Ask HN: How can I improve my intelligence? As I get older, I am realising there are tons of things I do not know. I am constantly meeting people younger than me that just blow me away with their smarts. What, is anything can I do to improve memory, intellect, acuity etc.. |
Find first priciples always.
for programming language, the more math-like, the better.
You can ensure you are optimally utilising your brain by giving it ideal conditions, including highly regimented consistent sleep, micro and macronutrients.
"Altering" your IQ is easy and same as any other test. Did you get a good sleep last night? Are you hungry? Which time of the day do you take a test in? Is there something in the back of your mind that makes it more difficult for you to focus? Are the questions designed with a different demographic in mind (for example, you're used to right-to-left text while the test is written left-to-right)? Do you like puzzles or do you consider them a hassle? Etc etc.
You're also definitely not as intelligent as a child as you are in old age, meaning that your intelligence absolutely changes during the course of your life. Hence, the decisions you're making today can and do impact your intelligence later in life.
Dismissing it as pseudoscience is unhelpful. Its the most accurate measure we have, its also wholly reliable for what it is used for. Yes, people who have access to IQ tests can eventually game them, so that always needs to be considered.
2) Healthy diet (low weight, appropriate vitamins preferably from foods, etc.)
3) Sleep well - 6.30 hours seem to be the sweet spot, some need a little more (the recent "8 hours or bust" is mostly bogus pseudo-science, which even if peddled by an actual scientist, is not backed up properly, since the data show otherwise).
- All three of the above boost congnitive skills, alertness, memory, etc, more than anything else. If you have some medical issues affecting the above (e.g. some condition), seek help, and treat them as well. E.g. you might need pills to focus. But take care of the above big 3 as a priority.
4) Read a lot. Mostly books.
On fields outside technical/science (where newer is better), try to read a healthy chunk of old ones too.
On scientific fields, read newer stuff, but also some of the classics (e.g. for IT, something like "The Mythical Man-Month").
For the fields you're interested in, don't go for summaries and lazy recaps, go to the sources. Cliff Notes helps you repeat the same talking points as anybody else. Reading the original material helps you form your own perspective (and, if the material is art, it's also a totally deeper experience). Shed the common tech/nerd prejudice that History, Literature, or Philosophy "don't matter".
5) Talk to people. All kinds of people. You don't only learn and get insights from Feynman or Buffet types, but also from a retired pilot, a plumber, a cook, a single mother of two, whatever. Some wont be insights about technical developments or scientific techniques, but will nonetheless be insights into human society, feelings, how the other half lives, and so on.
6) Don't try to master everything. Focus on 1-2 things, and try to get a general knowledge of others. Get personal experience with things you care about, not just theoritical.
7) Stress less. Excess stress (over things one should not stress about, rather than actual heavy problems of the moment) can kill cognitive ability.
8) Don't trust random eight point lists from random idiots on the internet. They could be right, but how would you know?
Here's the discussion part on long sleep:
> Proposed mechanisms for mortality associated with long sleep include: (I) long sleep is linked to increased sleep fragmentation that is associated with a number of negative health outcomes; (II) long sleep is associated with feelings of fatigue and lethargy that may decrease resistance to stress and disease; (III) changes in cytokine levels associated with long sleep increase mortality risk; (IV) long sleepers experience a shorter photoperiod that could increase the risk of death in mammalian species; (V) a lack of physiological challenge with long sleep decrease longevity; (VI) underlying disease processes mediate the relationship between long sleep and mortality.
-> No pain, no gain
https://guzey.com/books/why-we-sleep/
He sort goes a bit ad hominem on some parts but he has a lot of fair points.
Number eight is my fav :-p
Memory can be improved with exercise and various aids, some of which help you pack more into working memory, while others get your data to be close at hand.
I submit your intelligence is what it is.
What this all comes down to is work. While there may be a ceiling for all of us, defined by inability to grok no matter how much work is done, the fact is below that point work has real, tangible benefits.
You can improve your wisdom dramatically too. Processing either your own experience, or that which others share, can give you seriously potent mental tools, rules of thumb, contexts to reason with.
Think of wisdom like you do tools. It is a labor output multiplier. In our youth, we are rarely wise, but we also are white hot nimble. When we are old, we have a body of experience to draw on.
Wise people make more with fewer moves, generally see lower risks and costs and can often gain the benefit of time. That is time for the work needed to be relevant, vital.
All these things combined can really add up. I have changed careers a few times and take these things very seriously each time.
It pays off.
Whatever intelligence we have is likely to be enough, unless our goals are severely misaligned with our basic nature. In my experience, this is rare given one gets to hard work and sets clear priorities.
And that is the last thing. We lose a little of that youthful nimble mind as we age. It does not go away, but it does require priority to manifest and serve the function you need it for.
When you perform these works, make them count. Be present and give yourself time to play, explore, shake off inhibition.
Trust you will get there.
Don't compare yourself to others. Rather, set goals for yourself that work best for you.
But do keep learning and drawing inspiration from others. We are not meant to be islands unto ourselves.
Challenge your mind with books and articles that may run counter to your ingrained beliefs. Sit down and have a game of chess with someone who is the opposite of you on issues of the day.
Get out in nature, take regular walks through the local park, cemetery, etc. There's evidence that this has therapeutic effects on the brain and body.
Grow a garden, get your fingers in the dirt, eat your own homegrown produce.
Shake it up and do something totally new and different: African drumming, Asian cooking, 3D printing (my new hobby).
(sidenote: are you sure it's really "smarts"? Many people (younger and older) just have a combination of superficial knowledge with good salesperson skills. It creates the illusion of an expert)
Personally, I think it comes down to an ability to focus. I don't think there's a problem so impenetrable that time and focus can't crack.
The problem is (again, IMO) that today's society rewards quick feedback. I find myself in a disadvantage as I need quite a lot of time to sit down, break the problem down and reflect on it. I'll give an example on how this is unfair: school system exams. Everyone gets the same time, even though some will get there eventually if only given more time.
So perhaps the problem is not you, and your natural thinking rhythm.
This article had a huge impact on me: The T-Shaped Information Diet - https://junglegym.substack.com/p/the-t-shaped-information-di....
Here's the basic idea:
> The T-shaped talent model suggests that the best way to grow your abilities is to build a shallow understanding across a breadth of domains and a depth of expertise in whichever domain is most relevant to your profession.
But most people spending a lot of time working in a domain are still mediocre at it.
2) Surround yourself with those smarter than yourself.
You're doing fine!
Human-level intelligence, so far, is something miraculous. Your specific "intelligence" is fixed, but without the fundamentals (sleep, diet, exercise etc), you cannot know how much that is... Your learning, practice, experience, curiosity, playfulness, discovery and invention compounds day by day, building on itself, increasing your "apparent intelligence".
Follow your interest (you may need to push yourself at first), and you can become expert in something, and impress others as they have impressed you. Even better, you can guide them as they have guided you. OTOH
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be smarter and dumber persons than yourself.I think what you should focus on is making progress for your own sake; * overall it's about consciously (re)exposing yourself to intellectual inspiration, and making to effort to ingrain it. (meaning, next time around you have more tools to reason and express) *
1) throw out absolutism, completism, perfectionism, focus on 'good enough model / summary' that you repeat or relate to others
2) apply models of repetition as explained in things like 'learning how to learn', and 'the power of habits' (etc) to your reading, processing and decision making. Include reasoning, wisdom, and not just knowledge.
3) takeaways from any source can be on topic, form, style etc. You can learn a way of phrasing from one context that helps you convey your argument in another. (have fun with it)
4) reflect on experiences where you were in peak form. Your goal is to get to this more often, en recognize the path.
5) Try to make a manifesto or main collection of powerful ideas that should guide you. you can alter it along the way, strengthen it with references etc. just make sure you do the work of revisiting and culling. This is your externalized intellectual memory.
- bonus: take your pick of philosophical, spiritual, psychological texts and find some golden nuggets about how to appreciate yourself and deal with our sometimes negative instincts.
But supposing you do mean intelligence, then: First you need to take good care of your 'machine'. Enough rest, good diet, enough exercise, avoid aggravating things and people. There will be days it's not working; learn to recognize them; don't struggle, get some chores done.
After that: there are many kinds of intelligence. Get that list, pick the one you want to work on.
One example: creative intelligence. The kind authors, artists, composers, (even programmers!) may have. (Or not.) First they have to learn how to take great dictation (writing words, or painting, or writing musical notes down) ... to 'get ready'. Then they need to learn to get their 'brain intelligence' out of the way to get the flow going. Many will use some kind of mind-altering substance substance to get there. (Be careful you don't get owned.) Einstein got his top ideas by imagining. Music players get their chops solid, and then 'go nuts' (or artistic, depending on the genre). If you're lucky, 'The Source' will then start pouring. (Doesn't have to be 'artistic', just something where 'new' is an advantage... you have to be open to it.)
(1) try examining and playing with your beliefs. I highly recommend Sleight of Mouth, a book by Robert Dilts [0], in this area - it's 'content free' framework.
(2) ...also within the realm of mind/language, get to know 'meta model' from NLP patterning - this will work in the same direction as (1). Fifth chapter in [2] will show you the way. It's also 'content free' knowledge - meta knowledge.
(3) last, but not least... another big framework for a complete make over is to get to know a Voice Dialogue perspective. Embracing Our Selves [3] is a great and complete resource (I know, I repeat myself with this one a lot).
The changes you introduce using these perspectives will make a big, slow ripples throughout your mind. Voice Dialogue can blow your mind in an instant. All of this will help you release limitations of your mind which your mind places on itself. The path does not end and the journey is fascinating.
[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/667096.Sleight_of_Mouth
[2] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61610.Introducing_Neuro_...
[3] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/419437.Embracing_Ourselv...
Without stirring abroad
One can know the whole world;
Without looking out the window
One can see the way of heaven.
The further one goes
The less one knows.
Therefore the sage knows without having to stir,
Identifies without having to see,
Accomplishes without having to act.
In case anyone thinks this is about "an old grandpa that sits on his porch and just enjoys life" or something like that - it's not. The last three lines are exactly what good leadership is.
1/ The Bioneer - Current research on improving intelligence/working memory - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsGFCg72zoA&list=PLZo07XrNsS...
2/ Huberman Lab podcast - A deep dive into the mechanisms of our brain and body - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/how-to-focus-to-change...
For learning, check out fs.blog: https://fs.blog/mental-models/
For practice, check out Decision School: http://decisionschool.org/
If you are meeting smart people, talk to them and learn from them.
Otherwise, read more, think more, rest, relax, and have fun in between.
Lower your stress level. Secure your finances, relationships.
Intelligence is a non goal. Goal is to satisfy your curiosity, or accomplish some goals, or learn something interesting.
I have an intuitive sense that you have the intelligence to meet your goals, so the keys will end up being focus, drive, the ability to stay with it when the going gets really rough, and the humility to ask for help when you need it.
I recommend diving deep into problems that interest you, noodle on them until you fully understand the problem or start coming up with solutions. This also improves your intuition.
Personally, my memory (especially working memory) improves drastically after long hours and days of thinking. Memory improves as you build your cognitive knowledge map and the puzzle pieces start to connect and the picture becomes clearer.
Pick a problem that means something to you and start from there. It's sometimes hard to find such problems especially if you aren't into a particular domain. In such cases, start by understanding a domain you love and the problems will start popping.
this link may be helpful.
How old are you? How old they? Can you give some example of "blew away smartness"?
I’m a bit on edge, because as of right now I have no idea what that is. I’ve come up with a few medium-long to long term plans that will be an huge time investment and likely in some way a moderate monetary investment, but am not sure if I have the intelligence to complete them. Worse even, I figure I would unlikely find out until I’m significantly invested in them. Due to a mix of things like laziness and poor focus (the latter of which you note can be improved) that I believe in part has held me back in that past, but I also feel that certain failures could be due to intelligence, but as of right now, I’m unable to differentiate.
Either:
trust you are smart enough, and we almost always are, and commit to hard work
, or
abandon it and move on something lower risk, lower cost, but with a respectable or worthy reward
, or
seek help.
Rough place to be in, frankly. I do not envy you. :(
And what of the rewards?
You might try valuing them this way:
Actual value = (predicted value * risk) - (cost * time)
To also add,, I have been told meditation can help and I would also like to start that.
I find that I lack focus, memory and interest. My curiosity and desire to learn has been replaced with "CBA" for want of a better phrase.
I want to be better, smarter and able to understand situations better.
Of all that I said, being present, as in seriously lucid, is the biggest bang for the buck in all this work as you transition through age. Lucidity is much duller, not as potent of a state when one has a noisy mind.
It can bring you those young eyes and help you internalize wisdom.
Those fast, smart people will see that and value it. Hell, I did and have had wise mentors over the years too.
I cannot overstate the value in all of that. Nailing hard tasks beats quick convo over coffee almost everytime.
There is a big difference between being able to trade in smart things and wise people who can focus well and drill down to vital insights, and or see the golden ones amidst a pile of brassy, attractive things.
That's all I got really. Good luck!
Could you please expand on this?
First and foremost, being really present, lucid for new experiences, or as an observer to others new experiences, captures a lot of information in the moment that has high value.
Taking a while after something like that to think through it internalized it, what rules may apply, what dynamics were present, and details and importance is a very good exercise. What this does is kind of solidify and amplify the memory of the experience.
Secondly, a great many things are connected. As we have time, making those connections can yield perspective and commonality that can save us a lot of time in the future by recognizing when those things are in play. And what I mean by that is you may actually have a skill or an understanding that that's workable already known to you, but you don't know it because you have never matched up the task at hand with the full set of tools you possess.
This is going to seem like a silly example, but when I was working in the shop, I found a lot of similarities between how I staged the material I was handling, optimize the process I was executing, and programs how data moves, what's efficient what's not, that sort of thing.
Once I had that realization, I broke every production record in the building regularly, with very little negative impact, and a lot of positive impact.
I spent a lot of time in manufacturing, as and being a prototype mechanic, making things directly with my hands and the tools. I also spent a fair amount of time upfront engineering, putting in systems for automation, doing layout design reviews and that sort of thing.
I worked with a lot of people, from older workers who'd been doing this their whole lives to young people just getting started.
Take production. More fit, younger people do well, given they have discipline.
Now, protos, or improving production works very differently. Sometimes the goal is to make one or two of something hard.
Here, the people who have had experiences, who know how to think, who can qualify and quantify risks, who have an internal sense of the dynamics, scale, etc... who can feel its good, rock!
Normally it takes many years to perform that role. I was the youngest by a couple decades. And I performed well.
And that all happened because I understood the phrase you asked me more about.
Working with those guys, who learned their craft in all analog means, no computers was amazing!
Wisdom is to how we think and how productive those thoughts are like tools are to labor.
Here is the secret:
You watch with eyes and mind wide open. Try to remember that state when you were a little kid, no preconceptions and excitement, openness to a new thing and just be ultra lucid, present.
Then, afterword, think about it, connect things together, and then share with others to firm it up, get clarity and filter out noise, error.
Many people become good at repeating what they have seen or done. Does not matter physical, virtual, whatever. It is monkey see, monkey do.
And that's great! It is a skill I value highly, makes me a great technician.
But, the second order on all that is to know why, be able to derive that from basics and compare to other "whys" already known.
The third order comes with time, and that is perspective, scale, expectations, being able to plan well in advance, and execute with confidence, despite large portions of the task at hand being novel.
Truth is far less is truly novel, and we do not realize and benefit from that because we do not take the time to really see what our experiences, or those shared with us mean.
Ursula Le Guin's rendition is maybe more impactful to the modern reader:
So the wise soul
doesn't go, but knows;
doesn't look, but sees;
doesn't do, but gets it done.The only thing that is wrong is the fatalism with which he presents it. It's the 'do this or die soon' fear mongering which is uncalled for.
Life is complicated do what you can and what works for you.
It's a reference to focus. Sometimes those quick coffee conversations are part of the focus and make a lot of sense and are big help. Sometimes a fresh mind can really do wonders.
They also can be a major league distraction, and or a source of anti Focus. I wasn't really clear on that and should have been. Hopefully this helps.
I need at least 8 and preferably 10 hours of sleep (as an average).
I'd expect the optimum for mortality and congnitide ability in this case would be about the same. Else we'd have the case of something worsening your health but making you smarter (whereas for food, exercize, etc. it's the inverse).
>I need at least 8 and preferably 10 hours of sleep (as an average).
While there is more or less sleep required by different people, note that what an individual "needs" might not be the optimum for them under all conditions, but be such because e.g. they are stressed, overworked, sleep badly, etc.
E.g. someone with apnea (e.g. due to weight) might need 10 hours of sleep to feel well, but that is because they have low quality sleep, and need the extra time to conpensate - not because their organism, if cured of its apnea, actually needs that amount of time optimally.
Its probably due to reverse causation. If you are ill then the best thing you can do is sleep, so ill people sleep more. Its not that sleep is bad. If those people only slept say 8h then their health outcomes would be much worse. Basically if you are sleeping 11h then you should be worried about an underlying medical condition, not from the actual amount of sleep itself