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Comment by phobosanomaly | Hacker News Reader

I've personally found that a necessary prerequisite to listening to an expert talking about something (at least for myself) is to read some books on it. It's boring, and it sucks, and it takes forever, but that repetition of just jamming things in your head and then going over them over and over again is a necessary prerequisite to being able to really 'get' what someone is saying at a master level.

For example, I wouldn't pay to see Gordon Ramsay teaching something without first working through Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat and The Food Lab. And by the time I've worked through the books, I know if I'm actually interested in the subject, or if it's just something that I've convinced myself is interesting based on seeing someone doing it on YouTube.

That's just my own philosophy on it. You gotta chop the mesquite before you can smoke the ribs.

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This is why the original concept of master class --- a master giving class to musicians/artists --- are only opened to the brightest high-level students. It's sort of pointless to hire the top talent in the field and let them coach complete newbies.

I think whether the prerequisite is specifically to read books depends on the field. In fact, the first thing to do, in my opinion, is to ask someone already in the field what's the best way to get a taste of this activity. But the general message, "chop the mesquite before you can smoke the ribs", I agree very much on.

On the other hand, my university was in the habit of using the best professors to teach the intro / first year courses. Because those are the courses where you tend to lose the most of your students.

They used the professors best at teaching. There are probably other professors better at doing research.

It’s edutainment. They select top celebrities to teach to the widest possible audience and maximize profit.

Sometimes the celebrities are good teachers, most of the time not.

I think I'd prioritize doing the actual thing over reading books, whenever possible.

For your Gordon Ramsay example - Let's say you can prepare by spending 5 hours trying to cook 5 really nice dishes. Or, you can spend 5 hours reading about cooking. I think the cooking approach to preparing will make you much more "ready to learn" than the reading approach.

Obviously in some cases you can't easily do it at home, but there's often a better proxy than reading, even if that's just a conversation about the topic with someone more knowledgeable than yourself.

I 100% get what you're saying.

I guess where I differ is, I've been cooking food my entire life. Most of it sucks. I still eat it. But if you were to ask me how to make one of the foods I cook any better I really wouldn't even know where to start.

However, if I picked up one of the those books, all of a sudden I would start to understand how meat cooks, the different ways you can tweak the process, and how to achieve the best results.

From there, I would be prepared to actually start cooking well. But without reading, I would still be shooting in the dark with the same terrible dishes I've been cooking terribly for decades.

I tend to read way more than I should before diving into something, but there's definitely a question of "you don't know what you don't know" that can't be resolved by mere practice, or not very efficiently for reasonably complex skills/topics.

Author of the essay here -- I know they say you shouldn't read the comments, but the discussion on here was so thoughtful I just had to create and account and jump in.

Two thoughts to this convo:

1. One thing it took a few years of living in Europe to learn is that what seems like a logical way to learn or convey information is also -- at least partially -- cultural. I'm an experience first kind of gal -- and I judge theories by how well they explain experience. I also think it's a better way to communicate. But here in Europe the standard way of giving, say, a presentation is to begin with all the theory, definitions, concepts, and only then move on to case studies.

It was when I read Erin Meyer's The Culture Map that the whole thing clicked for me. I think it's worth reading the whole book, but here's a quick summary: https://www.mdttraining.vn/post/on-our-bookshelf-the-cultura...

One of her axes of comparison is "principles first vs applications first." It helped me to realise that my preference for applications first was also due to spending all my formative years in North America, being taught this way, consuming media structured this way, and so on.

2. I actually finally bought Salt Fat Acid Heat this spring, started reading it, and just the chapter on salt has already begun making a difference in my cooking. I do think cooking proves you can do something badly, every day, for an entire lifetime, if you don't either get some better theory or carry out a lot of experimentation and remember what works.

However... the reason I bought the Nosrat book was that I was starting to be inspired by cooking again, and what motivated me in that end was the Ramsay course! It gave me that sense of exploration and play again. So I think it's worth paying attention to what increases motivation, especially with something that can become quite a dull chore.

I'd like to add bread to the list of things that can be bad every day, without us questioning it.

I spent years eating bread rolls from the local bakery every morning and never questioning it. But there's like a whole world of bread variants that are not suitable for bakeries for various reasons (too much work, expensive ingredients, short shelf life). And now my new favorite is this:

http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/23662/sourdough-hokkaido-mi...

It has such a pleasant nut-like taste and the fluffiness really highlights some flavors like smoked salmon. Now that I know what is possible, I feel disappointed by the blandness of store-bought bread.

Ramsey can teach you to cook in some capacity. But to be a true master a deep dive is required.

You're correct. There's a difference between being hand held through a handful of meals and actually understanding how to cook.

For better or worse, most people don't want to be masters. They simply want to impress someone else.

Right. The funny thing is Ramsay talks about the years of work he did learning how to cook, studying Italian cuisine in Italy, etc. etc.

I think the MasterClasses -- or other online instruction -- are mostly great for inspiration and motivation. Someone who is already good at the craft might get more out of it, since they'll notice the finer points of technique. But for most people I suspect it will be passive entertainment, with a few widely applicable insights here and there.

What you’re saying is that the more you know the more you can learn from the world’s best. That is in fact what a masterclass is — a class for experts by a master.

This is interesting, and is reflected in some other comments, but I have always gone under the assumption that you will only learn things once so it is best to learn them the correct way. This mostly holds true in an academic situation though in my experience, and I have applied it as such.

I think it depends on the thing learned.

In dance it's pretty important to learn the basics well from day one. If you learn wrong technique it worms its way into your muscle memory and is difficult to unlearn and replace with something else. (It's also why the most basic dance classes ought to be taught by expert teachers, but that's another hobbyhorse.) And bad technique can lead to injury.

Other fields don't necessarily have a "correct" way, or they do but it's comparatively easy to replace a mistake once we notice it. In some cases, making a mistake and then correcting it can actually fix the right way to do it in one's memory. (Think of embarrassing mistakes we sometimes make when trying to speak a foreign language!)

What you're wanting isn't simply knowledge. You're seeking understanding.

Understanding > Knowledge

And yes, it also takes more effort, more grit.

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