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Comment by nxicvyvy | Hacker News Reader

The PG quote is a hot take.

Yes, writing can be a productive focusing mechanism, it can also provide you with good reflections. But so can meditation, so can a good walk. It's a tool, not a requirement. It also has it's own downsides in that it forces you to think a certain constrained way, and while that is also one of its strength, it does limit your ability to think creatively.

Similar to how using ChatGPt to draft writing or code, there is a strong biasing effect pushing you towards something non novel.

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Things you write down stick better (according to school teachers) and if you write digitally you can look stuff up as you write.

There are similar quotes about meditation and walking so they are all part of the same toolkit (and it is great if you can use any part of it).

> if you write digitally you can look stuff up as you write

is that supposed to be a good thing? if the goal is developing ideas, i would wager that it's not.

If looking up helps you catch a misconception or missunderstanding about the real world, it's great.

I find it very hard for external sources to support my thinking (if they do I don't read them but save for later comparison). If anything they prove me wrong when I am on the wrong path.

Not every part of your ideas need to be novel and unadulterated by the rest of human progress. If your ideas need to fit in to some wider context (e.g. you need to produce working code) then it is very helpful to be able to look up important facts about that wider context rather than guessing.

Can you give any examples of someone whose idea formation was not improved went they undertook the task of writing their thoughts down?

No, because we don't have access to the ideas of those who don't write them down.

I have had ideas that come to me, during walks, and other certain moments, briefly and they keep developing over time. It has happened that after I actually write them down, my mind stops caring about them and they stop happening.

Alternatively I have had ideas in mind that get stronger and stronger and at some point I just have to work them and so I work on them without writing them down and I actually bring them to fruition while writing down might have oddly killed that motivation or obsession.

It is mainly various side projects. The act of writing somehow diminishes that motivation or reward feeling as opposed to immediately starting to build the side project.

I've had many ideas that have been watered down by the editing process that by the time I'm done have lost the impact or connection to the original idea.

Maybe I lack the vocabulary? Writing skills? Maybe I'm self censoring? Maybe it's my perfectionism optimising the local maxima?

I don't know but I do know writing has ruined some, not all, of my ideas.

This also wasn't my main issue above. I was more concerned that the idea you can't have good ideas without writing them down was deeply flawed and a bit gatekeepery.

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