My general impression of the book

I think this does an outstanding job of capturing something that I’ve been feeling but that I was unable to put words to
The title of the book doesn’t really capture how profound the actual content is. To me, the value of the book is closer to “the existential and practical implications of extreme connectivity and powerful software”
The book alternates between “deeply insightful and profound truth” and “absolute bread and butter productivity advice”
Heaps of very evil animal experiments are referenced which I think is a shame
Personally speaking, this book explains a lot about me that I found confusing - e.g. my intuitive attraction towards very lofi/text-based tools, my allergy to email, my difficulty finding any benefit from coworking, my need to have the lights off when working if im tired
So while I think there are some things in this book that aren’t news to anyone who has read a productivity book before, there are also extremely valuable insights that I think will help me for many years
Some of the bits of empirical evidence are overinterpreted

Specific notes

Specifically listened to a) the audiobook and b) the two-part interview from 20240827 and 20240829 from the Greg Mckeown Podcast

We frequently receive information that is current, uninvited, and fragmented.

Current information (i.e. events happening today or whatever) distort our sense of space and time and make it feel like we are personally involved, even if it has no bearing on us

fragmentation and disorientation
e.g. krakatoa doesn’t just explode on java, it explodes in milwaukee, and now in the bedrooms in milwaukee
we’ve evolved to feel personally involved in events that are within proximity to us, so having distorted space and time, we mis-prioritise by giving attention and feeling threatened by events that are not within proximity to us
the medium we use changes us
I wonder if this is why I have this intuitive attraction towards lo-fi environments, even history as a discipline and old records

Fragmented information means that we fill in the gaps ourselves without necessarily noticing, and we don’t subject the information we fill in to proper scrutiny, so we get things wrong

Three gears: gear 1 = daydreamy, gear 2 = deep work, and gear 3 = hypervigilant. Correlated with noradrenaline.

Gear 2 is the best gear to be in for any form of knowledge work
Though there is still a spectrum between gears, e.g. the slow end of gear 2 (towards gear 1) is excellent for creative work
In gear 3, you’re ingesting information and responding automatically, but not really thinking deeply about what you’re putting in and out. Like sprinting. It’s okay in short doses, as long as it’s counterbalanced by time in a lower gear.
Gear 3 associated with information overload
Gear 3 is good for critical emergencies but not good for knowledge work - you miss nuance, lack judgment, and make overhasty decisions
Some people’s brains shift between gears more readily in response to environment, e.g. more easily triggered. Sticky vs shifty gears.
I’m certainly far on the shifty end!
This kinda makes sense to me - I feel quite anxious and hypervigilant in response to new information that my brain perceives as threatening/negative, even if I’m filling in parts of the detail (e.g. how society will actually change in the face of AI developments) that aren’t necessarily based on solid evidence or rigorous reasoning. This can help explain why I usually feel better with less stimulation and less new information.
You can control your environment to e.g. be in a slow gear 2 or a high gear 1 for very creative work, often early in the morning right after waking up

sleep - naps!

especially right after lunch
but you then have to make sure you exert yourself, either physically or mentally, to sleep well at night
you can train yourself to adjust your gear type (sticky vs shifty)
caffeine is a classic gear raiser - so more just use with wisdom

the pace of technological development has far outpaced the pace of human adaptability

characterised by high info volume, low info quality, insufficient attention
you cannot possibly “learn” something and hope to have it stick around for a long time - you need to repeatedly learn the best way to do things
exactly the same thing as I was talking about in that recent blog post (see my blog post on the existential implications of the pace of scientific development)
so just jump in and accept that you might need to learn new tools
I think it’s kind of a shame that the author’s conclusion is “if you can do this, you’ll have an edge over others” which feels overly competitive and not helpful for most people, sort of says “here’s how to do well in this system” rather than “here’s how we can think about this system to help everyone”
some other helpful tidbits: reduce redundancy and noise, like supplementary information, to reduce mental load; writing things down rather than memorising