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Ask HN: Pointless learning?

1 pointaaronmoodie3 comments

I often find myself reading up on a language/technology that I probably will never use, and wonder if this pointless learning and whether I should be using my time more effectively?

For example, over the weekend I started reading up on common lisp and the next thing had installed SBCL, Emacs and had started on the Practical Common Lisp book.

I am a graphic designer by trade, and am still getting a handle on Ruby and JavaScript, so my concern is that the time I spent investigating Lisp could be better used learning more about these languages and working on personal projects I already have underway using them.

Or is any learning beneficial and having a curiosity about other languages healthy?

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The standard response-- especially, I think, in popular books about Lisp and functional languages-- is that learning a new language helps you think and program better in other languages.

My own experience supports that idea, but not strongly enough to "justify" the time I've spent investigating other languages. However, I don't worry too much about justifying the time, since it's just something I enjoy doing.

From that point of view, I would say that if you enjoy learning Lisp, go for it. If as a hobby you brewed beer, or biked, or read Homer in the original, or played with your kids, would you feel bad that you weren't using that time to study Ruby and Javascript?

The only counter-argument I can think of is this. How many personal projects do you have under way? Could you be running into a problem where you start many projects but finish none of them? In that case, you might want to dig into the root causes of that. But it would have nothing to do with learning new languages-- that might just be a symptom of a problem that really might have something to do with "pointless" effort.

I only have a couple of personal projects, which are still under way, and there is definitely room to add another one.

Thanks for the feedback though, I guess my hobby would be 'tinkering' so putting it that way, no I wouldn't feel bad enjoying my hobby instead of studying ... which is still tinkering in a way.

Whenever I have a hankering to learn something new, I usually try to incorporate it into a project somehow. Usually it's made up just for that purpose. That way I get the feeling of being productive and the enjoyment of learning something new. The downside to this method is you spend less time on the fundamentals of the new language, so you might bring in old ways of thinking that are as efficient.

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