Ultralearning Ch. 1 - Can You Get an MIT Education Without Going to MIT?

The author starts by giving some background as to why he started the MIT challenge.

Next, he talks about language learning, and how someone he met was able to learn a new language in 3 months. The key strategy was that instead of formal study, he started diving into conversations right away, using a phrasebook to get started. He was bold in his application, and the approach served him well.

Scott realizes that this approach of aggressive self-education with incredible results wasn’t restricted to languages alone.

Next example is how Roger Craig gamed Jeopardy game show. He used unorthodox tactics and aggressive analytics. These tactics included downloading a large dataset of all the questions ever asked historically on Jeopardy. He analyzed patterns and used spaced-repetition software to learn his weak points and the most likely topics to be asked.

Scott says this isn’t the only person he found who had seen his fortunes change as a result of aggressive self-education. Eric Barone started his own obsession that would extend for nearly five years and require mastering many completely different skills.

Eric Barone created a game called Stardew Valley that made him a millionaire. He created the game all by himself, learning a breadth of skills required to make the game, such as programming, visual art, musical composition, story writing, game design, etc. He had just earned a computer science degree, and wanted to have complete control over his own vision. He chose not to work a programming job, because he didn’t want to get involved into anything substantial. It would have taken up his time, and he wanted to give game development his best shot. Instead, he worked as a theater usher, earning minimum wage so that he wouldn’t get distracted. This, along with support from his girlfriend, allowed him to focus on his passion. The process of practicing directly and redoing things allowed him to get steadily better at all of the aspects of game design.

Then, Scott continues discussing his MIT challenge. His strategy switched from trying to do a single class in several days to spending a month doing three to four classes in parallel. He hoped that interleaving in this way would spread the learning over a longer period of time and reduce some of the negative effects of cramming. As he made more progress, he also slowed down. After it seemed likely that he could finish in time, he was able to shift from studying 60 hours per week to studying 35-40.

Wow, my last OSSU session, I was logging close to 20 hours per week. He was doing 2-3x more hours than me. Maybe it’s possible for me to do more. I am opening my eyes to what’s possible, and I want to push myself to the limits. Scott claims the subjects felt alive and exciting, rather than stale chores to be completed. This is how I feel while I’m going through this learning journey. The ability to follow your own study plan and study topics that you want really keeps the interest and eagerness to study and make progress.

Scott ended up on the front page of Reddit, and this led to job opportunities. For him, job opportunities weren’t the reason he had done the project. He was already happy working as a writer online, which had supported him financially throughout. His goal was to see what was possible.

I want to see what’s possible for me. I’m in a privileged position to have all this free time to dedicate towards a learning project. For me, this learning project is OSSU and anything else related to CS.

Scott goes on to describe his next 2 learning projects, which was to learn 4 languages in a year, and learn how to draw. Using feedback strategies, he was able to improve quickly.

Uncovering the Ultralearners

Scott discusses the many different ultra learners he has come across. He says, "Despite their idiosyncrasies, the ultra learners had a lot of shared traits. They usually worked alone, often toiling for months and years without much more than a blog entry to announce their efforts. Their interests tended toward obsession. They were aggressive about optimizing their strategies, fiercely debating the merits of esoteric concepts such as interleaving practice, leech thresholds, or keyword mnemonics. Above all, they cared about learning. Their motivation to learn pushed them to tackle intense projects, even if it often came at the sacrifice of credentials or conformity."

I resonate with this. He concludes the chapter by saying that he wants to bring the common principles he observed across many ultra learners, and what he could generalize from the extreme examples. He says the things you can accomplish will make ultra learning worth the effort. We are left with a future glimpse of what’s to come, which is spending a moment to see exactly what ultra learning is and how it differs from the most common approaches to learning and education. Then, we can examine the principles that underlie all learning, to see how ultra learners exploit them to learn faster.

Great 1st chapter! Looking forward to continue reading.