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Cognitive Productivity

Using Knowledge to Become Profoundly Effective

Luc P. Beaudoin
You distinguish yourself from others not so much by what you've read, viewed or listened to, but by the lasting impact that information has had upon you. How can you use knowledge to become a more effective person? Cognitive Productivity answers this question with cognitive science and practical strategies.

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About

About

About the Book

There's no shortage of general productivity tools and information, such as David Allen's Getting Things Done. They deal with problems faced by the many (e.g., processing inboxes, running errands). However, we also need to be cognitively productive: to efficiently use knowledge in order to solve problems, create excellent products and improve ourselves.

There is no shortage of knowledge from which to learn. In fact, we are bombarded with so much information that some claim we are condemned to "The Shallows" described by Nicolas Carr. That is to be superficial information processors whose brains are (supposedly) being "rewired" by the Internet. To be sure, we've all had this experience: We've read a document that had the potential to make us more effective. But weeks later we can hardly remember the content. Worse, years go by and we have yet to apply the gems of knowledge it contains.

This book, however, rejects intellectual defeatism in favour of cognitive productivity. It is designed to help effective people systematically use knowledge and technology to become ever more effective. It does this by leveraging the most progressive attempt humanity has made to understand the human mind: broad cognitive science.

Cognitive Productivity is written in three parts:

Part 1 describes the process of taking information (as an input) and becoming more effective (as an output.) Your propensity to meet these requirements is one of the most significant contributors to your personal success. With it, you can optimally benefit from knowledge resources (web pages, ebooks, podcasts, videos, lectures, books, PDF files, etc) Part 1 explains why learning with technology is difficult, even for the best and brightest amongst us. Cognitive Productivity is a pro-active response to those challenges.

Part 2 provides powerful new concepts from cognitive science to help you understand the true engine of your own progress: your mind. It sketches how your mind develops as you master knowledge gems—snips of information with which you build your effectiveness. This surprising model of your mind may forever affect how you view yourself and your learning. You may come to see yourself as a "mindware developer" (a developer of your own mind!)

Part 3 contains powerful concepts and practical tips for processing knowledge with software. It will help you evaluate, organize, prioritize and navigate knowledge resources. It will help you analyze and comprehend them. You will learn to identify, extract and master knowledge gems. Part 3 will show you new ways to ensure you apply knowledge gems when they are applicable.

This book conveys a lot of information. (Compare the page count above.) Readers are advised to focus on the parts of the book that matter most to them. Readers who are only concerned with practical information, for example, may choose to read chapter 1, skim chapters 2 and 3, skip Part 2, and delve into Part 3.  

While Cognitive Productivity is based on existing affective cognitive science, it also is an original scientific contribution.

With Cognitive Productivity, you will learn to learn with today's technology while preparing for tomorrow. Add Cognitive Productivity to your mindware development kit.

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Author

About the Author

Luc P. Beaudoin

Luc specializes in macOS-based cognitive productivity, emotions, sleep onset and insomnolence. He is the author of Cognitive Productivity books. His work has been featured in Forbes Magazine, Inc., The New York Times, The Guardian, Lifehacker, The International Business Times of London, O'Magazines, Women's Health, CBC, etc. 

Luc is co-founder and lead designer of CogSci Apps (which invents cognitive productivity software including Hookmark and mySleepButton®), founder of CogZest (cognitive productivity publications and training), and Adjunct Professor of  Education at Simon Fraser University. He has a Ph.D. in Cognitive Science (School of Computer Science, University of Birmingham) and and undergrad degree in Psychology. He was a first-round employee of two of Canada's most highly-valued tech startups (Abatis Systems and Tundra Semiconductor). He was previously Assistant Professor of Military Psychology and Leadership at the Royal Military College of Canada. 

This eclectic combination of R&D experience led Luc to a new mission in 2001: to help smart people use knowledge, art and technology to become more effective. To this end, he extends and applies integrative design-oriented cognitive science. 

Luc's latest book, in progress, is Discontinuities: Love, Art, Mind. His next two books will be on sleep and emotions.

Luc is based in Metro-Vancouver, British Columbia. Still not satisfied? You can read more about him here. And check-out the 

Hookmark user forum.

Leanpub Podcast

Episode 124

An Interview with Luc P. Beaudoin

Contents

Table of Contents

List of Figures

Preface

Acknowledgements

  1. IChallenges and opportunities

1.Introduction

  1. 1.1Broad cognitive science
  2. 1.2Updating how we think about knowledge and ourselves
  3. 1.2.1The designer stance
  4. 1.2.2Mindware
  5. 1.2.3Adult mental development
  6. 1.2.4Effectance: motivation for competence
  7. 1.2.5Meta-effectiveness
  8. 1.3Example knowledge resources referenced in this book
  9. 1.3.1Keith Stanovich (2009). What Intelligence Tests Miss: The Psychology of Rational Thought
  10. 1.3.2John Gottman: Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work and The Relationship Cure
  11. 1.3.3Ries (2011): The Lean Startup
  12. 1.3.4The work of Aaron Sloman and other cognitive scientists
  13. 1.4Three vignettes: Disasters avertable by applying knowledge
  14. 1.4.1Being taken to the trough but choosing not to partake
  15. 1.4.2The applied science of marital failure
  16. 1.4.3Project failures
  17. 1.5The imperative of meta-effectiveness
  18. 1.6Overview of this book

2.Psychological contributors to effectiveness

  1. 2.1Effectiveness: The master objective
  2. 2.2Mastering objective knowledge
  3. 2.2.1Developing implicit understanding
  4. 2.3Developing skills
  5. 2.4Mastering norms
  6. 2.5Developing attitudes
  7. 2.6Developing propensities, habits and other dispositions
  8. 2.7Developing mentally
  9. 2.8Countering cognitive aging
  10. 2.9Becoming more meta-effective
  11. 2.10Back to the top: Excelling

3.Challenges to meta-effectiveness

  1. 3.1Information technology: Lack of support for cognitive productivity
  2. 3.1.1Tools designed for surfing, not delving
  3. 3.1.2Inadequate support for annotation
  4. 3.1.3The need to annotate entire resources
  5. 3.1.4The need for synchronized annotation services
  6. 3.1.5Where’s the productive practice app?
  7. 3.1.6Where’s the glossary manager and instiller?
  8. 3.1.7Drawbacks of smartphones and tablets
  9. 3.1.8Conclusion
  10. 3.2Challenging circumstances
  11. 3.2.1Demands on our time
  12. 3.2.2Sequestered and ill-presented information
  13. 3.2.3Cognitive productivity training
  14. 3.3Psychological challenges
  15. 3.3.1Cognitive science in the realm of knowledge work
  16. 3.3.2Illusions of meta-effectiveness
  17. 3.3.2.1Illusions of helpfulness of information
  18. 3.3.2.2Illusions of comprehension
  19. 3.3.2.3Illusions of (future) recall
  20. 3.3.2.4Illusions of rationality: transfer reframed
  21. 3.3.3Cognitive miserliness and its antagonists
  22. 3.3.3.1Effectance as a propensity to develop competence
  23. 3.3.3.2Perceived self-efficacy
  24. 3.3.4Cognitive aging
  25. 3.3.5Distractibility and the mind’s design
  26. IICognitive science

4.Introduction to Part 2

5.Your mind and its wares (the mind’s design)

  1. 5.1Overview
  2. 5.2Functional characterization
  3. 5.2.1Reactive mechanisms
  4. 5.2.2Internal motivators
  5. 5.2.3Management processes (Deliberative processes)
  6. 5.2.4Motive generators
  7. 5.2.5Meta-management
  8. 5.2.6Interrupt filters and perturbance (tertiary emotions)
  9. 5.2.7Alarm systems and emotions
  10. 5.2.8Long-term memory abilities
  11. 5.2.9(Short-term) working memory
  12. 5.2.10Long-term working memory
  13. 5.3Microcognition: Monitors, parallelism and mental reflexes

6.Adult mental development

  1. 6.1Objective knowledge (World 3), virtual machines (World 2’) and the rest (World 1)
  2. 6.1.1Mindware as World 2’: Virtual machinery
  3. 6.2Understanding understanding
  4. 6.3Developing monitors
  5. 6.4Developing motivators
  6. 6.5Developing long-term working memory
  7. 6.6Developing representational machinery
  8. 6.6.1Growth of component processes
  9. 6.6.2Taking child and adult development seriously
  10. 6.6.2.1Some phenomena that highlight mental representations
  11. 6.6.2.2Representational redescription (RR)
  12. 6.6.3RR in reverse: The problem of instilling mindware

7.Deliberate practice: A source of effectiveness

  1. 7.1Practice enhances factual learning and memory
  2. 7.1.1Practicing slows forgetting
  3. 7.1.2Practicing trumps reviewing
  4. 7.1.3Why practicing works: Explanations of test-enhanced learning
  5. 7.2Developing cognitive skills with practice
  6. 7.2.1Three phases of cognitive skill acquisition
  7. 7.2.2Beyond Ericsson’s theory of expertise
  8. 7.3Reflective practice and deliberate performance
  9. 7.4Enter productive practice
  10. IIISolutions

8.Introduction to Part 3

9.Learn your way around your R&D

  1. 9.1Learn your way around levels of processing
  2. 9.2Learn your way around your meta-information
  3. 9.2.1Appreciate the meta-access problem
  4. 9.2.2Address the meta-access problem
  5. 9.3Learn your way around your R&D projects and activities
  6. 9.3.1Identify your projects
  7. 9.3.2Classify your R&D tasks

10.Inspect

11.Assess

  1. 11.1About Assessment
  2. 11.2CUPA: Caliber, utility, potency and appeal
  3. 11.3C: Gauge its caliber
  4. 11.3.1Rhetorical and rational compellingness
  5. 11.3.2General epistemic criteria
  6. 11.3.3Assessing explanatory theories
  7. 11.4U: Gauge its usefulness
  8. 11.5P: Gauge its potency
  9. 11.5.1Potency as the potential for mental development
  10. 11.6A: Gauge its appeal and analyze your intuitions
  11. 11.7CUPA: Helpful information
  12. 11.8Other minds: Their recommendations, reviews and commentary

12.Delve

  1. 12.1Effective delving
  2. 12.2Annotation concepts and tools
  3. 12.3Tag entire resources
  4. 12.4Tag snips of text and images
  5. 12.5Write meta-docs
  6. 12.5.1An elaborate meta-doc template
  7. 12.6A template for conceptual understanding
  8. 12.7Quickly create and access meta-docs
  9. 12.8Delve ebooks, audio and other media
  10. 12.8.1Delve audio on the go
  11. 12.8.2Delve e-books
  12. 12.8.3Delve other media on your computer
  13. 12.8.4Productive laziness (cognitive parsimony)
  14. 12.9Computer monitors and other hardware

13.Productive practice: A master maker

  1. 13.1Productive practice in a nutshell
  2. 13.2An example: Learning the motive generator concept
  3. 13.3Co-opt flashcard software
  4. 13.4Capture and instillerize
  5. 13.5Design Instillers
  6. 13.5.1Instiller types and challenge templates
  7. 13.5.2Grow your understanding
  8. 13.5.3Divide and conquer
  9. 13.5.4RD cue mnemonic system: From free recall to cued recall
  10. 13.5.5Instiller design rules
  11. 13.6Practice with these general considerations in mind
  12. 13.6.1Set your practice time
  13. 13.6.2Respond to challenges
  14. 13.6.3Be efficient and effective

14.Practice productively

  1. 14.1Aim for effectiveness with knowledge: Rationality and transfer
  2. 14.2Grow monitors through review and reflection
  3. 14.3Master concepts and vocabulary
  4. 14.3.1Some basic distinctions
  5. 14.3.2Structure concept instillers
  6. 14.3.3Instill mindware about mindware, for example
  7. 14.3.4Develop effective (affective) bid monitors
  8. 14.4Master collections of information
  9. 14.4.1Apply the RD cue system
  10. 14.5Develop propensities to apply rules: Self-regulate with productive practice
  11. 14.5.1Consider the opposite
  12. 14.5.2Andon cord
  13. 14.5.3Avoid harsh startups with your new mindware
  14. 14.6Develop attitudes
  15. IVConclusion

15.Meta-effectiveness framework and clinical psychology

  1. 15.1The pertinence of psychotherapy concepts and methods to meta-effectiveness
  2. 15.2The practical relevance of meta-effectiveness to psychotherapy
  3. 15.3H-CogAff (mental architecture) and ACT as complementary

16.Delve and instill the knowledge of your choice

Postscript

  1. References
  2. Index

Contributors

About the Contributors

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