including the Personal Orientation Inventory, Personal Orientation Dimensions, the Pair Attraction Inventory, and the Caring Relationship Inventory ” (Wikipedia).

    • Arnold Lazurus. “Authored the first text on cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) called Behaviour Therapy and Beyond” and won various awards including two from the American Psychological Association and the American Board of Professional Psychology (Wikipedia).

    • Aaron Beck. “He is regarded as the father of cognitive therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)” (Wikipedia).

  • Dr. Alok Kanojia, “interviews” with influencers.

    • 6 years as a private psychiatrist; 6 years as a Clinical Fellow and Instructor in Psychiatry at Harvard; 5 years doing psychiatry at McLean Hospital (LinkedIn).

  • Esther Perel, live couples’ therapy session[s] with a guest couple. (h/​t @Freyja)

    • “It is rare to get access to a recorded therapy session, and she is at least world-renowned as a relationship therapist (although that doesn’t necessarily prove that she’s good at it).”

Transportation

Writing

Miscellaneous

  • David J. Peterson, “The Art of Language Invention” (30-episode series on language construction: ‘conlang’). (h/​t @Jonathan Sheehy)

    • He’s been creating languages for fun since 2000 and creating languages professionally since 2009. He’s done work for shows like HBO’s Game of Thrones, Syfy’s Defiance, Syfy’s Dominion, The CW’s Star-Crossed, The CW’s The 100, Showtime’s Penny Dreadful and the movie Marvel’s Thor: The Dark World. He published a book called The Art of Language Invention (he shares his credentials in this video).

  • Paul Meehl, Philosophical Psychology 1989 course lectures, “deep introduction to 20c philosophy of science, using psychology rather than physics as the model science—because it’s harder!” (h/​t @Jonathan Stray)

    • “Meehl was a philosopher of science, a statistician, and a lifelong clinical psychologist. He wrote a book showing that statistical prediction usually beats clinical judgement in 1954, and a paper on the replication crisis in psychology in 1978. He personally knew people like Popper, Kuhn, Lakatos, Feyerabend, etc. and brings their insights to life in these course lectures.”

    • Me: I was hesitant to add a lecture series to this list at first. I changed my mind after listening to the first video, where Meehl provides interesting details (gossip, almost) about the life of an academic and the various personalities of his successful academic peers.

  • Kenneth Folk, Guided Tour to 13 Jhanas and pranayama breathing.

    • “Kenneth Folk is an instructor of meditation who has received worldwide acknowledgement for his innovative approach to secular Buddhist meditation. After twenty years of training in the Burmese Theravada Buddhist tradition of Mahasi Sayadaw, including three years of intensive silent retreat in monasteries in Asia and the U.S., he began to spread his own findings, successfully stripping away religious dogma to render meditation accessible to modern practitioners” (Website).

  • Keith Johnstone, teaching improv.

    • Author of Impro.

    • “A pioneer of improvisational theatre, he was best known for inventing the Impro System, part of which are the Theatresports” (Wikipedia).

  1. ^

    What valuable project did they ship? How many years have they worked for their prestigious company or university? How many papers have they published? What awards have they won? What other domain-relevant metric did this person perform well on? You could also give your feedback based on your expertise. Ideally, these are proxies for the knowledge and expertise of these practitioners being good.

  2. ^

    Feel free to leave out the ‘Background’ and ‘Why’ sections.

Parker Conley31 Mar 2024 17:14 UTC
375 points
143 comments16 min readLW link