Exploring Andy’s notes spaced_repetition
Andy Matuschak has quite elaborate notes on spaced repetition, but his idea to use it for productive writing is especially useful. What people often do is creating a sort of inbox of ideas. These are fleeting notes that might become evergreen notes. The downside of continuously adding to an inbox, is that they usually end up being a large pile of junk, and it becomes scary to even look at them.
A spaced repetition system bolted on top of an inbox, will give a couple of new items a day, which can then be graded (easy, good, hard for memory prompts, but in this case it might be something like “fruitful” & “unfruitful” as Andy does). The note will return to the pile, and some time later return.
In this way a note can gradually be improved, until it becomes either an evergreen note, or gets banished to the archive. For notes to be useful, actively engage with them
This leads to: spaced repetition enables a workflow of incrementally improving notes and evergreen workflow (my current writing system)
See also
Primary sources
spaced repetition is an evidence-based learning technique that is usually performed with flashcards. Newly introduced and more difficult flashcards are shown more frequently, while older and less difficult flashcards are shown less frequently in order to exploit the psychological spacing effect. The use of spaced repetition has been proven to increase the rate of learning.Although the principle is useful in many contexts, spaced repetition is commonly applied in contexts in which a learner must acquire many items and retain them indefinitely in memory. It is, therefore, well suited for the problem of vocabulary acquisition in the course of second-language learning. A number of spaced repetition software programs have been developed to aid the learning process. It is also possible to perform spaced repetition with physical flashcards using the Leitner system.
By taking advantage of the exponential nature of spaced repetition intervals, one could make incremental progress on potentially hundreds of prompts, while considering only a few on any given day.
This would represent a system for incremental thinking. – Spaced repetition may be a helpful tool to incrementally develop inklings
Incremental writing is a method of writing in which ideas are written down and assembled incrementally. Incremental writing requires no linearity. It adapts to your way of thinking. ideas are written down and assembled incrementally – Incremental writing - supermemo.guru