Spaced repetition can allow for infinite recall (2022)(efavdb.com)
efavdb.com
Spaced repetition can allow for infinite recall (2022)
https://www.efavdb.com/memory%20recall
207 comments
Wozniak estimates that you actually get a maximum of~300,000 based on his decades of data, so it seems the simplified model misses some effect and so converges to the wrong total: https://supermemo.guru/wiki/How_much_knowledge_can_human_bra...
Wozniak is incredible, it saddens me that SuperMemo will probably drift into obscurity due to being closed source and the chances of seeing its source code drift away day by day, it took a few years to get anything beyond IE support after that died.
I wish to see a FOSS incremental reading application in the very least, such an underrated concept.
I wish to see a FOSS incremental reading application in the very least, such an underrated concept.
There is some progress in open source implementations. Anki originally used a SuperMemo-2 implementation, it now uses the improved FSRS algorithm. There is also an incremental reading addon.
It's a fairly opinionated space, which is surprising since there is good data. But regardless, SuperMemo, FSRS, both work, you will make progress with either. People can just pick either and get started.
https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/free-spaced-repeti...
https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/935264945
It's a fairly opinionated space, which is surprising since there is good data. But regardless, SuperMemo, FSRS, both work, you will make progress with either. People can just pick either and get started.
https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/free-spaced-repeti...
https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/935264945
> I wish to see a FOSS incremental reading application in the very least, such an underrated concept.
There's an Anki plugin[0] though I know almost nothing about Anki or incremental reading, so I have no idea who good it is.
0:https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/999215520
There's an Anki plugin[0] though I know almost nothing about Anki or incremental reading, so I have no idea who good it is.
0:https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/999215520
> I wish to see a FOSS incremental reading application in the very least, such an underrated concept.
Be the change you wish to see in the world
Be the change you wish to see in the world
Wow, never heard of SuperMemo and this Wozniak. What an interesting and awesome rabbit hole
The site's a great rabbit hole to go down for a few days. Woz is the father of digital spaced repetition.
Be aware that it's not peer reviewed, and some of the findings take a lot of experimentation if you want to dive deep and reproduce them.
My understanding is that his thoughts on sleep are pretty controversial within the sleep optimization community.
Be aware that it's not peer reviewed, and some of the findings take a lot of experimentation if you want to dive deep and reproduce them.
My understanding is that his thoughts on sleep are pretty controversial within the sleep optimization community.
I used to dabble in the sleep space since my circadian rhythm is shot anyway.
But the self reporting aspects of the “data” always made me suspicious. People in certain phases of sleep dep, hypoxia, or a number of other debilitating events don’t know they’re experiencing symptoms until someone else tells them they are. That’s why you’re trained to look for signs in others.
So I am sorry but I don’t trust you if you tell me you feel great on four hours of sleep a day. Let’s do a task or a test and see if you can brain or you’re just euphoric.
But the self reporting aspects of the “data” always made me suspicious. People in certain phases of sleep dep, hypoxia, or a number of other debilitating events don’t know they’re experiencing symptoms until someone else tells them they are. That’s why you’re trained to look for signs in others.
So I am sorry but I don’t trust you if you tell me you feel great on four hours of sleep a day. Let’s do a task or a test and see if you can brain or you’re just euphoric.
There was a HN post a few months ago, [sadly I can't find it] which correlated healthy sleep with faster card answering times in Anki.
I haven't used Supermemo, but believe it has fairly strong sleep tracking capabilities.
I've dabbled about doing the same in AnkiDroid. We could pull data from Android Health, and do something interesting with it, but we've got hundreds of other things to do, Google will probably pull our app from the Play Store if we request health data, and it at the moment it's a little out-of-scope and would be better for an addon using our API
I haven't used Supermemo, but believe it has fairly strong sleep tracking capabilities.
I've dabbled about doing the same in AnkiDroid. We could pull data from Android Health, and do something interesting with it, but we've got hundreds of other things to do, Google will probably pull our app from the Play Store if we request health data, and it at the moment it's a little out-of-scope and would be better for an addon using our API
I complained on that one about how repeating tests like this usually results in better answers over time so the fact the author saw the same results may mean no negative effects, or just very slow decline. Which tells us something interesting but doesn’t mean it’s necessarily harmless.
You have to be careful and spread your tests over a bunch of subjects to find the patterns.
You have to be careful and spread your tests over a bunch of subjects to find the patterns.
Interesting! Thanks for the insights. Do you happen to have the link to hand so I can delve into it, rather than refer to it anecdotally?
I still remember vividly the day I first heard of SuperMemo and Wozniak, I spent the next ~6 hours reading everything about him and his software.
Interesting fact, SuperMemo is written in Pascal.
Interesting fact, SuperMemo is written in Pascal.
Yeah, I've been in the same (amazing) rabbit hole, can recommend.
Are there any public sources about SM being written in Pascal? TIL
Are there any public sources about SM being written in Pascal? TIL
Turbo Pascal: https://super-memory.com/articles/soft/sm2.htm
As a colleague of mine used to phrase it, "yeah, I could learn that new thing but then I'd have to give up an episode of Gilligan's Island" ...
But this estimate is for "free learning"?
I have been wondering about this in the context of being ready for work in the age of LLM‘s. What nobody can deny is that they memorize information at a superhuman level, so it might reduce the value of having done that myself. On the other hand, “couldn’t you just google that“has been an erroneous retort to the value of space repetition for decades, during which I’ve gotten a lot of value out of doing. has been a erroneous retort to the value of space repetition for decades, during which I’ve gotten a lot of value out of doing it.
In the same way that notation is a tool of thought [1] actually knowing facts paves routes[2] of possibility and impossibility (instead of pausing everything to research or drowning in too many paths).
It's akin to seeing 37*55 and knowing it won't be a 20 digit number, greatly reducing your search space. Imagine feeding someone without knowing what they like (how do you choose something?) vs. "allergic to dairy"?
[1] https://www.jsoftware.com/papers/tot.htm [2] https://alexalejandre.com/programming/forge-deeper-thought/
It's akin to seeing 37*55 and knowing it won't be a 20 digit number, greatly reducing your search space. Imagine feeding someone without knowing what they like (how do you choose something?) vs. "allergic to dairy"?
[1] https://www.jsoftware.com/papers/tot.htm [2] https://alexalejandre.com/programming/forge-deeper-thought/
It seems pretty easy to illuminate this question once you consider concrete examples.
For example, neither google nor an LLM replaces the utility of building your own vocabulary so that you can express yourself in a foreign language when you're in convo with someone.
For example, neither google nor an LLM replaces the utility of building your own vocabulary so that you can express yourself in a foreign language when you're in convo with someone.
If the goal is for you to be understood in a foreign language, this will become possible in the near future with real time translation with something as simple as an AirPod. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WzUnEfiIqP4
Sure but being understood and expressing yourself are not the same.
sunnybeetroot explicitly said being "if your goal is being understood then x".
A software-based spaced repetition system probably could have made someone appear borderline superhuman in the era before Google. Google cleared a lot of this low-hanging fruit, and then it became "merely" the best way to cram facts into your noggin so you can become an expert at whatever you want, which is still extremely valuable. Your doctor probably used SRS to get through medical school, and now look at how much money they're making. For most professions, nothing -> Google was probably a much bigger jump than Google -> LLMs, so I expect that to still largely be the case.
TL;DR: SRS is, perhaps counterintuitively, most useful for those of us seeking true mastery over something.
TL;DR: SRS is, perhaps counterintuitively, most useful for those of us seeking true mastery over something.
> it became "merely" the best way to cram facts into your noggin so you can become an expert at whatever you want
Counterpoint: a noggin full of facts does not an expert make. Makes a good cocktail party trick, or Jeopardy champion. Expert in a subject? Definitely not.
Counterpoint: a noggin full of facts does not an expert make. Makes a good cocktail party trick, or Jeopardy champion. Expert in a subject? Definitely not.
Necessary, but not sufficient. Even the greatest genius can't operate without any raw material in there.
> during which I’ve gotten a lot of value out of doing. has been a erroneous retort to the value of space repetition for decades, during which I’ve gotten a lot of value out of doing it.
I imagine spaced repetition is not actually a cause of repeating yourself. That's just caused by being too lazy to proofread before you post.
I imagine spaced repetition is not actually a cause of repeating yourself. That's just caused by being too lazy to proofread before you post.
LLMs memorize information at a superhuman level the same way an 8 tb harddisk does.
Silly.
Silly.
Actually it's way easier to search for the information in an LLM compared to an 8 tb harddisk.
The search is vague, and the result is nondeterministic, but in a lot of cases it's still the better method.
https://fchollet.substack.com/i/137628402/llms-as-program-da... I like the way this article puts it. "LLM is a continuous, interpolative kind of database"
The search is vague, and the result is nondeterministic, but in a lot of cases it's still the better method.
https://fchollet.substack.com/i/137628402/llms-as-program-da... I like the way this article puts it. "LLM is a continuous, interpolative kind of database"
> the result is nondeterministic
That funny way to spell "hallucinated"
That funny way to spell "hallucinated"
[deleted]
What you remember becomes part of your thinking and reasoning. So no, why would you google something if it doesn’t come to mind as something relevant.
> What you remember becomes part of your thinking and reasoning
I find it also true for books, you unconsciously internalize things by reading the full book VS reading a summary. I sometimes reread books I read 10+ years ago and I often have these "ah so that's where I got this idea from". Most of the time it isn't even about the main point of the book, it can be a sentence or a dialogue that left an imprint on your psyche
I'd hate to be a simple proxy between google/llms and the real world
I find it also true for books, you unconsciously internalize things by reading the full book VS reading a summary. I sometimes reread books I read 10+ years ago and I often have these "ah so that's where I got this idea from". Most of the time it isn't even about the main point of the book, it can be a sentence or a dialogue that left an imprint on your psyche
I'd hate to be a simple proxy between google/llms and the real world
You can't know it all so choose what is important to know and what you look up.
I would even go as far as to say, you don’t know something, so you look it up, and now you know the thing. Onus to remember notwithstanding, I personally feel like when I look something up I didn’t know, it tends to stick.
Except for the regex syntax, and ffmpeg pipelines, I won’t ever dedicate brain-space for those.
So I suppose I contradict myself. Huh. Nuts.
Except for the regex syntax, and ffmpeg pipelines, I won’t ever dedicate brain-space for those.
So I suppose I contradict myself. Huh. Nuts.
it doesn't have to become part of your thinking and reasoning, even in context, even though it does carry some actual weight. because it can be (over)shadowed. something that some people currently learn to code into LLMs, if I understood layering and quantization more or less superficially correct.
so, you might want to google it, because some part in the back of your head itches to remember something that is actually relevant and located on the rim (of the knowledge graph) of something that you do remember.
fucked up indexing. an 8 hour rabbit hole and that one of 43 links you didn't open in a new tab.
so, you might want to google it, because some part in the back of your head itches to remember something that is actually relevant and located on the rim (of the knowledge graph) of something that you do remember.
fucked up indexing. an 8 hour rabbit hole and that one of 43 links you didn't open in a new tab.
FSRS is a really clever iteration on Anki's SM2 algorithm. I've been playing around with various spaced repetition implementations lately - there's a great collection of open source libraries at github.com/open-spaced-repetition. I ended up using their typescript bindings for a vocabulary builder I'm working on (deft.so) and it's been surprisingly straightforward to implement.
I found FSRS is not great for languages because it optimized for the wrong thing, ie. how likely you will recall a word after X days without encountering that word.
There are 2 big problems:
1. If you are studying seriously, you will encounter many words outside your SRS practice, so the FSRS prediction fails flat.
2. More importantly, language learning is not about recalling words.
The algorithm I use for my app has a different set of objectives, it's <30 lines of straightforward code, and it works better (I tested it for months to be sure about it)
I'll open source it soon
There are 2 big problems:
1. If you are studying seriously, you will encounter many words outside your SRS practice, so the FSRS prediction fails flat.
2. More importantly, language learning is not about recalling words.
The algorithm I use for my app has a different set of objectives, it's <30 lines of straightforward code, and it works better (I tested it for months to be sure about it)
I'll open source it soon
I used the same binding for a kanji learning app (https://shodoku.app).
I had some problems with their documentation though. Following their examples was pretty straightforward, but I always had trouble e.g. what is the difference between State.Learning and State.Relearning, or what does fuzzy mean in FSRS parameters, or reps on a Card. You have to either read the algorithm explainer or the Anki source code to understand that.
I had some problems with their documentation though. Following their examples was pretty straightforward, but I always had trouble e.g. what is the difference between State.Learning and State.Relearning, or what does fuzzy mean in FSRS parameters, or reps on a Card. You have to either read the algorithm explainer or the Anki source code to understand that.
> I had some problems with their documentation though.
I agree that our documentation is pretty bad at the moment haha. But I'm hoping we'll start cleaning things up more this year. I'd also like to potentially move away from using github's wiki system...
I agree that our documentation is pretty bad at the moment haha. But I'm hoping we'll start cleaning things up more this year. I'd also like to potentially move away from using github's wiki system...
On the Anki side: if you document it, I'll answer questions.
Thanks for your work. My issues were exclusively stuff like this page here: https://open-spaced-repetition.github.io/ts-fsrs/interfaces/...
It is great to have the docs well organized like this, what is missing is just a short explanation of what all those mean. The information is available, e.g. in the README or in the source code. So honestly it is just a minor annoyance, rather than a major issue. I was able to use ts-fsrs just fine actually.
It is great to have the docs well organized like this, what is missing is just a short explanation of what all those mean. The information is available, e.g. in the README or in the source code. So honestly it is just a minor annoyance, rather than a major issue. I was able to use ts-fsrs just fine actually.
It's fine for MIT work.
The Anki database format is still pretty opaque, despite a few efforts over the years, and it would be great to open some of this this up to allow apps to export apkgs
It doesn't help that our wiki is noindexed by GitHub: https://github.com/ankidroid/Anki-Android/wiki/Database-Stru...
The Anki database format is still pretty opaque, despite a few efforts over the years, and it would be great to open some of this this up to allow apps to export apkgs
It doesn't help that our wiki is noindexed by GitHub: https://github.com/ankidroid/Anki-Android/wiki/Database-Stru...
Can’t read Anki source unless your work is GPL. Could you share the insights yourself?
My work is MIT, as is ts-fsrs. I said anki source code, but I was being hyperbolic. To understand the different exports of ts-fsrs I had to browse around in different repos at https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition (particularly rs-fsrs; which I think is used in Anki proper) as well as read the algorithm https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/fsrs4anki/wiki/The... and infer by names being used.
I complain here, but this is open source and if I was slightly more ambitious I would submit PR with the missing docs (or at least an issue).
PS. my work is here https://github.com/runarberg/shodoku in case you are interested, but the source code bears the mark of being a weekend hobby project, so read at own risk ;)
I complain here, but this is open source and if I was slightly more ambitious I would submit PR with the missing docs (or at least an issue).
PS. my work is here https://github.com/runarberg/shodoku in case you are interested, but the source code bears the mark of being a weekend hobby project, so read at own risk ;)
Thanks for sharing details
I'd like to port my own flashcards app, Manabi from SM2 to FSRS so this is helpful
I made this companion reader app as well, btw, for learning Japanese: https://reader.manabi.io
I'd like to port my own flashcards app, Manabi from SM2 to FSRS so this is helpful
I made this companion reader app as well, btw, for learning Japanese: https://reader.manabi.io
Nice. I jumped straight to FSRS so I can’t compare, but so far I have no regrets. One of my features is I progressively disappear the furigana in the included dictionary and example sentences, as the reading proficiency of the kanji increases (specifically at 99% retrievability) https://github.com/runarberg/shodoku/blob/main/src/helpers/f... This feature was very easy to implement as retrievability is inherent in the algorithm (maybe it is in SM2 as well; I don’t know; but it was trivial in FSRS).
This library also makes it easy to undo a review (one of my missing features) as long as you keep the review records (which this library also makes easy).
This library also makes it easy to undo a review (one of my missing features) as long as you keep the review records (which this library also makes easy).
Very nice to have these modern setups under freer open source licenses. I have all my data synced to the client to work offline, so it's very nice having FSRS available on iOS & elsewhere (+ ability to run the rust one)
I thought I recognized your username from a political debate here a few months ago. I figured you would enjoy the donations page of my app:
https://shodoku.app/about#donations
> If you insist on paying for this app, consider donating to UNWRA instead.
Glad to see solidarity among the Japanese learning community.
> If you insist on paying for this app, consider donating to UNWRA instead.
Glad to see solidarity among the Japanese learning community.
Free Palestine!
Not all of Anki's source code is GPL. The FSRS implementation used within Anki is BSD, for example.
I know, my message is about referencing FSRS usage rather than its implementation
Besides LineByLine (https://linebyline.app), does anyone have tips on memorizing long texts using spaced repetition?
SuperMemo 19 (2024 - Desktop/Windows) has incremental reading support
https://super-memory.com/help/read.htm
Disclaimer: AnkiDroid maintainer
https://super-memory.com/help/read.htm
Disclaimer: AnkiDroid maintainer
Thank you so much for your work on Anki Droid, I use it daily
Much appreciated, thank you!
Still got a long way to go for me to be happy, but we make great progress every year
https://forums.ankiweb.net/t/ankidroid-2024-roundup-2-20-1-c...
Still got a long way to go for me to be happy, but we make great progress every year
https://forums.ankiweb.net/t/ankidroid-2024-roundup-2-20-1-c...
I don't how well it works in practice for long texts, but for song lyrics I've used this Anki plugin: https://ankiweb.net/shared/info/2084557901
It takes a text, and creates a bunch of cloze deletion cards, each presenting you with a number of lines, and asking you to recall the next line.
It takes a text, and creates a bunch of cloze deletion cards, each presenting you with a number of lines, and asking you to recall the next line.
No offense but why don't you memorize the songs by singing them instead? I memorized hundreds of songs just by being a dad and singing to my kids every evening. Of all the things you'd want to remember, song lyrics look to me to be the easiest by far.
I guess it matters how long it is and if you need to know it exactly, and how long you need to retain it. I had to memorize 50 to 100 word phrases and I chained them together with index cards. The first sentence is the cue for the second, the second for the third, etc. Carried them around in my pocket in order and started from first a few times a day until I could do the whole thing. But I only needed to know it exactly for a few weeks usually.
I've gotten tremendous mileage out of exporting book highlights to BufferApp.com and setting them to release only once per day or so. Shuffled, they pop up days, weeks, months after I've put down the book, re-igniting its themes as they spark discussion.
I also made a theoretical calculation like this a couple of years ago [1]. I didn't answer the question "Can you memorize an infinite number of facts?" but rather the question "If you add a constant number of cards to Anki each day, what does your daily review load look like in the limit?"
[1]: https://issarice.com/long-run-anki-review-load
[1]: https://issarice.com/long-run-anki-review-load
We've recently added a simulator in the deck options of the new scheduler.
If you don't want to upgrade to FSRS
* Export a colpkg
* File -> Switch Profile -> New
* Import
* Deck Options -> Enable FSRS & Optimize
* FSRS Simulator (experimental)
If you don't want to upgrade to FSRS
* Export a colpkg
* File -> Switch Profile -> New
* Import
* Deck Options -> Enable FSRS & Optimize
* FSRS Simulator (experimental)
I wrote a kanji learning app around Anki’s Flexable Spaced Repetition (FSRS) algorithm https://shodoku.app
My design principal is that I don’t need to be limited to few words, a sentence, and maybe a picture for each flash card. Instead each flashcard can be the all the relevant parts of the whole dictionary related to the kanji that you are learning.
Another design principal (where I deviate from Wankikani) is that drawing the kanji helps remembering it. So my app has two sided cards, one for drawing and one for reading. Both reading and writing practice include every word in the dictionary + example sentences that contains that kanji.
My third design principal is that I can learn vocabulary at the same time as I learn the meaning and the writing of the kanji (in fact, I like to learn a few vocab words instead of memorizing the different readings). So you can bookmark vocab words you want to learn along the kanji, and the next time the SRS system picks the kanji up for review, these words pop up at the top, to help you recall.
Note that the app is still in development, so use at your own risk, although I am actively using it for my kanji-studies. I still have a couple of features missing before I can call it done enough.
My design principal is that I don’t need to be limited to few words, a sentence, and maybe a picture for each flash card. Instead each flashcard can be the all the relevant parts of the whole dictionary related to the kanji that you are learning.
Another design principal (where I deviate from Wankikani) is that drawing the kanji helps remembering it. So my app has two sided cards, one for drawing and one for reading. Both reading and writing practice include every word in the dictionary + example sentences that contains that kanji.
My third design principal is that I can learn vocabulary at the same time as I learn the meaning and the writing of the kanji (in fact, I like to learn a few vocab words instead of memorizing the different readings). So you can bookmark vocab words you want to learn along the kanji, and the next time the SRS system picks the kanji up for review, these words pop up at the top, to help you recall.
Note that the app is still in development, so use at your own risk, although I am actively using it for my kanji-studies. I still have a couple of features missing before I can call it done enough.
> I still have a couple of features missing before I can call it done enough.
I've checked your website and HN profile but there's no email to contact you, so here are some simple suggestions: when you enter a deck, I would suggest you add 2 shortcuts or buttons: one to randomly jump from the present card to another one of the same deck, and the other to randomly jump to another deck in the review set
This is because when faced with a sequence, the brain learns the order the element in the set, which may affect recall.
Being able to randomize the set helps prevent that, and give better results.
I've checked your website and HN profile but there's no email to contact you, so here are some simple suggestions: when you enter a deck, I would suggest you add 2 shortcuts or buttons: one to randomly jump from the present card to another one of the same deck, and the other to randomly jump to another deck in the review set
This is because when faced with a sequence, the brain learns the order the element in the set, which may affect recall.
Being able to randomize the set helps prevent that, and give better results.
Thanks for the suggestion. The code is open sourced at https://github.com/runarberg/shodoku
I think you were browsing the cards and using the quick navigation to go to another card in the same deck. When you actually review the cards using the SRS system to review the cards (the big “Review” button), there is a setting (in the settings view) to enable fuzz (a small random delay; defaults to on) which will effectively scramble the cards for your next review. I actually had been using it for a couple of months without fuzz and just random noise in my retention abilities were enough to scramble the decks, at least in my experience.
But a button in the quick navigation bar when browsing the cards to jump to a random card is not a bad idea.
I think you were browsing the cards and using the quick navigation to go to another card in the same deck. When you actually review the cards using the SRS system to review the cards (the big “Review” button), there is a setting (in the settings view) to enable fuzz (a small random delay; defaults to on) which will effectively scramble the cards for your next review. I actually had been using it for a couple of months without fuzz and just random noise in my retention abilities were enough to scramble the decks, at least in my experience.
But a button in the quick navigation bar when browsing the cards to jump to a random card is not a bad idea.
> I think you were browsing the cards and using the quick navigation to go to another card in the same deck.
Yes, I was just looking at how it works because I liked how you presented your design principles.
My personal design principle is to minimize friction and allow immersion to concentrate on the task and not on the navigation.
> I actually had been using it for a couple of months without fuzz and just random noise in my retention abilities were enough to scramble the decks, at least in my experience.
I don't know about you, but when using cards or other repetition-based systems, I've found my recall is strongly increased by randomization: if you can "predict" which card you will be shown next (and I often did), you are not learning the content of the card, but their sequence. This is helpful for some tasks where order matters, but it's often an hinderance for things that don't have a natural order
> But a button in the quick navigation bar when browsing the cards to jump to a random card is not a bad idea.
A button is nice, but since your content doesn't fully fit on the screen, you should also consider keyboard shortcuts: being able to immerse in the viewing helps a lot for memorizing (cutting distractions)
After a while, I guess you must have nailed the common part (the drawing) while still benefiting from the varying part (the list of words): if you can have that on the screen more easily, without much friction (like scrolling down past the drawing), you will be able to immerse into that. Exposing the drawing area could be a setting, or more simply you could have shortcuts or buttons to jump to the word section.
Actually, maybe you should also get a button and a shortcut to randomize the words themselves: to take a quick example, https://shodoku.app/kanji/%E5%85%88 lists 104 words.
I think you know the #1 better than say the #103, because you have seen the top of the list more. If they are sorted by frequency (ie how common they are), that could be good when begging, but after a while you may want to learn the less common one, and having to scroll down may reduce your desire to do so.
I tested jumping to the bottom of the page with the End key, and I think you have a "load-on-demand", so you should be able to test my hypothesis quickly: look at the web server stats for the chunks of a given page for your own IP, and plot the frequencies: I think the bottom where the #103 word is will be seen far less often that the top where the #1 word is.
You have made a very cool project, and I like your design principles, so I hope you won't find my suggestions offensive or disrepectful.
Yes, I was just looking at how it works because I liked how you presented your design principles.
My personal design principle is to minimize friction and allow immersion to concentrate on the task and not on the navigation.
> I actually had been using it for a couple of months without fuzz and just random noise in my retention abilities were enough to scramble the decks, at least in my experience.
I don't know about you, but when using cards or other repetition-based systems, I've found my recall is strongly increased by randomization: if you can "predict" which card you will be shown next (and I often did), you are not learning the content of the card, but their sequence. This is helpful for some tasks where order matters, but it's often an hinderance for things that don't have a natural order
> But a button in the quick navigation bar when browsing the cards to jump to a random card is not a bad idea.
A button is nice, but since your content doesn't fully fit on the screen, you should also consider keyboard shortcuts: being able to immerse in the viewing helps a lot for memorizing (cutting distractions)
After a while, I guess you must have nailed the common part (the drawing) while still benefiting from the varying part (the list of words): if you can have that on the screen more easily, without much friction (like scrolling down past the drawing), you will be able to immerse into that. Exposing the drawing area could be a setting, or more simply you could have shortcuts or buttons to jump to the word section.
Actually, maybe you should also get a button and a shortcut to randomize the words themselves: to take a quick example, https://shodoku.app/kanji/%E5%85%88 lists 104 words.
I think you know the #1 better than say the #103, because you have seen the top of the list more. If they are sorted by frequency (ie how common they are), that could be good when begging, but after a while you may want to learn the less common one, and having to scroll down may reduce your desire to do so.
I tested jumping to the bottom of the page with the End key, and I think you have a "load-on-demand", so you should be able to test my hypothesis quickly: look at the web server stats for the chunks of a given page for your own IP, and plot the frequencies: I think the bottom where the #103 word is will be seen far less often that the top where the #1 word is.
You have made a very cool project, and I like your design principles, so I hope you won't find my suggestions offensive or disrepectful.
> You have made a very cool project
Thanks, I appreciate it ;)
> Keyboard shortcuts
It is on my missing feature list.
Another missing feature is next or previous stroke buttons (and keyboard shortcuts). I want to be able to use this flawlessly on a device without a touch screen, where you simply draw the kanji on a peace of paper (or even your palm). Users that use it like that should be able to benefit from stroke hints as well.
On the vocab list, the purpose is to give you some example words which you can use to learn the reading. I usually bookmark 1-3 words in my first writing practice, which will then appear at the top of the vocab list for later reviews, I will than try to learn along with the kanji. Another missing feature is integration with Anki proper. I would like to quickly create a vocab card for that word and add it to my Anki deck (I would rather not use this app for vocab practice). My current ordering of the vocab words is kind of a mess, I do some JLPT word-list prioritization. Having the most basic words on top. randomizing could be a good feature here. Another could be alternate sorting for the vocab words, or even a search bar.
I actually just host this on github pages, so I don’t have access to access logs (or I don‘t know how to access them). In the near future this is going to be a progressive web app with a hard cache of all the assets (which I generate into static assets from an sqlite3 database on my own machine) so you could actually use this offline with if you previously browsed the kanji.
Thanks, I appreciate it ;)
> Keyboard shortcuts
It is on my missing feature list.
Another missing feature is next or previous stroke buttons (and keyboard shortcuts). I want to be able to use this flawlessly on a device without a touch screen, where you simply draw the kanji on a peace of paper (or even your palm). Users that use it like that should be able to benefit from stroke hints as well.
On the vocab list, the purpose is to give you some example words which you can use to learn the reading. I usually bookmark 1-3 words in my first writing practice, which will then appear at the top of the vocab list for later reviews, I will than try to learn along with the kanji. Another missing feature is integration with Anki proper. I would like to quickly create a vocab card for that word and add it to my Anki deck (I would rather not use this app for vocab practice). My current ordering of the vocab words is kind of a mess, I do some JLPT word-list prioritization. Having the most basic words on top. randomizing could be a good feature here. Another could be alternate sorting for the vocab words, or even a search bar.
I actually just host this on github pages, so I don’t have access to access logs (or I don‘t know how to access them). In the near future this is going to be a progressive web app with a hard cache of all the assets (which I generate into static assets from an sqlite3 database on my own machine) so you could actually use this offline with if you previously browsed the kanji.
Random bit of UX feedback. When on https://shodoku.app/decks/add the + symbol means to add the deck, but in the interface even knowing that I accidentally pressed it 3 or 4 times to try and fold back the kanji after having clicked "show".
Thanks for the feedback. I am a UX engineer and frankly I‘m a little embarrassed I was caught employing such a bad UX pattern.
Even without the confusion of toggling a hidden detail, the or-or-off toggle button is known to be bad UX as it is unclear whether the toggler is on or off, unless clarified with a label. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39342649
My next feature is going to be custom decks, which is implemented on this page. I will for sure fix this (by adding labels, and changing the icon to a checkmark for active decks).
Thanks again, this was helpful.
Even without the confusion of toggling a hidden detail, the or-or-off toggle button is known to be bad UX as it is unclear whether the toggler is on or off, unless clarified with a label. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39342649
My next feature is going to be custom decks, which is implemented on this page. I will for sure fix this (by adding labels, and changing the icon to a checkmark for active decks).
Thanks again, this was helpful.
> Anki’s Flexable Spaced Repetition (FSRS)
Sorry to nitpick: Free Spaced Repetition Scheduler
https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/
Sorry to nitpick: Free Spaced Repetition Scheduler
https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/
Discussed at the time:
Spaced repetition can allow for infinite recall - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32381206 - Aug 2022 (169 comments)
Spaced repetition can allow for infinite recall - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32381206 - Aug 2022 (169 comments)
I made a well-received native iOS/macOS app for mining Japanese web and ebook content (Mokuro manga up next) into Anki or my own companion flashcard app: https://reader.manabi.io
I'm now working on flashcard auto-reviews while reading, so that if you read words/kanji that you have cards for, it'll automatically mark those cards as reviewed rather than ask you to recall them shortly after you just had to recall during your reading.
I hope this helps people replace more SRS time with actual reading (or listening)
I'm now working on flashcard auto-reviews while reading, so that if you read words/kanji that you have cards for, it'll automatically mark those cards as reviewed rather than ask you to recall them shortly after you just had to recall during your reading.
I hope this helps people replace more SRS time with actual reading (or listening)
I've done the whole spaced repetition and Anki thing, realized that if it's boring, you won't learn as well, and you won't stick with it in the long term, once you miss a week and suddenly you have 863 reps to get through to catch up. Instead, read stuff you're interested, apply it in your work, learn mostly Just In Time for when you need it. Learn by doing.
Strongly disagree. The worst thing that’s happened to educational theory is the idea that everything needs to be fun and exciting to be worth doing. Some stuff is worth doing because it works, even if it’s a little boring. SRS is one of those things.
If an approach is so boring that you don't do it, then what does it matter how effective it might be?
Either find a way to make it less boring or switch up the approach. Whatever gets you to keep a habit is what's important.
Same with any habit we want to develop. Cooking. Exercise. Language learning. Building software. Meet people.
Either find a way to make it less boring or switch up the approach. Whatever gets you to keep a habit is what's important.
Same with any habit we want to develop. Cooking. Exercise. Language learning. Building software. Meet people.
Because realistically doing your Anki cards should take 10-30 minutes a day, maximum. If you can’t slog through 30 minutes of learning vocabulary/etc. then the thing you’re learning isn’t very important to you. SRS isn’t about doing flash cards for hours on end, it’s about determining the maximum retention rate while doing the minimum amount of work.
Even then, personally I don’t find Anki that boring at all. But I make custom cards that include audio, images, and other items.
Even then, personally I don’t find Anki that boring at all. But I make custom cards that include audio, images, and other items.
> If you can’t slog through 30 minutes of learning vocabulary/etc. then the thing you’re learning isn’t very important to you
This obviously isn't the case if there's an alternative approach that does work for you.
> Even then, personally I don’t find Anki that boring at all.
Right, and you're having trouble picturing how something you get for free (or take for granted) has a cost for others. Isn't it obvious?
Running 10km a day is a great way to stay in cardiovascular shape. If you like running, it might be a great daily habit for you. But would you say other people must not care about their body just because they're not willing to run 10km, but they are willing to bicycle, swim, or kickbox daily?
This obviously isn't the case if there's an alternative approach that does work for you.
> Even then, personally I don’t find Anki that boring at all.
Right, and you're having trouble picturing how something you get for free (or take for granted) has a cost for others. Isn't it obvious?
Running 10km a day is a great way to stay in cardiovascular shape. If you like running, it might be a great daily habit for you. But would you say other people must not care about their body just because they're not willing to run 10km, but they are willing to bicycle, swim, or kickbox daily?
I think you are dramatically undervaluing how effective SRS is. 30 minutes of doing flashcards with Anki will accomplish about 500% as many other learning activities in the same time, in my experience.
So the point is that while SRS might be boring at times compared to other types of learning, the benefits are worth it. Effectiveness of learning does not correlate directly with enjoyment.
To phrase this another way: yes, in general you should find learning methods that appeal to you. But spaced repetition is so effective that it’s worth implementing, even if you don’t enjoy it.
Edit: using the metaphor that you added: if say, doing jumping jacks for 10 minutes burned 10x calories than every other exercise does in 60 minutes, and your goal is to lose weight, then yeah, it would seem a little silly to me to avoid doing jumping jacks because you don’t enjoy them. The benefits are worth the hassle.
So the point is that while SRS might be boring at times compared to other types of learning, the benefits are worth it. Effectiveness of learning does not correlate directly with enjoyment.
To phrase this another way: yes, in general you should find learning methods that appeal to you. But spaced repetition is so effective that it’s worth implementing, even if you don’t enjoy it.
Edit: using the metaphor that you added: if say, doing jumping jacks for 10 minutes burned 10x calories than every other exercise does in 60 minutes, and your goal is to lose weight, then yeah, it would seem a little silly to me to avoid doing jumping jacks because you don’t enjoy them. The benefits are worth the hassle.
GP: If an approach is so boring that you don't do it... Either find a way to make it less boring...
You: But I make custom cards that include audio, images, and other items.
I think you're agreeing!
You: But I make custom cards that include audio, images, and other items.
I think you're agreeing!
Not really if the solution is to stop using SRS. In my experience the benefits are as good as the hype.
You know what is more effective than spaced repitition? Reading, listening, and doing to the thing you are interested in. Anki gives you fact that are disjointed from what you need. using the skill forces a study of what is important not facts that are of no use.
i'm not saying spaced repititon is useless - it is a great beginners tool. However you need to move on as soon as possible. once you can use the skill that is better in gereral. Doctors use spaced repition more than most because there are a lot of rare things they will never encounter but mixed in is one rare thing they need to know instantly and they cannot know in advance what that thing is. Almost nothing else is both like that and doesn't allow time to look it up.
note that reading/doing something is itself spaced repititon. It isn't algorithemic but it is still randon spacing of things you need to know and the more you need it the more often it repeats
i'm not saying spaced repititon is useless - it is a great beginners tool. However you need to move on as soon as possible. once you can use the skill that is better in gereral. Doctors use spaced repition more than most because there are a lot of rare things they will never encounter but mixed in is one rare thing they need to know instantly and they cannot know in advance what that thing is. Almost nothing else is both like that and doesn't allow time to look it up.
note that reading/doing something is itself spaced repititon. It isn't algorithemic but it is still randon spacing of things you need to know and the more you need it the more often it repeats
I agree with you for language learners.
I built and ran the academic side of a language school for four years, worked on two language learning startups and also learned two languages in different language families from my native language (and from each other) to a pretty fluent level.
In all those years I’ve never met a single really successful learner who made SRS a major part of their studies, though some used it as a small supplementary practice.
The thing is that words aren’t usually discrete pieces of information in the way that names of capitals or things a med student has to memorize often are (unless your goal is just to play scrabble with them, in which case SRS is great). Meanings don’t map one to one across languages, collocations are important , etc, etc. Putting sentence cards into Anki is better than isolation words with translations but even then, you won’t get as much cultural information or even raw quantity of input as you would from extensive reading and this is a topic L2 Acquisition researchers have covered in depth.
I think part of the problem is that SRS sounds really compelling to engineers and it’s generally easy to build into an app, so that’s been the focus of most language learning apps for the past 20 years.
There are some better ones that exist mostly to help learners handle native text and audio, though. LingQ, Language Reactor and language-specific apps that do similar things are great.
I built and ran the academic side of a language school for four years, worked on two language learning startups and also learned two languages in different language families from my native language (and from each other) to a pretty fluent level.
In all those years I’ve never met a single really successful learner who made SRS a major part of their studies, though some used it as a small supplementary practice.
The thing is that words aren’t usually discrete pieces of information in the way that names of capitals or things a med student has to memorize often are (unless your goal is just to play scrabble with them, in which case SRS is great). Meanings don’t map one to one across languages, collocations are important , etc, etc. Putting sentence cards into Anki is better than isolation words with translations but even then, you won’t get as much cultural information or even raw quantity of input as you would from extensive reading and this is a topic L2 Acquisition researchers have covered in depth.
I think part of the problem is that SRS sounds really compelling to engineers and it’s generally easy to build into an app, so that’s been the focus of most language learning apps for the past 20 years.
There are some better ones that exist mostly to help learners handle native text and audio, though. LingQ, Language Reactor and language-specific apps that do similar things are great.
> In all those years I’ve never met a single really successful learner who made SRS a major part of their studies
I did, but very differently from how most people do it.
Premade decks with single words sucks, yes. But creating your own flashcards with lots of audio and mined sentences from your learning materials accelerates learning better than anything I tried before.
And yes, it requires a lot of immersion / exposure and other things. But when done properly it works really really well.
I did, but very differently from how most people do it.
Premade decks with single words sucks, yes. But creating your own flashcards with lots of audio and mined sentences from your learning materials accelerates learning better than anything I tried before.
And yes, it requires a lot of immersion / exposure and other things. But when done properly it works really really well.
Have you ever gotten to a C1 level in a language you learned as an adult that isn't close to your native language? If so, what kind of effort did it take you?
Or if you only learned closely related languages, what aspect of it was "really successful"? Accent? Writing ability? Something else?
Or if you only learned closely related languages, what aspect of it was "really successful"? Accent? Writing ability? Something else?
For me fluency is lower than C1, but yes.
It is a lot effort, I find Spaced Repetition actually very demanding – but effective, that's the point.
If you take Paul Nation's math (the famous https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1044345.pdf) and instead of doing that you mine the hardest sentences you find to an SRS (basically, separating grain from chaff) you save yourself a lot of time, because you will never find a piece of text long enough where you know exactly 98% of the words.
In my case, I use flashcards primarily for reading and listening comprehension, but lately I am using it a bit more for pronunciation, and it can also work well for spelling.
It is a lot effort, I find Spaced Repetition actually very demanding – but effective, that's the point.
If you take Paul Nation's math (the famous https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1044345.pdf) and instead of doing that you mine the hardest sentences you find to an SRS (basically, separating grain from chaff) you save yourself a lot of time, because you will never find a piece of text long enough where you know exactly 98% of the words.
In my case, I use flashcards primarily for reading and listening comprehension, but lately I am using it a bit more for pronunciation, and it can also work well for spelling.
Some repetition is good and children in fact often repeatedly read their favorite book or watch their favorite show. However, a key thing to keep in mind with Paul Nation's study is that "repetitions" of a word represented encountering it in different contexts.
This is important for three reasons. First is polysemy, which he mentioned. This is words with multiple meanings like fair (reasonable/just / light or unblemished / a type of public event with entertainment and vendors).
The second and in my opinion even larger issue is gaining and understanding of how the words are used and their scope. E.g., there's no word in Chinese that quite matches "nose" in English. The closest is 鼻子, but that can refer to an elephant trunk or a pig's snout, which "nose" can't. In some languages, there's a word that can be used for humans and pigs, but not elephants. In others, the same word also encompasses bird's beaks. The only way you'll learn this is from encountering the word in a lot of different contexts, not from drilling it repeatedly in the same context. Furthermore, there are a lot of words that tend to be used with or near each other but near others (collocations). In English, it's normal to say you're doing "pretty good" or "absolutely fantastic", but saying you're doing "absolutely good" would be very strange.
Finally, there are a lot of shared cultural stories each language community has. In English, these would be from Christianity, from classical Greco-Roman figures like Aesop, from German storytellers like the Brothers Grimm, other European storytellers like Hans Christian Anderson, etc. In Chinese (or Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese or other nearby countries) people are going to have a lot of shared stories from ancient China—philosophers from the Spring and Autumn era, historical stories and dramatizations of the interesting times in history such as the Three Kingdoms era, and many, many folk tales. If you don't understand at least the core of the cultural cannon, you'll regularly be confused by things in TV shows like soap operas or variety shows, even if you understand every word in transcript. Reading fiction will be even harder.
The more distant the language is from the one you speak natively, the more the second and especially third points will impact you unless you take in an enormous amount of input.
This is important for three reasons. First is polysemy, which he mentioned. This is words with multiple meanings like fair (reasonable/just / light or unblemished / a type of public event with entertainment and vendors).
The second and in my opinion even larger issue is gaining and understanding of how the words are used and their scope. E.g., there's no word in Chinese that quite matches "nose" in English. The closest is 鼻子, but that can refer to an elephant trunk or a pig's snout, which "nose" can't. In some languages, there's a word that can be used for humans and pigs, but not elephants. In others, the same word also encompasses bird's beaks. The only way you'll learn this is from encountering the word in a lot of different contexts, not from drilling it repeatedly in the same context. Furthermore, there are a lot of words that tend to be used with or near each other but near others (collocations). In English, it's normal to say you're doing "pretty good" or "absolutely fantastic", but saying you're doing "absolutely good" would be very strange.
Finally, there are a lot of shared cultural stories each language community has. In English, these would be from Christianity, from classical Greco-Roman figures like Aesop, from German storytellers like the Brothers Grimm, other European storytellers like Hans Christian Anderson, etc. In Chinese (or Korean, Japanese, Vietnamese or other nearby countries) people are going to have a lot of shared stories from ancient China—philosophers from the Spring and Autumn era, historical stories and dramatizations of the interesting times in history such as the Three Kingdoms era, and many, many folk tales. If you don't understand at least the core of the cultural cannon, you'll regularly be confused by things in TV shows like soap operas or variety shows, even if you understand every word in transcript. Reading fiction will be even harder.
The more distant the language is from the one you speak natively, the more the second and especially third points will impact you unless you take in an enormous amount of input.
"Dialog Challenged" here.
Your essay exposes many unconsidered ideas I can USE
Such as sorting spoken language from written.
*written* has vast Man-Page (Library!) For all languages. From parts of speech to detailed standards for each sort of publication, intended audience.
The only Man-Page (comments) I could find for spoken dialog was "Miranda Act", I better see what we have NOW.
Thanks
Your essay exposes many unconsidered ideas I can USE
Such as sorting spoken language from written.
*written* has vast Man-Page (Library!) For all languages. From parts of speech to detailed standards for each sort of publication, intended audience.
The only Man-Page (comments) I could find for spoken dialog was "Miranda Act", I better see what we have NOW.
Thanks
> You know what is more effective than spaced repitition? Reading, listening, and doing to the thing you are interested in.
No, they are not more effective, they are less effective. The fact that they are less effective is the only reason that people do spaced repetition. It takes less time to learn a fact if you optimize for the way memory works. Reading, listening, and doing the thing you are interested in builds memory just like spaced repetition does, just in a haphazard, random way.
> note that reading/doing something is itself spaced repititon.
But worse. There are plenty of things that simply can't be learned by spaced repetition because nobody has come up with a good way to do them, and/or they are physical. But some facts simply have to be memorized, and when doing the thing you will have to recall them. You can either look them up every time you have to use them, and a) forget completely if there's too large a gap between incidents of having to look a thing up, or b) spend all day studying something that you'll completely forget in a week. Spaced repetition is about using a timing trick to make those facts reflexive and long-lasting.
No, they are not more effective, they are less effective. The fact that they are less effective is the only reason that people do spaced repetition. It takes less time to learn a fact if you optimize for the way memory works. Reading, listening, and doing the thing you are interested in builds memory just like spaced repetition does, just in a haphazard, random way.
> note that reading/doing something is itself spaced repititon.
But worse. There are plenty of things that simply can't be learned by spaced repetition because nobody has come up with a good way to do them, and/or they are physical. But some facts simply have to be memorized, and when doing the thing you will have to recall them. You can either look them up every time you have to use them, and a) forget completely if there's too large a gap between incidents of having to look a thing up, or b) spend all day studying something that you'll completely forget in a week. Spaced repetition is about using a timing trick to make those facts reflexive and long-lasting.
When reading/listening and doing you encounter thousands of facts/words/whatever in the same amount of time spaced repetition will give you tens. If you are a complete beginner spaced repetition does well, but that is misleading - it does well in the easy to study situation of someone who knows nothing and doesn't examine the much harder to study place where someone knows a little something where you spend most of your time.
If you know nothing, spaced repetition can get you over that initial hump well. However I maintain that you quickly reach a point where you are beyond that and then space repetition is less useful than other courses of study in general. Use well it can still be a supplement to other study methods, but those others should be the priority.
If you know nothing, spaced repetition can get you over that initial hump well. However I maintain that you quickly reach a point where you are beyond that and then space repetition is less useful than other courses of study in general. Use well it can still be a supplement to other study methods, but those others should be the priority.
Anki is just a software tool for presenting pieces of data at an optimal rate for memory. It’s perfect possible to use it for reading, listening, or even prompting activities.
> If an approach is so boring that you don't do it, then what does it matter how effective it might be?
Yeah true, but an obvious argument is that this is where discipline comes in. If you are one of the people Anki works for, then you have to find the level of discipline required to stick with it.
Yeah true, but an obvious argument is that this is where discipline comes in. If you are one of the people Anki works for, then you have to find the level of discipline required to stick with it.
> once you miss a week and suddenly you have 863 reps to get through to catch up.
You only have to "catch up" ASAP if you want to minimize the risk of forgetting any card at all, and then having to memorize it again. Otherwise, just working through the backlog at your preferred pace is the best strategy; you'll still be recalling most of the cards and the system will push repetitions for those that you do recall further out in time.
Perhaps the Anki devs should add some kind of special workflow in the UX that shows up when the user has a huge backlog to go through due to missed reviews, and tells them this. Because you're right that just seeing a bare number (863 cards to go through!) can be quite scary.
You only have to "catch up" ASAP if you want to minimize the risk of forgetting any card at all, and then having to memorize it again. Otherwise, just working through the backlog at your preferred pace is the best strategy; you'll still be recalling most of the cards and the system will push repetitions for those that you do recall further out in time.
Perhaps the Anki devs should add some kind of special workflow in the UX that shows up when the user has a huge backlog to go through due to missed reviews, and tells them this. Because you're right that just seeing a bare number (863 cards to go through!) can be quite scary.
Spaced repetition is the cherry on the cake: learn by practicing, but create your own cards along the way, and when reviewing just focus on making a recall effort, not nailing everything.
For language, 10-20 mins / day is great, and if you are putting enough effort, 6-8 reps is enough to learn a card with 2 new concepts at ~15secs / rep, which really makes a difference long term.
I made a tool[1] with that approach in mind and tailor-made for language acquisition patterns. The key part is that creating cards (audio included) must be super-easy and fast, but they need to come from you nevertheless.
[1] https://thehardway.app
For language, 10-20 mins / day is great, and if you are putting enough effort, 6-8 reps is enough to learn a card with 2 new concepts at ~15secs / rep, which really makes a difference long term.
I made a tool[1] with that approach in mind and tailor-made for language acquisition patterns. The key part is that creating cards (audio included) must be super-easy and fast, but they need to come from you nevertheless.
[1] https://thehardway.app
This looks very interesting. The language dialect that I am learning now has no online sources, but many words are similar to other dialects that are online. How does the app find the native pronunciations of words? What can we do with the voice notes, other than just listening to them? Transcription?
Wow this looks great! Reminds me a bit of Mochi.cards
Thanks! Still polishing a few corners...
I think the mistake here is simply to many new cards a day. If you miss a week and have 863 reps, you definitely are going way too fast. You shouldn’t have to spend more than 5-20 minutes daily going over your review, and if you miss a week you shouldn’t need more than two or three half hour sessions to catch up.
I think there are diminishing returns as well by having to many daily new cards, as there is only so much you can commit into memory every day. So you will probably end up having terrible recall as well (which further adds to your reps).
I’m using Anki to learn Japanese. I actually go a step further in taking it slow as I’m still on my N5 vocab (first 1000 words) after 9 months of learning. I think it will be another 9 months before I can read stuff I‘m interested in in Japanese (which will probably be Go books).
I think there are diminishing returns as well by having to many daily new cards, as there is only so much you can commit into memory every day. So you will probably end up having terrible recall as well (which further adds to your reps).
I’m using Anki to learn Japanese. I actually go a step further in taking it slow as I’m still on my N5 vocab (first 1000 words) after 9 months of learning. I think it will be another 9 months before I can read stuff I‘m interested in in Japanese (which will probably be Go books).
I used it for language learning and CS among other things. The thing is, life gets busy. Suddenly you have a kid or two. Spaced Repetition falls into the same category of things that people in their 20s do because they have too much time, like using intricate note taking systems, journaling, training for triathlons and being really into artisanal coffee.
I haven't found that at all. I'm well past my twenties but find Anki is one of the things I can fit in, mainly because even with kids and responsibilities you can often find small periods (say 15 mins) of time through the day. It's not enough time to sit down and start into something really complex, especially as the time is sometimes interrupted, but it is enough time to try a few questions.
You can do Anki while commuting, if you use public transport. Then it's just free time.
If you don't use that, then you have to use your time dedicated to learning, where Anki is probably more efficient than your learning method anyway.
If you don't use that, then you have to use your time dedicated to learning, where Anki is probably more efficient than your learning method anyway.
If you're busy you're probably already using public commuting time for reading books etc.
I guess it just boils down to what you want to do with your spare time. You find time for HN. Me, I can find time for 20-60 min a day studying Japanese (of which 5-20 is in Anki). I also find time for 20-60 min a day playing go so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Fine, time AND energy. HN is entertainment. SR feels like work. When I have an hour at night on average to yourself, I don't want to spend it studying. I've tried taking breaks at work to do it, but you need those mini breaks at work to be a bit unproductive as well. I can't be "ON" 100% of the time, I need rest.
Am I missing something here? Because I fail to understand how something like this is susceptible of a priori proof or disproof. Seems pretty obviously an empirical matter.
I merged spaced repetition with knowledge management app (), and I must say it was the biggest personal improvement for me in terms of organising and remembering stuff.
As a product though I struggle to make it work. I assume people mostly afraid of their notes and cards stored in the cloud vs local storage, which is understandable.
https://www.mindthis.io/
As a product though I struggle to make it work. I assume people mostly afraid of their notes and cards stored in the cloud vs local storage, which is understandable.
https://www.mindthis.io/
Logseq does it already and is well-established. Probably other solutions like Obsidian can do the same. It's a tough market to be in.
Seems nice. The page is so irritating on iOS that it must dominate your revenue losses though, not fear from cloud. Like portrait screen 4 colums of 2 character wide lines of texts. All video autostarts on fullscreen when gets into view, ehh.
Have to ask, have you ever tried this?
Just so the original poster knows, this also happens on Android running Microsoft Edge.
Thanks for bringing this to me. The website is optimized for web, so I didn't really tested on mobile devices, but yeah, this looks horrible...
Update: made it look a little bit better.
Update: made it look a little bit better.
Oof, yeah, this site is really not great on iOS.
The first time I published a site, I was surprised by how much traffic came from mobile devices, even though my page was intended for desktop users. I really shouldn’t have been surprised, but fortunately I had some basic analytics and saw fairly quickly how bad my bounce rate was on mobile and was able to work on it a bit.
The first time I published a site, I was surprised by how much traffic came from mobile devices, even though my page was intended for desktop users. I really shouldn’t have been surprised, but fortunately I had some basic analytics and saw fairly quickly how bad my bounce rate was on mobile and was able to work on it a bit.
The redundant nature of mass scale internet content operates on spaced repetition I think. If you doom scroll HN for example, over time you’ll know more about random things. WSB might be a better example. I didn’t realize how many stock ticker prices and movements over the last few years are now embedded in my mind, without deliberately trying.
This is the 1000th time you’ll have read the same thing. The hivemind naturally regurgitates the same information at a predictable cadence. We’re due for a few Rust posts on HN, for example.
If you stay tapped in, you will always be learning from this organic body.
This is the 1000th time you’ll have read the same thing. The hivemind naturally regurgitates the same information at a predictable cadence. We’re due for a few Rust posts on HN, for example.
If you stay tapped in, you will always be learning from this organic body.
> The redundant nature of mass scale internet content operates on spaced repetition I think
Not really. Depends on the definition of spaced repetition, but you typically want increasing intervals (normally exponentially) for it to be effective.
See 9.1: https://pcl.sitehost.iu.edu/rgoldsto/courses/dunloskyimprovi... [PDF]
Not really. Depends on the definition of spaced repetition, but you typically want increasing intervals (normally exponentially) for it to be effective.
See 9.1: https://pcl.sitehost.iu.edu/rgoldsto/courses/dunloskyimprovi... [PDF]
Not all spaced repetition is equally effective.
Repeated exposure (e.g. re-reading a book) does something, but active recall is much more efficient at solidifying memories.
Repeated exposure (e.g. re-reading a book) does something, but active recall is much more efficient at solidifying memories.
Anyone had any experience using spaced repetition for reinforcing math learning?
I used it in my abstract algebra
classes
I basically only put two things in there: "Prove X" and my ordinary problems. Then I'd just do that. Those cards usually took at least a minute apiece, but I got really good at abstract algebra, at least when compared to similarly skilled peers. Mind you, I have always been good (perfect SAT score) but not great (never scouted for Putnam) at math.
Contrary to what you might think, memorizing definitions is less useful (though not totally useless) than memorizing the proofs of theorems which rely upon those definitions.
I would almost certainly go back to doing this if I ever want for a master's degree with a math class again. The idea crosses my mind every now and then to do it with linear algebra, which counterintuitively isn't actually a prerequisite for or all that similar to abstract algebra.
I basically only put two things in there: "Prove X" and my ordinary problems. Then I'd just do that. Those cards usually took at least a minute apiece, but I got really good at abstract algebra, at least when compared to similarly skilled peers. Mind you, I have always been good (perfect SAT score) but not great (never scouted for Putnam) at math.
Contrary to what you might think, memorizing definitions is less useful (though not totally useless) than memorizing the proofs of theorems which rely upon those definitions.
I would almost certainly go back to doing this if I ever want for a master's degree with a math class again. The idea crosses my mind every now and then to do it with linear algebra, which counterintuitively isn't actually a prerequisite for or all that similar to abstract algebra.
Checkout mathacademy.com
Not affiliated but 3 months in and I feel my math foundations are finally solidifying into something that will allow me to build into areas previously out of reach
Not affiliated but 3 months in and I feel my math foundations are finally solidifying into something that will allow me to build into areas previously out of reach
I haven't worked through it, but Michael Nielsen has a great article about this: https://cognitivemedium.com/srs-mathematics.
I tried it ones to reinforce chess openings, but I never developed the momentum to keep it up. I think I was—and still am—lacking the ability to visualize the moves in my head from the algebraic notation on the cards.
I don't want to rain on anyone's parade, but: of all the really brilliant people I've ever met, interacted with or learned from, I haven't heard of anyone that used techniques like this. Like, the way they learn things and become brilliant is the exact same way every brilliant person has done it for thousands of years: they read books, they discuss and debate with other brilliant people, they study their subjects and work hard. Like, true intelligence is very rarely about rote memorization of facts, it's about making new connections, being creative, and working really hard. There are no shortcuts, you have to put in the work. Aristotle, Leibniz, Einstein or whatever brilliant person you can think of didn't become who they are using cue-cards.
Spaced repetition always seemed like those schemes to get you fit or slim in 30 days that never work. There is exactly one way to get physically healthy, and it's super-unfun: diet and exercise. Same thing with your mind, you have to exercise it and feed it appropriately for months and years. Spend the time you would spend on spaced repetition reading books or watching lectures and doing exercises instead.
Spaced repetition always seemed like those schemes to get you fit or slim in 30 days that never work. There is exactly one way to get physically healthy, and it's super-unfun: diet and exercise. Same thing with your mind, you have to exercise it and feed it appropriately for months and years. Spend the time you would spend on spaced repetition reading books or watching lectures and doing exercises instead.
How do you think that "working hard" bit works and produces results?
Repetition!
If you're learning a language and trying to learn vocabulary, a new alphabet, etc, anything that involves lots of recall being necessary, spaced repetition is an excellent aid because without the basic shit you can't do any of the rest.
Plus it's supposed to be consistent over a (very long) time, not a "quick fix" so it's actually really the opposite of the "get slim quick" type schemes.
It's probably not especially useful when you're not cramming stuff/trying to build up a base to stand on, which lets you actually get on with the actual meat of the learning.
Repetition!
If you're learning a language and trying to learn vocabulary, a new alphabet, etc, anything that involves lots of recall being necessary, spaced repetition is an excellent aid because without the basic shit you can't do any of the rest.
Plus it's supposed to be consistent over a (very long) time, not a "quick fix" so it's actually really the opposite of the "get slim quick" type schemes.
It's probably not especially useful when you're not cramming stuff/trying to build up a base to stand on, which lets you actually get on with the actual meat of the learning.
Memory is associative. So if you study a topic from different approaches or read other tangential material, that has connections to the topic, you remember it a lot better, thanks to associations.
Repetition techniques simply ignore associations.
Learning new vocabulary works up until 200-300 words, then it's useless.
Repetition techniques simply ignore associations.
Learning new vocabulary works up until 200-300 words, then it's useless.
It's not all or nothing, you can combine approaches :)
And if you're learning an alphabet where before you know 1000-2000 unique characters, you can't reasonably read anything, it's still very useful!
Plus who says that repetition techniques can't include context (like sentences for instance?), Bunpro being a pretty good example of this for learning Japanese grammar
Obviously don't just use SRS all day, consume media, read books, etc.
And if you're learning an alphabet where before you know 1000-2000 unique characters, you can't reasonably read anything, it's still very useful!
Plus who says that repetition techniques can't include context (like sentences for instance?), Bunpro being a pretty good example of this for learning Japanese grammar
Obviously don't just use SRS all day, consume media, read books, etc.
Good point, they indeed have a flat and very large set of items, and they have few connections with anything outside the system.
> Aristotle, Leibniz, Einstein or whatever brilliant person you can think of didn't become who they are using cue-cards.
You aren’t Einstein, I presume. Neither am I. So first of all, you can’t say that with any certainty.
But more importantly, the vanishingly small top end of the bell curve does not hold useful lessons for the rest of us. Things that mere mortals have to expend effort on are not even a second thought for them, so they have nothing to teach someone who is working to learn things they never even tried to learn.
This is why great coaches are usually middling athletes. This is why great teachers are rarely great in the field they teach. This is why lessons from those who are great are often frustrating and filled with statements like “just…you know…do X.”
You aren’t Einstein, I presume. Neither am I. So first of all, you can’t say that with any certainty.
But more importantly, the vanishingly small top end of the bell curve does not hold useful lessons for the rest of us. Things that mere mortals have to expend effort on are not even a second thought for them, so they have nothing to teach someone who is working to learn things they never even tried to learn.
This is why great coaches are usually middling athletes. This is why great teachers are rarely great in the field they teach. This is why lessons from those who are great are often frustrating and filled with statements like “just…you know…do X.”
Are you sure this class of people don’t implicitly do spaces repetition via:
- “reading books” (coming across the same ideas in different books, tying new ideas to old books)
- “discuss and debate” (remembering and being reminded of previously learned things)
- “study their subjects” (?) (presumably restating the previous two? - Maybe original research, which is finding new facts or reinforcing old ones)
- “work hard” (??)
I also wonder if there’s something about the mental process of people who seem to “just get it” - is their mind subconsciously turning over stuff they’ve learned in the same way an external spaced repetition regimen would? They may be getting the benefit of spaced repetition, but from the outside it doesn’t look like they follow a study plan.
- “reading books” (coming across the same ideas in different books, tying new ideas to old books)
- “discuss and debate” (remembering and being reminded of previously learned things)
- “study their subjects” (?) (presumably restating the previous two? - Maybe original research, which is finding new facts or reinforcing old ones)
- “work hard” (??)
I also wonder if there’s something about the mental process of people who seem to “just get it” - is their mind subconsciously turning over stuff they’ve learned in the same way an external spaced repetition regimen would? They may be getting the benefit of spaced repetition, but from the outside it doesn’t look like they follow a study plan.
Spaced repetition is merely an optimal way of organizing repetition. All of the “brilliant” people you’ve met almost certainly study their topics constantly, and this daily exposure is itself a form of repetition.
This misconception is a common mistake by people that think Anki / SRS are equivalent to the spacing effect itself. That is not the case. The spacing effects exists independently of any particular software implementation.
I don’t think any one claims that memorizing a bunch of facts will make you a genius; rather that if you are aiming for optimal learning and memory, SRS is pretty much the gold standard and is backed up by tons of scientific research.
This misconception is a common mistake by people that think Anki / SRS are equivalent to the spacing effect itself. That is not the case. The spacing effects exists independently of any particular software implementation.
I don’t think any one claims that memorizing a bunch of facts will make you a genius; rather that if you are aiming for optimal learning and memory, SRS is pretty much the gold standard and is backed up by tons of scientific research.
> Aristotle, Leibniz, Einstein or whatever brilliant person you can think of didn't become who they are using cue-cards.
Indeed, but I think that being relevant assumes that people using these techniques believe it will somehow make them brilliant/geniuses.
> Spaced repetition always seemed like those schemes to get you fit or slim in 30 days that never work.
I'm not arguing for spaced repetition, but the whole point is you do some amount every day (or as needed) for the rest of your life (within reason). So it's not equivalent to get fit/slim quick at all, it's more about disciplined improvement of yourself. If that isn't effective for you don't do it, but based on your comment it seems like you're coming at it from the wrong angle.
Indeed, but I think that being relevant assumes that people using these techniques believe it will somehow make them brilliant/geniuses.
> Spaced repetition always seemed like those schemes to get you fit or slim in 30 days that never work.
I'm not arguing for spaced repetition, but the whole point is you do some amount every day (or as needed) for the rest of your life (within reason). So it's not equivalent to get fit/slim quick at all, it's more about disciplined improvement of yourself. If that isn't effective for you don't do it, but based on your comment it seems like you're coming at it from the wrong angle.
> I'm not arguing for spaced repetition, but the whole point is you do some amount every day (or as needed) for the rest of your life (within reason). So it's not equivalent to get fit/slim quick at all, it's more about disciplined improvement of yourself. If that isn't effective for you don't do it, but based on your comment it seems like you're coming at it from the wrong angle.
Fair enough, I haven't looked into spaced repetition deeply.
I just always got this weird vibe from people talking about it, like they think memorizing all the world capitals was a way to improve your intelligence. It's not.
Same thing with, like, "memory palace" stuff: being able to memorize a deck of cards is probably fun, and it's a nice parlor trick, but it will not help you solve real-world problems, analyze situations, make discoveries or be a better engineer. The way to do that is to just read books, study, work hard in your chosen field and keep up with the latest developments. That is the only way anyone has ever gotten good at anything.
Fair enough, I haven't looked into spaced repetition deeply.
I just always got this weird vibe from people talking about it, like they think memorizing all the world capitals was a way to improve your intelligence. It's not.
Same thing with, like, "memory palace" stuff: being able to memorize a deck of cards is probably fun, and it's a nice parlor trick, but it will not help you solve real-world problems, analyze situations, make discoveries or be a better engineer. The way to do that is to just read books, study, work hard in your chosen field and keep up with the latest developments. That is the only way anyone has ever gotten good at anything.
> they think memorizing all the world capitals was a way to improve your intelligence. It's not.
It definitely is. I don't understand the disdain for facts. If, when talking about a city, I know that it's a capital city, I am smarter than I would be if I did not know, and I have a better ability to participate in the conversation. If I know a bunch of constants (in whatever trade I work in) offhand, I can quickly do calculations in my head. Does knowing how many centimeters are in an inch make me smarter? Yes, it does. There was a reason why you memorized every letter in the alphabet.
> The way to do that is to just read books, study, work hard in your chosen field
Spaced repetition is literally just a way to study. You make the cards as you read books.
It definitely is. I don't understand the disdain for facts. If, when talking about a city, I know that it's a capital city, I am smarter than I would be if I did not know, and I have a better ability to participate in the conversation. If I know a bunch of constants (in whatever trade I work in) offhand, I can quickly do calculations in my head. Does knowing how many centimeters are in an inch make me smarter? Yes, it does. There was a reason why you memorized every letter in the alphabet.
> The way to do that is to just read books, study, work hard in your chosen field
Spaced repetition is literally just a way to study. You make the cards as you read books.
> Same thing with, like, "memory palace" stuff: being able to memorize a deck of cards is probably fun, and it's a nice parlor trick, but it will not help you solve real-world problems, analyze situations, make discoveries or be a better engineer.
> The way to do that is to just read books, study, work hard in your chosen field and keep up with the latest developments.
These are the same things, just a different form.
> The way to do that is to just read books, study, work hard in your chosen field and keep up with the latest developments.
These are the same things, just a different form.
Ahh got you. Yeah agreed on a lof of that. What I do is when I learning something that I think will be useful, but that I'll forget, I stick it in Anki.
Otherwise I know the fact will be written in the sand, it won't be there for me to use at the time when it would be useful. That's terminology from a book on memory I read a while back, which ironically I've now forgotten name of because I never put it in Anki.
Also should say I used to be much more scatter gun with what I put in Anki, but these days I combine it with Obsidian which I think is more managable.
Anyway not trying to sell Anki to anyone, if you don't need it don't use it for sure. I just know (think?) it's working for me, at least compared to the alternatives.
Otherwise I know the fact will be written in the sand, it won't be there for me to use at the time when it would be useful. That's terminology from a book on memory I read a while back, which ironically I've now forgotten name of because I never put it in Anki.
Also should say I used to be much more scatter gun with what I put in Anki, but these days I combine it with Obsidian which I think is more managable.
Anyway not trying to sell Anki to anyone, if you don't need it don't use it for sure. I just know (think?) it's working for me, at least compared to the alternatives.
I mostly agree with you, I don't do SR myself, but I do think the benefit of spaced repetition is solid for medical students/researchers and language learners.
Also some people just find it fun to go through their Anki deck instead of doomscrolling while on the subway or waiting in line. Whether there's any real benefit for that person is debatable. It's “fun“ in the same way going to the gym, or drinking kale smoothie is fun.
The key for improvement is deliberate practice, and one component of that is "working really hard" which you've pointed. But this is still too vague to be helpful. For those interested in the science of expertise, I highly recommend Peak by Andres Ericsson.
Also some people just find it fun to go through their Anki deck instead of doomscrolling while on the subway or waiting in line. Whether there's any real benefit for that person is debatable. It's “fun“ in the same way going to the gym, or drinking kale smoothie is fun.
The key for improvement is deliberate practice, and one component of that is "working really hard" which you've pointed. But this is still too vague to be helpful. For those interested in the science of expertise, I highly recommend Peak by Andres Ericsson.
> Also some people just find it fun to go through their Anki deck instead of doomscrolling while on the subway or waiting in line. Whether there's any real benefit for that person is debatable. It's “fun“ in the same way going to the gym, or drinking kale smoothie is fun.
I'm probably one of those people, but commuting is one of those examples where you have a small (hopefully) amount of relatively low value time, time that is somewhat interrupted. What else of value would you do in it? Maybe listen to a podcast, catch up on blogs. All fine, reasonable choices, but doing a bit of Anki is a reasonable alternative.
Only time I feel like I've wasted those periods is when I end up wasting it (just scrolling through social media or random videos). Anything else is I think a reasonable choice.
I'm probably one of those people, but commuting is one of those examples where you have a small (hopefully) amount of relatively low value time, time that is somewhat interrupted. What else of value would you do in it? Maybe listen to a podcast, catch up on blogs. All fine, reasonable choices, but doing a bit of Anki is a reasonable alternative.
Only time I feel like I've wasted those periods is when I end up wasting it (just scrolling through social media or random videos). Anything else is I think a reasonable choice.
For those of us who aren’t brilliant, but want to learn well anyway, Anki’s (my preferred SRS) is a godsend when used in the right domains — foreign language vocabulary is the best example.
I don’t see spaced repetition as one of those get-fit-fast schemes. I see it as going to the gym as opposed to generally living an active lifestyle. Some gifted people can get very, very fit without going to the gym, just by playing sports and other physical activities. Gym isn’t that fun compared to playing soccer, and it takes a lot of time and consistency to be worth it.
I don’t see spaced repetition as one of those get-fit-fast schemes. I see it as going to the gym as opposed to generally living an active lifestyle. Some gifted people can get very, very fit without going to the gym, just by playing sports and other physical activities. Gym isn’t that fun compared to playing soccer, and it takes a lot of time and consistency to be worth it.
That's an excellent way to put it. Personally, it allowed me to get excellent grades despite my post-concussion syndrome. It's miserable, but optimising your learning can really let you punch above your weight.
Also, you can fit Anki into parts of your day where "proper" learning is more difficult. I used to do it on the bus to and from school, where it was far to loud - and I was often too tired - to learn through other means.
The alternative was scrolling through HN... I did that a lot, too.
Also, you can fit Anki into parts of your day where "proper" learning is more difficult. I used to do it on the bus to and from school, where it was far to loud - and I was often too tired - to learn through other means.
The alternative was scrolling through HN... I did that a lot, too.
Would you mind outlining how you use Anki? I've had some memory issues lately and I think it would really help.
Specifically, when do you create cards, how do you make sure your cards are good quality, what are the scheduling settings, how is it organized (sub decks?). I feel like Anki itself is overwhelming...
Specifically, when do you create cards, how do you make sure your cards are good quality, what are the scheduling settings, how is it organized (sub decks?). I feel like Anki itself is overwhelming...
I haven't used Anki for a while now. I've had an aversion to it since I completely burnt out after my A levels.
I primarily added Anki cards from Obsidian. I'd have a heirarchal note structure for the subject (e.g. physics -> paper 3 -> astrophysics -> stars -> star type categories). Then I'd have my plainly-formatted notes, and below it I'd have some flashcards. The Obsidian4Anki extension let me create cards from the markdown.
The cards would strictly be on the topic in the note, generally be written around the same time or a few days later, and would be Q-and-A or clozes.
So as an example, "What colour is an O class star::Blue" would be in my notes and turned into a matching card, or "A {1:type 1A supernova} always has an {2:absolute magnitude} of {3:-19.3}" would create three cloze cards.
At the top of each note I'd use a note property to specify the notes' place in the Anki heirarchy, and I'd use the first three parts of the Obsidian heirarchy. So I'd save it as Physics -> Paper 3 -> Astrophysics -> [many, many cards]. I always duplicated notes to make new ones, so I rarely touched this.
Generally I'd practice all the physics cards at once, but categorising them this way let me drop the paper 1 cards once I'd done it and focus on paper 2 and 3 etc.
Honestly, though, I first started this when I was fourteen. My notes and my Anki decks were a complete mess compared to when I stopped when I left school four years later. You'll find what works for you - and clean things up - as you go along.
I primarily added Anki cards from Obsidian. I'd have a heirarchal note structure for the subject (e.g. physics -> paper 3 -> astrophysics -> stars -> star type categories). Then I'd have my plainly-formatted notes, and below it I'd have some flashcards. The Obsidian4Anki extension let me create cards from the markdown.
The cards would strictly be on the topic in the note, generally be written around the same time or a few days later, and would be Q-and-A or clozes.
So as an example, "What colour is an O class star::Blue" would be in my notes and turned into a matching card, or "A {1:type 1A supernova} always has an {2:absolute magnitude} of {3:-19.3}" would create three cloze cards.
At the top of each note I'd use a note property to specify the notes' place in the Anki heirarchy, and I'd use the first three parts of the Obsidian heirarchy. So I'd save it as Physics -> Paper 3 -> Astrophysics -> [many, many cards]. I always duplicated notes to make new ones, so I rarely touched this.
Generally I'd practice all the physics cards at once, but categorising them this way let me drop the paper 1 cards once I'd done it and focus on paper 2 and 3 etc.
Honestly, though, I first started this when I was fourteen. My notes and my Anki decks were a complete mess compared to when I stopped when I left school four years later. You'll find what works for you - and clean things up - as you go along.
Learning isn't only about becoming brilliant. For me personally, spaced repetition is one of the best tools to aid language learning. Classes and such are great for your main progression, but spaced repetition is the way to make the vocabulary actually stick.
Actually consuming content in any form is even better.
Obviously depends on your memory. I found that in the past I read voraciously, and spend a lot of time tinkering. Which was good and fun but I sometimes found I'd forgotten the stuff by the time it would have been useful, particularly when learning about topics I wasn't using day by day. Anki an SRS partially solves that.
It's a trade-off though, I now read less and tinker less. Do I regret that, you bet. But still Anki/SRS works for me, especially because I often do it at times when I wouldn't be able to effectively read/tinker (perhaps tired, or getting kids to sleep). That's a long way of saying, do what's effective for you, but there's no point of being so dismissive of what others are doing.
It's a trade-off though, I now read less and tinker less. Do I regret that, you bet. But still Anki/SRS works for me, especially because I often do it at times when I wouldn't be able to effectively read/tinker (perhaps tired, or getting kids to sleep). That's a long way of saying, do what's effective for you, but there's no point of being so dismissive of what others are doing.
Does consuming content include watching movies/shows in the language? For me, I can state with high certainty that simply watching a lot of movies or shows in the language I was learning did absolutely nothing to help my vocabulary compared to using anki. If by consuming content you meant taking a specific movie/episode and breaking it down, studying it relentlessly, and moving on to the next after you've seen it 20 times and practically have it memorized, then maybe that would've helped? It would've meant I learned a different set of things than I studied though, which is not too useful come exam time (quite possibly more useful in real life though).
> Does consuming content include watching movies/shows in the language?
Yes. Assuming the content is around your level - contains words you do not know, but not too much. Obviously, if you know every single word in the movie, you wont learn new ones. And if you understand nothing of it, you wont learn either.
> If by consuming content you meant taking a specific movie/episode and breaking it down, studying it relentlessly, and moving on to the next after you've seen it 20 times and practically have it memorized, then maybe that would've helped?
That sounds like self torture rather then anything else. Why would anyone do that? What would be the point of watching the same thing till you memorize that thing?
The value of consuming content comes from seeing many different sentences in many different contexts. So you build more connections in your brain and you eventually learn to combine own sentences. Movies specifically have value of showing something more similar to "normal speech" in speed so that your brain wont have time to translate.
Memorizing segments goes against everything it is supposed to provide.
> I can state with high certainty that simply watching a lot of movies or shows in the language I was learning did absolutely nothing to help my vocabulary compared to using anki.
For me, each time I tried anki, it seems to work short term. And it completely fails to teach me new words. Flashcards seem to be the least effective way to actual learn words that are truly new. I keep forgetting words I have learned from anki much much faster then words I learned from elsewhere.
Yes. Assuming the content is around your level - contains words you do not know, but not too much. Obviously, if you know every single word in the movie, you wont learn new ones. And if you understand nothing of it, you wont learn either.
> If by consuming content you meant taking a specific movie/episode and breaking it down, studying it relentlessly, and moving on to the next after you've seen it 20 times and practically have it memorized, then maybe that would've helped?
That sounds like self torture rather then anything else. Why would anyone do that? What would be the point of watching the same thing till you memorize that thing?
The value of consuming content comes from seeing many different sentences in many different contexts. So you build more connections in your brain and you eventually learn to combine own sentences. Movies specifically have value of showing something more similar to "normal speech" in speed so that your brain wont have time to translate.
Memorizing segments goes against everything it is supposed to provide.
> I can state with high certainty that simply watching a lot of movies or shows in the language I was learning did absolutely nothing to help my vocabulary compared to using anki.
For me, each time I tried anki, it seems to work short term. And it completely fails to teach me new words. Flashcards seem to be the least effective way to actual learn words that are truly new. I keep forgetting words I have learned from anki much much faster then words I learned from elsewhere.
> Actually consuming content in any form is even better.
And going over pieces of said content in some sort of structured scheduled form isn't "consuming"?
And going over pieces of said content in some sort of structured scheduled form isn't "consuming"?
Off the top of my head: John Carmack and Derek Sivers are Anki users.
I've met a ton of brilliant people at Olympiads who use Anki, and you'll find heavy usage from people who rank #1 in highly competitive exams (JEE Advanced, Cambridge Medicine etc...). I graduated top of my class, and I attribute this to consistent Anki usage
But, of course: there's a subset of truly incredible people who don't need it. I've met some people at 20+ languages, no Anki
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Disclaimer: AnkiDroid maintainer. Did a bit of work on a new website today, so stats are top of mind.
I've met a ton of brilliant people at Olympiads who use Anki, and you'll find heavy usage from people who rank #1 in highly competitive exams (JEE Advanced, Cambridge Medicine etc...). I graduated top of my class, and I attribute this to consistent Anki usage
But, of course: there's a subset of truly incredible people who don't need it. I've met some people at 20+ languages, no Anki
----
Disclaimer: AnkiDroid maintainer. Did a bit of work on a new website today, so stats are top of mind.
My understanding is that Anki is pretty much used by every single medical student, at least in the U.S. It's the perfect applications for retaining massive amounts of information just long enough to pass med school and board exams. Look at this: https://www.reddit.com/r/medicalschoolanki/ -- 166k followers.
We have a reasonable source for 70%[0].
There are a number of anti-Anki users (and to be honest, I don't blame them: there's 30k+ cards that they should learn in the 'meta' decks, and our onboarding is lacking). They've got an abusive workload.
The longer I'm US med-adjacent, the more jaded I become. There's continuing score creep, and this is due to the bar being raised[1], in order to maintain a failure rate.
I believe there's systematic academic misconduct due to the pressure to publish. The AVERAGE successfully matched neurosurgery resident has 37.4 research items (papers/presentations/abstracts)[2].
[0] https://www.cureus.com/articles/70371-an-analysis-of-anki-us...
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gKKAZ5aO8E [mean score in 2022-3 was 248. This was a 99th percentile score in 1993-4. Mean student in 1993-4 would no longer meet the passing score, exams are not getting easier]
[2] https://medschoolinsiders.com/medical-student/how-many-publi...
There are a number of anti-Anki users (and to be honest, I don't blame them: there's 30k+ cards that they should learn in the 'meta' decks, and our onboarding is lacking). They've got an abusive workload.
The longer I'm US med-adjacent, the more jaded I become. There's continuing score creep, and this is due to the bar being raised[1], in order to maintain a failure rate.
I believe there's systematic academic misconduct due to the pressure to publish. The AVERAGE successfully matched neurosurgery resident has 37.4 research items (papers/presentations/abstracts)[2].
[0] https://www.cureus.com/articles/70371-an-analysis-of-anki-us...
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gKKAZ5aO8E [mean score in 2022-3 was 248. This was a 99th percentile score in 1993-4. Mean student in 1993-4 would no longer meet the passing score, exams are not getting easier]
[2] https://medschoolinsiders.com/medical-student/how-many-publi...
> they study their subjects and work hard
And spaced repetition is a very efficient way of doing that.
Using cards for spaced repetition has always been common between top students. I would not be surprised if brilliant people used it in one way or another. Modern spaced repetition apps are just the paperless equivalent.
And spaced repetition is a very efficient way of doing that.
Using cards for spaced repetition has always been common between top students. I would not be surprised if brilliant people used it in one way or another. Modern spaced repetition apps are just the paperless equivalent.
That is spaced repition, just with a bit of change in what they’re repeating
Fully agree.
Commenters who argue with you, suggesting that discussion is repetition, miss one thing: associativity of memory.
Discussing material, reading something tangential or in another aspect of the subject, all that makes more associations, not just simply repeat the same fact.
I had tried that 20 years ago learning a new language: after ~300 words, my brain could recall every word in the cards, but not in real text. At some point I looked a word in a dictionary, then vaguely remembered that I had looked it up earlier. And a minute later recalled that I had a similar word in the cards -- I browsed through them and found it, and guess what, repeating by the cards, I named it very easily (I guess, brain learns any cues, like cursive writing features, and cuts every corner). But this knowledge never transferred to the real language practice (at the time I was starting to write and say something sensible).
I remember taking driving exam, the theoretical test. You're given 20 questions with pictures and a question whether or not you can do a particular maneuver. Some groupmates just rote-repeated the entire 800-question set of last year's test multiple times (and learned the pictures rather than their meaning).
I instead did the homework: analyzed the entire rulebook, and where rules were irregular and chaotic, organized them in tables to bring any kind of system to this. And then I had no troubles remembering those single rules. Also, I made myself a checklist for the picture questions, what to look at -- are there lights (which have priority over signs), is there a tram (has priority, and changes passing order), and so on.
The pictures in the real test were re-drawn in different style, and sure some folks couldn't load the right answer from their brain and failed the test. One of them told me "You're so smart" (probably implying that I simply have much more RAM in the brain, which isn't true). That was pleasure to ears, but I didn't try memorizing the material at all, and knew very little of it beforehand.
Commenters who argue with you, suggesting that discussion is repetition, miss one thing: associativity of memory.
Discussing material, reading something tangential or in another aspect of the subject, all that makes more associations, not just simply repeat the same fact.
I had tried that 20 years ago learning a new language: after ~300 words, my brain could recall every word in the cards, but not in real text. At some point I looked a word in a dictionary, then vaguely remembered that I had looked it up earlier. And a minute later recalled that I had a similar word in the cards -- I browsed through them and found it, and guess what, repeating by the cards, I named it very easily (I guess, brain learns any cues, like cursive writing features, and cuts every corner). But this knowledge never transferred to the real language practice (at the time I was starting to write and say something sensible).
I remember taking driving exam, the theoretical test. You're given 20 questions with pictures and a question whether or not you can do a particular maneuver. Some groupmates just rote-repeated the entire 800-question set of last year's test multiple times (and learned the pictures rather than their meaning).
I instead did the homework: analyzed the entire rulebook, and where rules were irregular and chaotic, organized them in tables to bring any kind of system to this. And then I had no troubles remembering those single rules. Also, I made myself a checklist for the picture questions, what to look at -- are there lights (which have priority over signs), is there a tram (has priority, and changes passing order), and so on.
The pictures in the real test were re-drawn in different style, and sure some folks couldn't load the right answer from their brain and failed the test. One of them told me "You're so smart" (probably implying that I simply have much more RAM in the brain, which isn't true). That was pleasure to ears, but I didn't try memorizing the material at all, and knew very little of it beforehand.
it's a pretty narrow set of people that want or need to be able to memorize and recall a bunch of facts as efficiently as possible. mostly med school students and language learners, where this stuff obviously works.
Working in a fast changing but also wide and deep field like software I think being able to remember quite a few facts can be important.
it's doable I guess. I think it's more productive to learn a concept and be able to derive everything about the concept from first principles instead though
I'd argue that you should spend time just thinking. Reading can be a great way to get some new input into to think about, but just getting comfortable silently thinking is really helpful.
"There are no shortcuts, you have to put in the work." Spoken like someone who doesn't use an SRS system, then. They're actually extremely hard to use, because the focus is on feeding you the toughest possible version of every recalled card. Part of why people quit using them is because it's mentally exhausting!
You're right that nobody became brilliant through spaced repetition. But spaced repetition is not meant for that.
Spaced repetition is not meant for conceptual things or skills. It's meant for only the simplest of facts.
It's meant particularly for foreign language vocab, names and quantities in medical school, names of cases in law school, that sort of thing.
It has little to no relevance in math, physics, and engineering.
Just because it's not meant for all things doesn't mean it doesn't excel at some things.
Spaced repetition is not meant for conceptual things or skills. It's meant for only the simplest of facts.
It's meant particularly for foreign language vocab, names and quantities in medical school, names of cases in law school, that sort of thing.
It has little to no relevance in math, physics, and engineering.
Just because it's not meant for all things doesn't mean it doesn't excel at some things.
> Spaced repetition is not meant for conceptual things or skills. It's meant for facts.
> It has little to no relevance in math, physics, and engineering.
That's one bit I disagree with. Engineering is full of facts/concepts, things you often need to know inherently to be able to apply them, or even to know to google them at the right time. So I think SRS can apply there too.
> It has little to no relevance in math, physics, and engineering.
That's one bit I disagree with. Engineering is full of facts/concepts, things you often need to know inherently to be able to apply them, or even to know to google them at the right time. So I think SRS can apply there too.
I disagree also. I have lots of formulae, proofs and more as mathjax in my Anki cards.
You'd be surprised how big of a help this actually is for college exams. Not only for cramming before exams but also to retain the facts after for follow up classes (I see other students constantly struggle with having to relearn whole subjects while I don't because Anki implicitly makes me relearn them every week).
You'd be surprised how big of a help this actually is for college exams. Not only for cramming before exams but also to retain the facts after for follow up classes (I see other students constantly struggle with having to relearn whole subjects while I don't because Anki implicitly makes me relearn them every week).
> It has little to no relevance in math, physics, and engineering.
This is more a lack of imagination on your part than necessarily an issue with SRS.
This is more a lack of imagination on your part than necessarily an issue with SRS.
It would be better to have a photographic memory and not need to repeat anything.
You are 100% right but have absolutely no point.
You are 100% right but have absolutely no point.
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As someone actually on this end of the spectrum, I agree with you. The thing that I feel makes my brain and my methodology special is that I can make a single pass through a body of work and internalize just enough of the information.
This then ends up as something analogous to a table of weak pointers. I keep a sort of abstract digest of the information in the mental database and I use it to go look up hardcopy when it becomes necessary to actually reference.
The result is something akin to a vector database. I can look at a problem and apply many different approaches simultaneously. The mental machinery autonomously eliminates the worst paths through my knowledge graph and I'm left with a few pretty good options.
Actually memorizing all the information my mental database links to would be explicitly detrimental to the process. This pushes the signal/noise ratio way too low, and more importantly wastes time I could spend indexing a larger amount of information.
Perfect recall just isn't necessary for the way I solve problems. Reference books exist for a reason. every machinist ever has a copy of the machinist's handbook for a very good reason.
The process is all about knowing what is possible and drawing paths through the graph of possibilities. The details aren't relevant until the implementation stage when you'd be accessing reference materials anyway.
I find that spaced repetition does increase recall. I don't think that's in dispute. But better recall does not make you a better engineer. I don't think it's something even worthwhile in the general case, unless you're specifically trying to build a deep specialization.
People in general really dislike this notion. People want to believe that hard work and dedication makes an Einstein. The idea that it's just how some brains are is, I dunno, unfair?
But it's a tradeoff. There's a huge psychological burden involved. I won't get into it, but it's something Einstein spoke about. I'm also no use on my own. My abilities have led me to specialize deeply in generalism; I have no real specialization in any one field. If I had to operate on my own, it'd take me ten times longer than with a couple of specialists behind me. But with a good team, the amount of work we can put out is scary.
No, not everyone can learn to think and operate this way, sorry. My brain is wired different and you probably don't want it, it really, truly sucks. But that's a good thing. A healthy mixture of perspectives and abilities is what makes a successful team/company/project. You can't really get by with just a generalist or just a specialist. You need both perspectives.
This then ends up as something analogous to a table of weak pointers. I keep a sort of abstract digest of the information in the mental database and I use it to go look up hardcopy when it becomes necessary to actually reference.
The result is something akin to a vector database. I can look at a problem and apply many different approaches simultaneously. The mental machinery autonomously eliminates the worst paths through my knowledge graph and I'm left with a few pretty good options.
Actually memorizing all the information my mental database links to would be explicitly detrimental to the process. This pushes the signal/noise ratio way too low, and more importantly wastes time I could spend indexing a larger amount of information.
Perfect recall just isn't necessary for the way I solve problems. Reference books exist for a reason. every machinist ever has a copy of the machinist's handbook for a very good reason.
The process is all about knowing what is possible and drawing paths through the graph of possibilities. The details aren't relevant until the implementation stage when you'd be accessing reference materials anyway.
I find that spaced repetition does increase recall. I don't think that's in dispute. But better recall does not make you a better engineer. I don't think it's something even worthwhile in the general case, unless you're specifically trying to build a deep specialization.
People in general really dislike this notion. People want to believe that hard work and dedication makes an Einstein. The idea that it's just how some brains are is, I dunno, unfair?
But it's a tradeoff. There's a huge psychological burden involved. I won't get into it, but it's something Einstein spoke about. I'm also no use on my own. My abilities have led me to specialize deeply in generalism; I have no real specialization in any one field. If I had to operate on my own, it'd take me ten times longer than with a couple of specialists behind me. But with a good team, the amount of work we can put out is scary.
No, not everyone can learn to think and operate this way, sorry. My brain is wired different and you probably don't want it, it really, truly sucks. But that's a good thing. A healthy mixture of perspectives and abilities is what makes a successful team/company/project. You can't really get by with just a generalist or just a specialist. You need both perspectives.
> The process is all about knowing what is possible and drawing paths through the graph of possibilities. The details aren't relevant until the implementation stage when you'd be accessing reference materials anyway.
Well put. But in that case, couldn’t you utilize SRS to memorizing high level concepts (e.g., coarse characteristics of various algorithms as opposed to how they are actually implemented, etc)
Well put. But in that case, couldn’t you utilize SRS to memorizing high level concepts (e.g., coarse characteristics of various algorithms as opposed to how they are actually implemented, etc)
Probably, but that's really only helpful if you need that piece of information regularly. In the way that I work, it's not necessary. If a particular problem domain pops up frequently enough that I'd need to drill on it, the act of working the problem provides the repetition.
In general, I don't find techniques like this helpful. My brain is just really good at holding the overall concept of what I read. Once I've digested the information, the abstract is logged in the database forever. But that's just the autistic nature of my brain, I think.
In general, I don't find techniques like this helpful. My brain is just really good at holding the overall concept of what I read. Once I've digested the information, the abstract is logged in the database forever. But that's just the autistic nature of my brain, I think.
Fine but what to use in practice. Tried Anki and found its algorithm bit infuriating. SuperMemo is better but thoroughly proprietary.
When building a spaced repetition toy, the most satisfying algorithm I found was:
* Model the forgetting curve as p = 2 ^ (−∆/h) (p = probability of recall, ∆ = time since last review, h = forgetting half-life for a particular card and user) (see https://research.duolingo.com/papers/settles.acl16.pdf)
* Numerically fit this curve to the last ~10 recent reviews of the card by the user to give an estimate for h (the half-life but effectively the intrinsic "difficulty" of the card for that user)
* Schedule the next review of the card at the time when a particular recall probability is reached. This probability should be configurable by the user: >90% for an "easy" session, <70% for a "hard" session.
* Use the "due date" to queue up cards for review. If a user reviews a card _before_ the due date, ensure that the half-life is never reduced after a succesful review. Provide some feedback to the user to suggest they stop the session when there are no pending cards left ("10 more cards due today, 100 cards due tomorrow, 1000 cards due next week")
* Don't schedule the same card twice in a row as this is annoying for the user. If it has just been reviewed and is due next, move it back to second place in the queue.
I found this works well once there are 2 or more reviews of a particular card for a particular user. For scheduling the _second_ review of the card I had to invent a heuristic like: if first review failed, schedule again in 1 minute, if first review passed schedule again tomorrow. However in apps where many users are reviewing the same cards, you could probably build a good model of the difficulty of a card for a user before 2 reviews by considering the performance of other users on that card.
* Model the forgetting curve as p = 2 ^ (−∆/h) (p = probability of recall, ∆ = time since last review, h = forgetting half-life for a particular card and user) (see https://research.duolingo.com/papers/settles.acl16.pdf)
* Numerically fit this curve to the last ~10 recent reviews of the card by the user to give an estimate for h (the half-life but effectively the intrinsic "difficulty" of the card for that user)
* Schedule the next review of the card at the time when a particular recall probability is reached. This probability should be configurable by the user: >90% for an "easy" session, <70% for a "hard" session.
* Use the "due date" to queue up cards for review. If a user reviews a card _before_ the due date, ensure that the half-life is never reduced after a succesful review. Provide some feedback to the user to suggest they stop the session when there are no pending cards left ("10 more cards due today, 100 cards due tomorrow, 1000 cards due next week")
* Don't schedule the same card twice in a row as this is annoying for the user. If it has just been reviewed and is due next, move it back to second place in the queue.
I found this works well once there are 2 or more reviews of a particular card for a particular user. For scheduling the _second_ review of the card I had to invent a heuristic like: if first review failed, schedule again in 1 minute, if first review passed schedule again tomorrow. However in apps where many users are reviewing the same cards, you could probably build a good model of the difficulty of a card for a user before 2 reviews by considering the performance of other users on that card.
Whats wrong with Anki? Works like a charm for me
I never got try the algorithm - I simply don’t get the UI in spite of all my best efforts. I’m looking for a wanikani like tool, with the same srs , and same excellent and simple ui.
I’ll have a look at supermemo ( I don’t mind paying ).
That is surprising, I don't even remember having to look up that much to use the Anki UI.
I make cards on a linux desktop and sync to ankidroid.
Really one of my all time favorite pieces of software. I would have given anything to have had this 30 years ago in school.
I make cards on a linux desktop and sync to ankidroid.
Really one of my all time favorite pieces of software. I would have given anything to have had this 30 years ago in school.
If you’re looking for a vocabulary tool, I just released an app for this: https://deft.so. It uses FSRS, which I’ve found to be perfect for me.
You might like Mochi for macOS and iOS.
www.mochi.cards
www.mochi.cards
This looks exactly like what I’m looking for. Thanks.
Have you tried Anki since FSRS was introduced? If not, may be worth giving it another shot.
I did. It gave me absurdly long intervals. It kind of assumed that since I can remember some things easily (usually because I learned them outside of Anki), it totally makes sense to assume that about everything.
I tried anki multiple times, ended up disliking it each time. FSRF did not made it better.
I tried anki multiple times, ended up disliking it each time. FSRF did not made it better.
In my experience, the long intervals can freak you out at the beginning. You might think that it's just stupid and not possible to have that long intervals ("I will remember that in 3 years!?").
But in practice long intervals are shortened when you answer wrong once or more, or when you mark the answer as "hard" when it actually takes time for you to recall a card.
For me FSRF really work well, sometimes I see cards that I feel are really showing quite often and when I check the card history it usually shows that I had some "again"/"hard" answers in some recent past, and because of that these intervals and not increasing that much.
Plus you can also always increase "desired retention" from default 90%. You will have shorter intervals, but it will of course increase number of the reviews too.
But in practice long intervals are shortened when you answer wrong once or more, or when you mark the answer as "hard" when it actually takes time for you to recall a card.
For me FSRF really work well, sometimes I see cards that I feel are really showing quite often and when I check the card history it usually shows that I had some "again"/"hard" answers in some recent past, and because of that these intervals and not increasing that much.
Plus you can also always increase "desired retention" from default 90%. You will have shorter intervals, but it will of course increase number of the reviews too.
The big interval was something like 3-6 months. Mostly 3 months, but some had 6.
I just concluded I am better off without algorithm that assumes once I have seen a word on flashcard once, it is reasonable to see it next time in months.
I just concluded I am better off without algorithm that assumes once I have seen a word on flashcard once, it is reasonable to see it next time in months.
Did not know they added it, thanks for the info.
Sorry what is FSRS? And when was it released?
It's a new algorithm that was integrated into the Anki codebase from a very popular add-on, maybe around 2023 or so. I switched over to it basically immediately, and it works like a charm.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39002138
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39002138
To add to what hiAndrewQuinn said:
It basically works by optimizing parameters of the "memory model" against your review history, thus fitting against your particular memory instead of using a one-size-fits-all approach.
It is described in (much) more detail here: https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/fsrs4anki/wiki/The...
It basically works by optimizing parameters of the "memory model" against your review history, thus fitting against your particular memory instead of using a one-size-fits-all approach.
It is described in (much) more detail here: https://github.com/open-spaced-repetition/fsrs4anki/wiki/The...
Hilbert's memory palace.
Spaced repetition is an excellent technique, but it shouldn't be the only tool in your learning toolbox.
I found that spaced repetition really works as advertised, with software like Anki. However, it is not really suited at learning large amount of facts and concepts. If it took an hour to review your deck, it's not a good use of your time unless the cards are really high value.
For example, if I want to learn electronics, my time would be better spent on fiddling with circuits and learning through mistakes of implementation. The nice thing is that concepts are interrelated to each other, not discrete and decontextualized that usually happened with utilizing spaced repetition. You get much better value from learning through experimentation and retain it better.
Don't get me wrong, spaced repetition still apply. However, if you can learn something that will last a lifetime, you don't have to repeat it for a long time if ever.
I found that spaced repetition really works as advertised, with software like Anki. However, it is not really suited at learning large amount of facts and concepts. If it took an hour to review your deck, it's not a good use of your time unless the cards are really high value.
For example, if I want to learn electronics, my time would be better spent on fiddling with circuits and learning through mistakes of implementation. The nice thing is that concepts are interrelated to each other, not discrete and decontextualized that usually happened with utilizing spaced repetition. You get much better value from learning through experimentation and retain it better.
Don't get me wrong, spaced repetition still apply. However, if you can learn something that will last a lifetime, you don't have to repeat it for a long time if ever.
Most people don't use space repetition as their only study technique, they just use it for 10-15 min and spend most of their time actually doing the thong to learn, for I with language learning, I do 10-15min of anki and 45-90 lf language immersion.
In fact you shouldn't use Anki for learning itself - put cards only when you're ready, when you have been taught them, and then use spaced repetition for recall.
fwiw, one of the biggest uses of anki is learning language vocabulary. for that, i think you can jump right into anki. obviously grammar, pitch accent -- if it applies, and other things surrounding the language will benefit from material outside anki but as someone who spends a lot of time learning languages; my first exposure to 90%+ of words is anki (i rely on pre-built decks).
what does it mean to have learnt a word if you can't recall it?
Understanding versus remembering.
You first understand and only afterwards encode your understanding in cards. It's in reviewing the cards that you put the understanding into your long-term memory (or possibly reveal gaps in your knowledge, in which case you revise your understanding).
You first understand and only afterwards encode your understanding in cards. It's in reviewing the cards that you put the understanding into your long-term memory (or possibly reveal gaps in your knowledge, in which case you revise your understanding).
Swedish: Vad har det med saken att göra?
direct translation: what has this with the matter to do?
meaning: what does this have to do with it?
Where does understanding come in? I can imagine what understanding mean for mathematics, science, etc. but for language, I'm having difficulty figuring it out.
direct translation: what has this with the matter to do?
meaning: what does this have to do with it?
Where does understanding come in? I can imagine what understanding mean for mathematics, science, etc. but for language, I'm having difficulty figuring it out.
The understanding comes from knowing when to use that phrase compared with other phrases that might mean similar things. Idiomatic usage to some extent. If learning a language was just remembering direct phrases then machine translation would be trivial
right so "med saken" was the new word, I understood the rest of the phrase. so it took like 4 seconds to understand. it'll take about 10-20 reviews to remember it for good.
so the understanding took far less time than remembering. I could read a whole grammar book 10 times, but if I don't remember any of the words, then I'll never be able to write/say something.
having all the words on the tip of my tongue is no good for communication.
so the understanding took far less time than remembering. I could read a whole grammar book 10 times, but if I don't remember any of the words, then I'll never be able to write/say something.
having all the words on the tip of my tongue is no good for communication.
I understand the English words you are using. I’m still not convinced I understand what you are saying. In this particular case recall doesn’t seem to be the problem.
I think it's possible we're not in disagreement at all, but I'm struggling to express the issue: to me, "recall" is the task that takes all the effort, "understanding" is pretty much instant. Therefore "recall" is the bottleneck between me now and me using the word in a conversation or piece of writing.
But it's possible that we have conflicting ideas of what recall/understanding means.
But it's possible that we have conflicting ideas of what recall/understanding means.
sorry, I wasn't clear.
Personally, I just went through word lists. When I had them memorised, I'd put them into Anki deck. Because I am going to forget them over time.
Personally, I just went through word lists. When I had them memorised, I'd put them into Anki deck. Because I am going to forget them over time.
I haven't quite convinced myself either way, whether learning a big list and then anki them for recall is better, or having a big list on anki but only introduce two of them a day. personally I find it makes it much more enticing to learn two new phrases each day, rather than trying to remember same 50 phrases all week.
Ever have a word on 'the tip of your tongue'?
that's fair - but I consider it useless if I can't recall it when I need it for everyday words.
for really rare words that I'll use 5 times in my career, sure, I'll explain it to chat gpt and it'll get it in one go.
for really rare words that I'll use 5 times in my career, sure, I'll explain it to chat gpt and it'll get it in one go.
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This is putting the cart before the horse. No matter how you slice and dice your equations, everyone intuitively understands you can't really store infinite data in your brain. Trying to claim otherwise is simply academic sophistry. No matter how hard you write your proof, it won't make information theory, basic physics, etc go away.
This is a math exercise, it assumes an infinitely long lived person, as well as a lot of simplifications. That's the same kind of arguments that can make sailboats go infinitely fast as long as there is any kind of wind.
It is not useless. It tells you essentially two things. First, it shows the limits of your model. If you have proven that sailboats can go infinitely fast, which is obviously not the case in reality, then it is an indication that your model is incomplete and you have to refine it until it stops giving out nonsense, or establish its limits. Second, it shows that what you have taken into account in your model is not what limits the speed of sailboats or memory recall.
It is not useless. It tells you essentially two things. First, it shows the limits of your model. If you have proven that sailboats can go infinitely fast, which is obviously not the case in reality, then it is an indication that your model is incomplete and you have to refine it until it stops giving out nonsense, or establish its limits. Second, it shows that what you have taken into account in your model is not what limits the speed of sailboats or memory recall.
It's not a math exercise. The author poses a question that is in the realm of psychology or neuropsychology or something like that, and then jumps straight into solving it with pure math, picking premises out from thin air.
The premises are obviously wrong, like assuming an infinitely long lived person, which means the answers arrived at will have no correlation with anything factual. You can't fix that with any sort of refinement. To be refinable would require it to be coarsely correct to begin with.
The premises are obviously wrong, like assuming an infinitely long lived person, which means the answers arrived at will have no correlation with anything factual. You can't fix that with any sort of refinement. To be refinable would require it to be coarsely correct to begin with.
There have been estimates of how much stuff storytellers from oral traditions could remember, and it’s measured in gigabytes. There are caveats beside the obvious (compressibility) that probably cost you an order of magnitude—stories in oral traditions have evolved for easier recall over the generations—but it’s fair to say that the intrinsic limits of human memory are nowhere near what any of us have deliberately memorized.
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