{"id":2168,"date":"2024-06-12T22:30:19","date_gmt":"2024-06-13T03:30:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thinkulum.net\/blog\/?p=2168"},"modified":"2024-06-12T22:30:19","modified_gmt":"2024-06-13T03:30:19","slug":"weeknote-for-5-26-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thinkulum.net\/blog\/2024\/06\/12\/weeknote-for-5-26-2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Weeknote for 5\/26\/2024"},"content":{"rendered":"

Learning<\/h2>\n

\ud83e\udd2f<\/p>\n

I had the epiphany that my memory system should be a language.<\/strong> Reading about the grammar of American Sign Language in the Gallaudet dictionary made me realize that memory techniques sort of have a grammar too as well as the vocabulary I\u2019d already been working on, and it struck me that maybe I could make this grammar and vocabulary consistent and treat a memory system as a language, which would let me use the many resources of linguistics to fill out the system. Similarly to when I first encountered ChatGPT<\/a>, it\u2019s been a captivating thought, though the flow of ideas has been slower, and it\u2019s reminding me of the power of a unifying idea to draw in work from a variety of fields.<\/p>\n

As usual in my projects I immediately launched into a search for resources and tools to work with, and in this case the main ones I found were the r\/conlangs subreddit<\/a>, the open textbook Essentials of Linguistics<\/em><\/a>, and SIL\u2019s lexicography software FieldWorks Language Explorer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So even though I\u2019m past due to wrap up this iteration of the memory project and move on to other areas, there\u2019s no possibility I\u2019ll be dropping it, and instead I\u2019m doubling down on the experiment of having this project live in symbiosis with the others\u2014they will be labs for developing my mnemonic language, and the language will help me learn their material.<\/p>\n

Productivity<\/h2>\n

\ud83e\udd14<\/p>\n

I analyzed my weeknote process again to see how I could write them more easily.<\/strong> My weeknotes were taking too long to write, which is unhelpful when I\u2019m trying to catch up, and they were putting me in procrastination mode. I decided to go back to my old pattern of four sentences per topic and then add other patterns as I discovered them. I\u2019m also planning to move some of the writing to other places, mainly articles on the wiki side of the site, which would make a weeknote less of a self-contained report and more of a log with links\u2014maybe less satisfying to read, but it could help me spread out my writing more naturally and maybe let me post on time.<\/p>\n

Nature<\/h2>\n

\ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

The cicada emergence gained steam in my area, and I\u2019ve been surprised at how much I\u2019ve been enjoying it.<\/strong> I thought they were gross when I was growing up, but in the past few years my revulsion at bugs has morphed into curiosity, so now I find cicadas interesting and funny, like an insect version of frogs<\/a>, with a beautiful, whirring chorus<\/a> in the trees, and I feel kind of protective of them. Great timing, cicadas!<\/p>\n

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A post shared by Andy Culbertson (@thinkulum)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n