POV: You're Having Fun And It No Longer Feels Like A Punishment

It’s August which means I’m obsessed with all of my pens and journals again 🤌🖋️

to the anon struggling with the kanji memrise course, there is also some just in kana, such as course 29267 which is for Genki 1 or 258569 which is N5 grammar for beginners. (I can't link the courses in an ask, but you can put 'course/258569' in the memrise URL, hope this helps ^^

for the anon ^

thanks for the tip 💖

you are the dearest to my heart.

ig: cawefee

Find them here!

I want to try learning Kanji and I think I want to try it your way w having a kanji and the list of vocabulary the kanji it is in. Was it a teacher or yourself that made those lists?

I made the lists! I made them based off of the jouyou kanji break down (this list is all over the internet). So I’m learning grade-by-grade, and just learning common vocabulary attached to those particular kanji. It’s possibly a more grueling process, but it’s helping me.

I also use WaniKani, which uses a slightly similar system of learning kanji in vocabulary. They do teach readings first, however.

Pain is temporary. GPA is forever.

What did you learn about people? How might a person who is not studying develop their bullshit-ometer?

“What did you learn about people” is much too broad to answer given how much is covered in a three year bachelors degree. Everything from theories of the self, errors biases and heuristics, attitudes and emotions, theories behind behaviours, social influence, group affiliation, psychological development from childhood to adulthood and its effect, models of personality and individual differences, memory, how we learn, the psychology of choice and decisions, and the genetic/biological/social/environmental factors of all of the above and what happens when it goes wrong and becomes pathology.

In terms of developing a bullshit-ometer, or improving your judgement and understanding of evidence, the key is practice. For a module in my first year we were given a paper every week and a prompt sheet to fill in that effectively helped you tear the paper apart. Prompts included everything from the method and sample size, to the statistical tests used, whether they were used appropriately, and whether all of the assumptions of each test were met, etc. It would take me upwards of two hours to get through a ten page paper, and even then I’d miss things. Three years on, I can skim a paper or article or hear a person’s argument, spot any major red flags, and tear it apart under exam conditions in thirty minutes. It takes a lot of time and work to be able to do it quickly. Having it embedded as a philosophy into everything you’re learning helps as you start doing it unconsciously eventually.

Resources:

Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. To me, an absolutely essential read.

The Art of Statistics by David Spiegelhalter. Spiegelhalter is a statistical genius, and he’s now spending his time trying to change the way statistics is taught, moving it away from learning loads of formulas and then trying to figure out how they relate to evidence, towards the PPDAC (problem, plan, data, analysis, conclusion) model. To understand evidence and pick up the misuse of statistics (aka bullshit) you need at least a basic understand of stats. This book does it perfectly, in plain English, with interesting examples. I wish it had been published when I first started my degree.

I Think You’ll Find It’s A Bit More Complicated Than That by Ben Goldacre. This is a collection of most of Ben Goldacre’s columns which used to appear in The Guardian, in which he takes a claim in the media or a new study and tears it apart. It’s an interesting read, might change your perception on a few things, and is him tackling bullshit in practice.

Reckoning With Risk by Gerd Gigerenzer. There are lots of complex statistics in this (which he signposts and you can just pass over), but understanding how statistics of risk work, and what they mean, will completely change how you read and assess a lot of claims made in the news.

The Students 4 Best Evidence blog. It mainly covers evidence based medicine, but the key concepts transfer to all research and claims outside of medicine. Anything under the bias, critical thinking, intro to evidence-based practice, and statistics topics is relevant. Particularly anything tagged ‘tutorials and fundamentals’. Their Key Concepts Archive is a good place to start.

The Testing Treatments website. Again, covers medicine, but most of the points generalise out. Under each concept, say ‘association is not causation’, there is a ‘find learning resources’ link that will find papers, online courses/modules, and books about that concept.

Cochrane Training. Cochrane are the gods of the systematic review. All their online learning modules surrounding assessing evidence are here.

Think Again: How to Reason and Argue, either the book, or the online course. The perfect crash course in reasoning, arguing, avoiding fallacies, picking apart other people’s arguments, and finding bullshit.

The Clearer Thinking website has a range of tools/mini modules. Relevant ones here:

How well can you tell reality from B.S.?

Interpreting evidence

Belief challenger, making your views more accurate

Guess which experiments replicate

More books.

A Field Guide to Lies and Statistics: A Neuroscientist on How to Make Sense of a Complex World by Daniel Levitin

How To Lie With Statistics by Darrell Huff

22.08.2022|| Hello! I watched too many shows in august, and made a spread for it. I'll start going to uni from next week!!! It has rained almost everyday the past week and the weather is really nice.

What shows are you watching?

august 5th 2020 // been feeling a bit low lately, i always get this feeling in the summer like i’m wasting valuable time doing nothing and yet i’m still putting off my summer work oops. did my first bujo spread since october today though and i’m feeling a lot more motivated and organized! now to crack on with my mountain of IAs and revision for IB mocks in october eeek. hope everyone’s having a good summer and staying safe :)