His brother’s hint contained information that he couldn’t have gotten by giving the hint to himself. The fact that his brother said this while passing by means that he spotted a low-hanging fruit. If his brother had spent more time looking before giving the hint, this would have indicated a fruit that was a little higher up.
This advice is worth trying, but when you give it to yourself, you can’t be sure that there’s low hanging fruit left. If someone else gives it to you, you know it’s worth looking for, because you know there’s something there to find. (The difference is that they, not you, took the time to search for it.)
Again, it’s a worthwhile suggestion. I just want to point out that it boils down to “If you’re having trouble, check for easier solutions,” and that while you can always give this advice to yourself, it will not always help.
The fact that his brother said this while passing by means that he spotted a low-hanging fruit. If his brother had spent more time looking before giving the hint, this would have indicated a fruit that was a little higher up.
The brother could have spent arbitrarily much time on the jigsaw puzzle before Claude started playing with it.
I suppose, but even then he would have to take time to review the state of the puzzle. You would still expect him to take longer to spot complex details, and perhaps he’d examine a piece or two to refresh his memory.
But that isn’t my true rejection here.
If you assume that Claude’s brother “spent arbitrarily much time” beforehand, the moral of the story becomes significantly less helpful:
“If you’re having trouble, spend an arbitrarily large amount of time working on the problem.”
the moral of the story becomes significantly less helpful: “If you’re having trouble, spend an arbitrarily large amount of time working on the problem.”
I don’t think that’s what it becomes. It remains what it was: ‘a solution exists, and oddly enough, reminding yourself of this is useful’.
Yet that was enough hint to help Claude solve the puzzle. The great thing about this hint… is that you can always give it to yourself.”
Not credibly and not with the actual information content that the brother’s utterance provides. That leaves the question of whether and in what circumstances it is instrumentally rational to self deceive in the direction of optimism bias (or optimism regarding the relative merit of rechecking the low branches for more fruit instead of climbing higher). Some considerations:
Humans have all sorts of biases against doing the kind of tasks that a beginning graduate student has to do. Because evolutionary speaking (and possibly colloquially speaking too, for that matter) it’s probably a crazy thing to be doing. Assuming the academic qualification has been adopted as a goal, however, overriding the long term focus problem with mental hacks is nearly a necessity.
It is more beneficial for others in my society to systematically take risks (in this case of time and potential) than for me to take risks. This would lead me to expect advice of this form to become common wisdom even were it slightly bad for the recipient.
The hint given is sufficiently ambiguous as to be a nudge in the direction of various discrete strategies. This includes “think from the perspective of your model of various other suitable people” which is popular advice itself (with some credible studies backing it).
Mild social competition can be a useful focus for some people’s problem solving skills. Conceivably the imaginary social competition could help too.
An excerpt from a likely-never-to-be-finished essay:
--Manuel Blum, “Advice to a Beginning Graduate Student”
His brother’s hint contained information that he couldn’t have gotten by giving the hint to himself. The fact that his brother said this while passing by means that he spotted a low-hanging fruit. If his brother had spent more time looking before giving the hint, this would have indicated a fruit that was a little higher up.
This advice is worth trying, but when you give it to yourself, you can’t be sure that there’s low hanging fruit left. If someone else gives it to you, you know it’s worth looking for, because you know there’s something there to find. (The difference is that they, not you, took the time to search for it.)
Again, it’s a worthwhile suggestion. I just want to point out that it boils down to “If you’re having trouble, check for easier solutions,” and that while you can always give this advice to yourself, it will not always help.
The brother could have spent arbitrarily much time on the jigsaw puzzle before Claude started playing with it.
I suppose, but even then he would have to take time to review the state of the puzzle. You would still expect him to take longer to spot complex details, and perhaps he’d examine a piece or two to refresh his memory.
But that isn’t my true rejection here.
If you assume that Claude’s brother “spent arbitrarily much time” beforehand, the moral of the story becomes significantly less helpful: “If you’re having trouble, spend an arbitrarily large amount of time working on the problem.”
I don’t think that’s what it becomes. It remains what it was: ‘a solution exists, and oddly enough, reminding yourself of this is useful’.
Not credibly and not with the actual information content that the brother’s utterance provides. That leaves the question of whether and in what circumstances it is instrumentally rational to self deceive in the direction of optimism bias (or optimism regarding the relative merit of rechecking the low branches for more fruit instead of climbing higher). Some considerations:
Humans have all sorts of biases against doing the kind of tasks that a beginning graduate student has to do. Because evolutionary speaking (and possibly colloquially speaking too, for that matter) it’s probably a crazy thing to be doing. Assuming the academic qualification has been adopted as a goal, however, overriding the long term focus problem with mental hacks is nearly a necessity.
It is more beneficial for others in my society to systematically take risks (in this case of time and potential) than for me to take risks. This would lead me to expect advice of this form to become common wisdom even were it slightly bad for the recipient.
The hint given is sufficiently ambiguous as to be a nudge in the direction of various discrete strategies. This includes “think from the perspective of your model of various other suitable people” which is popular advice itself (with some credible studies backing it).
Mild social competition can be a useful focus for some people’s problem solving skills. Conceivably the imaginary social competition could help too.
Good quote. I guess the lesson there would be to tell yourself “It might just actually be possible for me to do this”?