Advice for young people: Learn things deeply | John Carmack and Lex Fridman

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GUEST BIO:
John Carmack is a legendary programmer, co-founder of id Software, and lead programmer of many revolutionary video games including Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, and the Commander Keen series. He is also the founder of Armadillo Aerospace, and for many years the CTO of Oculus VR.

PODCAST INFO:

SOCIAL:

[cameronbaird]

"You can't know everything, but you should convince yourself that you can know anything." Inspirational. Legend

[bangkokadventures]

That combination of charisma and intelligence is really something else. So much fun to listen to this guy

[chrisp]

"weaponize curiosity"
- John Carmack

[jl_]

I love that John acknowledges the ways that guided him might not exactly be what someone else might need

[meltygear]

Revisiting this snippet after months into my career always makes me confirm how truthful the whole thing is. "Weaponize curiosity".

[samyak]

I remember seeing my physics teacher's study room it was full of so many books. It seemed like a library, it was hella inspiring to just look at them and know what's it like to be balls deep into something

[ninjalacoon]

I love carmack. I remember listening to the masters of doom as an audio book back in college and just being fascinated by this legend. Guy has preoccupations with things like pizza, games, and an overpowering fascination with complex systems. What a combination.

[alphaandomegaministry]

Every school in the UK needs this guy as a keynote speaker. A true inspiration = a man who makes dreams a reality. Original Quake is an unforgettable masterpiece. A living work of art. Carmack scaled a technological mountain to make it happen.

[shantanushekharsjunerft]

I have experienced this on a personal level. Learning to deconstruct ELF format executable on Linux. It was during one of these exercises that I found how the "main" function of any program gets invoked. Tracing system calls through strace and library calls through ltrace to understand the internal implementation of user space processes.

[leastimnotarepublican]

If you know something, you don't have to remember it

[abhishekkumarbiswas]

Such an innocence for learning and digging deep into things is just a work ethic of a Monk master .His wisdom is for long term success in tech

[Ianforcements]

Reminds me of Richard Feynman walking about seeing the beauty in all the parts. The surface level beauty doesn't go away, and you also get all the extra beauty of all the parts, how they go together and how they work etc.

[MonaMarMag]

I know and believe that every and each of us has it own path that should follow .
The most important thing is to live
in harmony with yourself .
Then you are also honest with others .

[thoyo]

Definitely one of my favorite interviews

[rileyfletch]

You can drive a nail through a layer cake problem space, and learn a cross section there. What a unique quote.

[harulem]

Sound advice with a sound caveat. What was best for him is not for everyone. Consuming knowledge at such a pace and such a deep level require a very special mindset and intellect.

[woolfel]

what carmack is describing is growth oriented thinking that Sal Kahn talks about. Sadly most university CS programs are the opposite of growth oriented thinking. Instead, it's a filter to identify students that are candidates for grad school.

[dieuveillemabounda]

I always wanted to learn things deeply, it just happens when I am using a tool I want to know how it really works underneath not at the surface level.

I want to be able to write my own compiler, virtual machine and so on. These kind of things is want I want to do.

I need direction. Anyone out there who can give few tips to get down on this path. It would be much appreciated.

[etcetera]

This guy is too smart...he's murdering lots of my brain cells just listening to him.

[EdeYOlorDSZs]

awesome. Great nugget from 5+ hour conversation