There are also lots of valuable intellectual tasks that appear more fun than effortful at face value. Watching talks at conferences springs to mind.
Citation needed. There are many anecdotes of peak performers not liking the practice. I guess we could all agree that being at least able to tolerate the practice must be a necessary condition.
I also wholly reject the idea that this "edutainment" content is useless. Same as spaced repetition, once you see some concepts often enough (which the algorithm guarantees if it knows you are into that topic), you will learn something. I don't consume such content myself, but to dismiss it just looks as rejecting formats different than what you used.
I think there's a quote on this but I can't remember by whom, but I think it's something like "Familiarity doesn't lead to repetion, repetition leads to familiarity."
Even if not a quote, I think the idea (with spaced repetion adding the concept of time) of repeated exposure to a subject as the thing that drives understanding, and not understanding just being a thing that itself allows people to do the subject a lot, is an important one to keep in mind for learning any new topic, particularly ones that are perhaps further away from your current knowledge base, and so feel inherently trickier.
And if you fully comfortable with the subject, you're probably not learning anything at that point ;)
I don’t think the author disagrees with you. Some people really enjoy the effort of a tough workout. But they don’t do it primarily for the fun. Can / should workouts be entertaining? Sure. But there’s a difference between a primarily entertaining bit of content and a primarily workout-oriented bit of content.
Karpathy doesn't really say they are. What he's postulating is that learning must be purposefully effortful. Kind of like playing any sport, say Football / Volleyball. You'll enjoy it, but it isn't without effort.