Share with us what is happening in your ZK this week. March 24, 2024

Will · March 24

Swimming with Ideas

This is yet another opportunity to share with your friends what you are working on. Add to this discussion by telling us about your zettelkasten journey. Share with us what you're learning. Sharing helps me and, hopefully, you, too. It helps us clarify our goals and visualize our thinking. And sometimes, a conversation sparks a magical moment where we can dive into an idea worth exploring. We'd love to hear more from you. 🫵🏼

Ideas I'm exploring with my ZK:

My Zk is another story. I have a couple of new areas of attention–cogency and ambiance. I'm studying these terms and how they relate to ideation and love, respectively. Ah-ha, moment while writing this. "These two terms have a relationship. Something ambient is cogent when examined. Because of the naturalness of the products of cogent ideas, they are in the end discovered as ambient to the environment." I have a wealth (30) of ideas in my inbox. Each one is like a planet orbiting a star, a rocket ship sitting on the launch pad, holding in anticipation, each with the potential to send this zettelnaut into a lifetime of exploration. I feel like the richest man alive. Because I've shifted my attention to EDCI445 Young Adult Literature, my ideation processing queue has exploded. The pile sits there, taunting me. It is my collector self trying to steal my attention.

Words stand for things, things stand for ideas, and the world of things stands for the world of ideas. (In the flavor of John Locke.)

I attack my practice of zettelkasting with two prongs.
1. How do we feed this benevolent monster?
2. How do we surface the buried treasure that lies hidden in the sediment of our ZK? To quote the great @pseudoevagrius "I want my zettelkasten to be poetic, not mimetic."

Books I'm reading:

Sertillanges, A. G. and Ryan, Mary. The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods. 1987. PDF
Heiligman, Deborah. Charles and Emma: the Darwins' leap of faith. 2011. Kindle
Reilly, Winifred M. It Takes One to Tango: How I Improved My Marriage - with Absolutely No Help from My Husband* - and How You Can, Too (*Maybe Just a Little). 2017. Everand Audiobook
Gaffigan, Jim. Food: a love story. 2015. Everand Audiobook
Lockhart, E. (2018). We were liars (First Ember edition). Ember is an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. Kindle
Doty, M. (2010). The art of description: World into word. Graywolf Press. Kindle

Music I'm listening to:

Themes of this week's ZK work:

1 zettel - meta zettelkasting
5 zettel - meta writing or reading
0 zettel - advancing python
2 zettel - Ed-Curriculum & Instruction (EDCI445)
8 zettel - captured new and novel ideas

★★★★★

The "My rolling ten-day zettel production" is produced by a script for attachment to my daily journaling template. I do my journaling in Bear to keep personal journaling separate from my knowledge work.

Let me know if you would like to discuss any of these notes.

My ten day zettel production

ZettelDistraction · March 24

Rpt.5.0.24.0324 Vernal Equinox Report

In any case, I am not appealing for any man’s verdict, I am only imparting knowledge, I am only making a report. To you also, honored Members of the Academy, I have only made a report. (Kafka 1972, 259)

A Report to a Zettelkasten

Why do I feel love toward my computers, my radios, and mathematics? These are close to the warm feelings I might have had toward people when I was younger, though, without the uncertainty of contingent reciprocity. My feelings were unrequited, more often than not.

Such enthusiasm used to occur to me late at night, before bedtime, too late to be motivating. By morning, it had dissipated, and I had forgotten about it.

ChatGPT’s contrasting perspective

If these experiences do not interfere with your daily life, they may deepen your connection to your interests. However, if they are unsettling or disruptive, discussing them with a mental health professional who can provide personalized insights and strategies might be beneficial. They can help discern whether these states are a cause for concern or a unique aspect of your intellectual and emotional landscape.

Reply to ChatGPT

The AI suspects I might be insane.

In addition to our desire for clarity and definiteness, humans exhibit a second set of equally essential properties that need to be more adequately understood, little under our control, and seriously underappreciated. These are the powers of forgetting, ignoring, and failing to ask questions. – (Geuss 2005, 6) [Excerpt rewritten by Grammarly, with apologies to Prof. Raymond Geuss.]

References

Geuss, Raymond. 2005. Outside Ethics. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.

Kafka, Franz. 1972. The complete stories. 2nd print. New York: Schocken Books.

ZettelDistraction · March 25

Another entry this week.

Dream.1.0.24.0324 The Void

The Siren Song of Brain Entrainment

During the early part of 2006, I became curious about binaural music. I found most of it tedious, except the “Brain Power” CD by Kelly Howell. I was interested in its use of binaural beats in the theta range. The Brain Power CD is advertised to encourage “big-picture thinking” – a dubious claim I would later find hilariously understated. The CD induced an odd trance-like state at most, with no other effects. Then, in March 2006, while listening to the CD, I experienced a strange vision.

My God, it's full of stars

My surroundings faded from view. Through closed eyes, I found myself surrounded by a field of stars. Moments later, I was suspended in extragalactic space, hovering over a funnel of dust twisting toward the center of a slowly rotating galaxy.

Beyond “big-picture thinking”

The vision dissolved, and then I became aware of “The Void.” It was a superior presence–though nothing like a sentient entity in any recognizable sense. The Void appeared to be transforming itself.

Olaf Stapledon

I was reminded of the novel Star Maker by Olaf Stapledon, who wrote that the Star Maker viewed the universe with the critical eye of an artist impatient to proceed with ever more incredible creation (Stapledon 2008). Stapledon hoped to account for the cosmic indifference of “the supreme being.”

The Void expressed neither impatience nor love but a fleeting sense of humor–only there was nothing in which its free-floating, teleological deadpan could inhere.

Aftermath

My subsequent attempts to return to The Void were largely unsuccessful. After such a terrifying encounter, I found it increasingly difficult to use the CD.

The grandeur of The Void was so remote from my experience that I found myself lost to its significance. Only recently did I realize that the vision could inform some areas of conduct.

References

Stapledon, Olaf. 2008. Star Maker. Dover ed. Mineola, N.Y: Dover Publications.

tjex · March 25

For context: I'm working on my masters thesis which is exploring (on a high level) connections shared between Zettelkasten, network graphs and creative ideation. It's part theoretical and part practical. The practical side is to build a program to assist in the efficacy of the Zettelkasten process (whatever that turns out to be).

I've decided to try and do all my note making and documentation for the thesis within the Zettelkasten as well. So there is a little 'practice based research' going on as well.

Here a recently edited Zettle that captures the thinking a bit:

---
title: creative ideas arise through dialogue
date: 2024-03-19 18:25
id: epzx
tags: [tree, pos, p/thesis]
aliases: []
---

# creative ideas arise through dialogue

As described in [Communicating with Slip Boxes](r/dueb), creative ideas are
shown to come through the process of dialogue. This makes me wonder, is what
gives us humans the perception that we're creative, simply our ability to have
internal dialogues?

Brian Eno also states that [creativity doesn't happen in isolation](df0u), it
takes a group. It's the exchange of ideas, experiences and discussion that fuel
creativity in particular; i.e, a dialogue. This dialogue can also be with
technology, [Zettelkasten and network graphs support creative ideation by
offering interactive systems of interconnected data](50p9).

Likewise it's been written that
[consciousness occurs when colonies of cells are large enough in number and connections](k8pg), in other words, through connections and transmission of electrical activity, an
'entity' such as consciousness can be created.

This could well lead us closer to answering questions such as,
[are generative AI models creative?](83st)

---

References:

- [creative ideas are derived from indeterminism](zibq)

Loni · March 25

Hi,

My life changed a lot since the last time I posted about my Zettlekasten here, but I am so glad to see you again, Will and ZD

As I had a lot on my plate last year, I just took notes on loose leaves. I tried index cards and written Zettlekasten to fight attention span problems but, well, not for me, writting by hand was tiring, confusing and while I really liked to had some physical object into my hands, my brain was always way to fast and I ended up frustrated. So my Zettelkasten as itself was hibernating all this time. It is spring again and new things come into light.

I take back my previous work however and I introduce my notes about sport, health care and nutrition. I began last year a medical journey to heal some wounds and health problem. While I am cautious to do not injure myself again, I AM BACK TO SPORT and it is so, so, so good. I do climbing, and I grew passionate about this sport. I do musculation too. My high-level energy is focused again on something.

So I introduce notes about move of musculation, the way of doing it, the muscles implied, etc. When I am working on a problem in bloc climbing, I note it too, to remember. I also keep a journal of performance, noting my sport seance, duration, noting myself on differents parameters. The sport journal will stay on loose paper in a binder.

Right now, I am looking back at my Zettelkasten, asking myself how to work with it, and if I can't produce a new way to structure it. The objectif is to keep it alive, even if my life turns wild again. There was something missing, or something was too much. I have a lot of new notes and new readings notes to add to it.

READING : F.Thilliez, The ghost memoy"

Beginning: 2024.03.22
Finishing :
Note : 5/10 for now (110e page)

Easy to read, but hell, the style is quite scholar and I recognize the (stereo)typical scenario construction of the American school of writers. Boring. I think I know who is the killer but why doing this like this? There is no true mistery when the only mistery is kept by the writer, not the story or the characters.

The Pi number and the golden number like fascination object? Wow, something never seen before /yawn/ Screams "I don't understand mathematics but I tried to write a story about them anyway". Just like 50 shades of Gray about BDSM. Fantasms only. I would prefer a story about a Nautilus fetishist killer for no other reason that he liked Nautilus. It would be fun, at least.

The part about Manon'memory is more documented. Not excellent, but more logical and well constructed.

I will forget to finish it, probably.

I prefer Sherlock Holmes : every keys are given to us by the writer. At some point of the story, something triggers Sherlock : I like to guess what.

I become more and more and more critic about fiction... I am cynical, or demanding about quality, too much maybe?

The real mystery here is : will I be able to take pleasure in reading again?

ctietze · March 25

@Loni welcome back!

Quoting from the other thread:

I know there was a logic for my organisational system but I can't remember now.

Sounds like the mystery thriller you were looking for

Might be a weird hobby of mine, but I'd be interested in more details about your re-discovery of the previous organizational system, and making sense of it again, as an archaeologist. (I'd be esp. keen to know/test a hypothesis: whether you find that the old system was overly structured and thus inflexible for change in circumstance and thinking, and that loosening the degree of organization somewhat would help, and stuff like that!)

This happens with my vocation a lot, too, since source code that was okay to write back then and still works fine in practice can be completely incomprehensible at the same time when revisited a year later.

ZettelDistraction · March 25

@Loni said:
Hi,

My life changed a lot since the last time I posted about my Zettlekasten here, but I am so glad to see you again, Will and ZD

Likewise, long time no see.

I do musculation too.

In my case, it's a miscalculation.

-F

Loni · March 25

Nice to see you again Christian

Sounds like the mystery thriller you were looking for

... Well, you are totally right Thank you, I laughed out of loud. I see myself with a magnifying glass on my screen telling to my plushy something like "Elementary, Teddytson. The criminal was a chaotic woman with high expectations..."

Much more interesting that the novel I'm reading in fact x)

Might be a weird hobby of mine, but I'd be interested in more details about your re-discovery of the previous organizational system, and making sense of it again, as an archaeologist.

Sounds like reverse engineering as well, just as someone who tries to figure out how this Cobol thing works.

I really appreciate taking part into strange hobby, some here we are :

I had to move from my town to another quite quickly, 450km away, adventure time! \o/ I was scared about damaging my hardware, so I took my Zettelkasten on my back-up device.

What a genious I am : I did'nt check if I had made some other back-up before doing the new one, first point. Second one : I tried also to make a new organisation for my notes with new writing conventions of titles, folders and whatever, just like that, before leaving. I just can't remember what I wanted to do. And you can add the layer of complexity I tried to implement before being a Chaos Agent, in my normal practice of note taking. I also have test files with totaly new notes in them and old ones mixed, test for a "Big File to rule them all, one file to find them, One file to bring them all and in the darkness (of Sublime Text) bind them" with a lot of intersting elements... And of course, some bugs that threw some files in random orders inside random folders because why not.

So, as you can see, it is a mix, a salad from an age of pure chaos eruption /add some dramatic music for theatric/. Your hypothesis is the right one with a "it's more complicated than that" toping.

This happens with my vocation a lot, too, since source code that was okay to write back then and still works fine in practice can be completely incomprehensible at the same time when revisited a year later.

I imagine that's why a programer has to comment their code. I can try as well and try to comment not only my notes with context, but my organization too... But the simplest solution is probably to simplify my process to keep track of my logical decision , that would allow me to use my Zettelkasten through years. If I had simplier thing to work with, I would'nt need to import so much notes right now.

ctietze · March 25

I imagine that's why a programer has to comment their code.

There's this weird back and forth between the urge to comment to clarify, and figuring out ways to make the code itself clearer, thus making the comments obsolete.

Recognizing that there's a pendulum that swings at all here is the key insight.

Loni · March 26

@ctietze said:

I imagine that's why a programer has to comment their code.

There's this weird back and forth between the urge to comment to clarify, and figuring out ways to make the code itself clearer, thus making the comments obsolete.

Recognizing that there's a pendulum that swings at all here is the key insight.

This metaphore rings a bell, not only for Zettelkasten, thank you.

Now after analysis, I think I was also trapped into the "what if I can find a better system" obsession. Not the classical procrastination of playing with parameters, but the true "OK let's begin with something new, a true better, faster, stronger version" fixation.

I really enjoyed working with one solution for a while (one big file, or multiple files with a simple classification, etc) and then grew up frustrated by a point or another (no media handle, or confusing classifcation between project notes and ideas notes...) and started anew. As far I can see analysis my previous tests, I had multiple structures ideas, some of them were quite good in fact, but I was perfectionnist an lacked patience. Just like I was constantly changing the main programming language in the middle of the project instead of working on finding solutions about the small weakness problems.

Oscillation between occasional frustration and overall satisfaction should be normal. Balance is a movement. Sometimes, discomfort takes part of the process.

Sascha · March 26

Hey Loni,

nice to see you again!

Loni · March 26

@Sascha said:
Hey Loni,

nice to see you again!

Hi Sascha, thank you! I'm glad to see you all

Edmund · March 26

@Will said:
Music I'm listening to: ...

Do you have links between some of your notes and music you are listening to?

GeoEng51 · March 26

@Loni READING : F.Thilliez, The ghost memory

Are you reading that in French? A quick search does not show any of his books in English (but I'll dig deeper).

Loni · March 26

@GeoEng51 said:
@Loni READING : F.Thilliez, The ghost memory

Are you reading that in French? A quick search does not show any of his books in English (but I'll dig deeper).

Hi GeoEng
It's indeed a french writer. I don't know if every books he wrote are translated in english, but you probably can find a few of them. I really hope I have the "not his best" novel -every writer has a few of them when they write a lot- as some of my friends were enthusiastic about him.

Will · March 27

@Edmund said:

@Will said:
Music I'm listening to: ...

Do you have links between some of your notes and the music you are listening to?

I don't use the ZK method for music notation. Instead, I occasionally jot down brief notes about a music recording during deep-think retreats. However, I have noticed that there is an opportunity gap in my ZK when it comes to music. Although I have 156 notes that reference music, not a single one of them contains a pointer to an actual music track.

Do you link the music you listen to with your notes?

Maybe someone will enlighten me on the particulars of linking notes with music.

MPeony · March 28

Hello all,

I am new to the forum. I am a dyslexia and dyscalculia tutor. I have been enjoying and finding useful insights in many of the blogs and comments here. I appreciate the collegial feel of the forums.

This week I am setting up my Zk in preparation for starting my EdD in Montessori Studies this summer. When I wrote my master's thesis I printed all the sources, color-coded the ideas and then just remembered the location of my relevant sources. I loved writing my thesis and want to be more systematic going forward.

I am reading R Kramer's Maria Montessori: A Biography and using it as my Zk test case. My goal is to build a "good enough" Zk right now that has flexibility built in: I know things will need to adapt as I add more. My first challenge has been how to capture Z's. I finally settled on color-coded flags:

These are quick to use and force me to analyze and categorize the relevance of a Z. I have also begun to coalesce my Z's into themes (structural notes?):

My next challenge was how to turn my flags into fuller Z's, with more of my thinking/responses added. As Sascha noted, it can be easy to get bogged down in the specifics.

I like having the exact quotes in my Z's, but I don't want to write them all out, possibly printing them and adding them to analog Z's. I decided to track quotes and thoughts in a simple table in Microsoft Word:

I really appreciated Sascha's post about the Zk and the iceberg model, especially his comments about going beyond Luhmann to fit who we are, the world we live in, and the tasks we have. It is exactly my thinking about Montessori. This created my third challenge which is linking notes (Thanks Sascha for my first linked note!):

I am keeping it simple and trying to figure out how to do this as a system and not just individual tasks. I am struggling with tagging Z's and find myself stuck picking the "right" words or phrases. Any words of wisdom?

This has all been very inefficient in terms of time but has been invaluable for helping me figure out how I think. I would like to add a digital system, but I am utterly overwhelmed at the options. I'm going to explore Protolyst this weekend.

I look forward to learning from all of you.

Edmund · March 28

@Will said: Although I have 156 notes that reference music, not a single one of them contains a pointer to an actual music track.

Do you link the music you listen to with your notes? Maybe someone will enlighten me on the particulars of linking notes with music.

Yes, I‘m also linking music tracks with ideas. For me Zettelkasten is a universal tool to revisit old ideas, memories, moments, places, emotions, and more. Linking between this different types of notes extends the reasons to revisit my ideas. So I use: images, colors, music, noises and taste. Smell is missing, but I can give it a try.

Sascha · March 28

However, I have noticed that there is an opportunity gap in my ZK when it comes to music. Although I have 156 notes that reference music, not a single one of them contains a pointer to an actual music track.
Do you link the music you listen to with your notes?
Maybe someone will enlighten me on the particulars of linking notes with music.

Example from fiction writing: You can set a reminder and a link to soundtracks for various topics, plot lines and characters. For example: The fight music for the main character of my fantasy novel is: (only in his half-demon-eater form) This is the song that I play when I let my character fight or edit the scenes. (Strangely, my daughter slept within 10 seconds of this song playing when she was freshly out of the box)

Loni · March 28

@Will
I do like Edmund - music tracks for ideas and memories, and like Sascha too, as a fiction writer and creator, music is an important part of inspiration. Some music is linked to a specific character, a scene for a mood indicator...

As a (apprentice) singer, I also have lyrics, a lot. A passionate musician friend of mine keeps partitions, but also custom extract of music and videos because "this riff is so godlike omg, listen to that!" "this technic is perfect, I have to learn" and so on. He could easily integrate all of this in a Zettelkasten with notes and his own recording of him playing.

Strangely, my daughter slept within 10 seconds of this song playing when she was freshly out of the box

Ahaha! I'm not suprised. My son used to be more peacefull after listening punk or death metal.

djdrysdale · March 28

@Will, what do you think of the Doty book? It appears that I have read it, according to Goodreads, but alas it was before I had much of a note-making practice and it's beyond my recollection. Worth picking up again?

Sascha · March 29

@Loni

Ahaha! I'm not suprised. My son used to be more peacefull after listening punk or death metal.

Sadly, I think it is because these genres are very similar to (white) noise.

Loni · March 29

@Sascha said:
@Loni

Ahaha! I'm not suprised. My son used to be more peacefull after listening punk or death metal.

Sadly, I think it is because these genres are very similar to (white) noise.

Bwah hahaha don't tell that to his proud father x)

Welcome aboard, @MPeony !

Are you building an analog Zettelkasten? Would you want to keep a paper one or a digital one? If I mind, maybe you should look for a more agnostic solution with something that keep your notes local (not on a distant server) and use a plain text format to keep your notes yours on the long run (like .md or .txt). The Archive, Zettlr, Obsidian, VS Code, Sublime Text and other custom solutions are fine. You can easily transfer all your files from your computer to your phone with something I like much : Syncthing, it's an open source software which sync two folders on two devices.

I am a dyslexia and dyscalculia tutor.

Does that mean that you have to handle a lot of ressources and citations and read studies to keep yourself up-to-date? Did you try working with Zotero? It's a software made for quotes from books to handle them in publication. You can also make a special note into your Zettelkasten as well if you don't have to write academic papers.

For more generic and/or specific purposes, there's a lot of articles and forum posts which may be really useful to help you. It's a never ending gold mine here

I wish you the best for your Zettelkasten journey!

Sascha · March 29

@MPeony The best starting point of structure notes is to ask yourself: What is the purpose of the note and what do you expect of it. Not as a note, but as a tool for later use. It could be a hub, a thinking canvas, a tool box etc.

djdrysdale · March 29

@Sascha said:
The best starting point of structure notes is to ask yourself: What is the purpose of the note and what do you expect of it. Not as a note, but as a tool for later use. It could be a hub, a thinking canvas, a tool box etc.

This is a point that cannot be emphasized enough!

When I started to understand this it transformed my practice. I used to just use structure notes as collections of links to notes on a topic. This was fine, for a while, but when I began to use them more deliberately as tools to engage with my notes they became much more powerful. They helped me crystallize my own thinking on different topics and unlocked the "conversing with my zettelkasten" piece that I had been missing for a long time.

rwrobinson · March 29

@djdrysdale

Do you have examples of before and after that you'd be willing to share to see the difference?

Will · March 29

@djdrysdale said:
@Will, what do you think of the Doty book? It appears that I have read it, according to Goodreads, but alas it was before I had much of a note-making practice and it's beyond my recollection. Worth picking up again?

Yes. It is especially inspirational to my poet persona.

djdrysdale · March 29

@rwrobinson said:

Do you have examples of before and after that you'd be willing to share to see the difference?

I don't have much I am comfortable sharing but to give you examples ways to use a structure note as a tool is when I am doing (fiction) writing, I create a structure note that is a "beat sheet" that identifies major plot milestones that I want to hit with the appropriate notes linked to it.

I have a few different ones for fiction writing for things like character development, plot development, and research. I plan to develop some for my editing process as well, bringing together notes I have taken on good writing that will help me polish my drafts in different phases (e.g., an editorial pass for structure, for characterization and dialogue, for technical edits, etc).

For other kinds of notes, I am more deliberate when I sub-divide a structure note. Where I used to slavishly just parrot the topics I observed everyone talking about, I try to be more mindful of focusing on what matters to me, specifically, and how I might use those notes; this is where I started to see how I might more usefully use my notes to help me develop an argument or position that I could then write about versus just collecting notes and filing them away. Early on I might have made a structure note that was just, say, "Creativity" and then did little more than list the relevant notes underneath it. It was a navigational aid but not a thinking tool. When I started to be more thoughtful about the sub-sections that mattered to how I was approaching the area of study I started to find additional novel links that I might not have immediately considered before. These will vary depending on the structure note and what I think I might do with it. A structure note where I am trying to bring together knowledge for self-improvement will look quite different from one that is for a project I am tackling at work. Previously this would not have been the case for me.

c4lvorias · April 2

Ideas I'm exploring with my ZK:

Knowledge worker's problem: Knowledge is implicit in outputs, a ZK can handle this problem because it's the environment(?) thinking happens. It's a tool yes, but it's also the thinking itself.
How the brain changes: Especially in DID patients it's hard to internalize a piece of truth because of the dissociation. I call it cognitive sink. How knowledge is acquired by our core self? Otherwise it floats inside without causing any change. Also memory reconsolidation is important here. How cognitive sink can be triggered to open a memory reconsolidation window?
Building a brain: How connectionist and bayesian approaches differ?

Things I'm reading:

How to Change: The Science of Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be
Mostly papers

Zettelkasten Forum

Share with us what is happening in your ZK this week. March 24, 2024

Swimming with Ideas

Ideas I'm exploring with my ZK:

Books I'm reading:

Music I'm listening to:

Themes of this week's ZK work:

Comments

Rpt.5.0.24.0324 Vernal Equinox Report

A Report to a Zettelkasten

ChatGPT’s contrasting perspective

Reply to ChatGPT

SEE ALSO

References

Dream.1.0.24.0324 The Void

The Siren Song of Brain Entrainment

My God, it's full of stars

Beyond “big-picture thinking”

Olaf Stapledon

Aftermath

SEE ALSO

References

Ideas I'm exploring with my ZK:

Things I'm reading:

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