Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware

by Andy Hunt

book data

53 ratings, 4.15 average rating, 20 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		37%
4		47%
3		9%
2		3%
1		1%

edit

published

August 15th 2008 by Pragmatic Bookshelf

binding

Paperback, 251 pages

isbn

1934356050 (isbn13: 9781934356050)

description

Together we'll journey together through bits of cognitive and neuroscience, learning and behavioral theory. You'll discover some surprising aspects of...more

find at: Amazon | Half.com | Barnes & Noble | compare prices ($18.70)…

new topic
discuss this book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

friend reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

lists with this book

This book is currently not featured on any Listopia lists. Add this book to your favorite list »

other reviews (showing 1-20 of 144)

sort: default (?) | date
filters: all | text-only

04/11/09

Demian rated it:

I just finished reading Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware. The book is geared towards anyone who wants to learn and think better. It has plenty of specific details for software engineers.

The book does a lot of build up to get you to understand what it means to be an expert, what are the levels of skill and how the brain works for better and worse.

The best part of the book is the last few chapters. He puts the theory aside and gets to the low level pra...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/01/09

Steve rated it:

Read in January, 2009

This is one of the better books I have read recently. It is as if the author "Andy Hunt" wrote this book to inspire me personally. This was the perfect book to read around new years. It helped me re-gain my focus and passion about being in technology.

I don't want to get in to too many specifics about the book, since you can read the outline of the book online elsewhere, but generally speaking, the book helped me create a plan for 09, and suggests ways to help effecti...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

04/22/09

Sean O'steen rated it:

Read in April, 2009

I haven't tuned up my reading and study habits much since college. And before that, my only formal training came from a sixth grade study skills class. This book provides a strong summary of neural science as it applies to what we currently [think we:] know about the human brain's ability to perceive and store information. The book then describes several helpful frameworks to gain a proper balance between systematic (L-Brain) & creative (R-Brain) activities to make learning and creating more fun...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/05/09

Xixa rated it:

bookshelves: life-hacking

Read in January, 2009

This book presents a nice overview about how the mind works (Based mainly on the same Betty Edward's L-mode/R-mode approach) and suggests a good set of techniques for you to try to improve your learning skills, getting focused and stay in the "flow". Although some of the topics are indeed common knowledge and some of the techniques might not work on given kind of people, it's still worth a reading. As any other book by Pragmatic Bookshelf, this one was written by a programmer aiming th...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/30/09

Robert rated it:

bookshelves: management

Read in January, 2009

This is a very interesting book on how to understand and rewire ones brain...

I came away with a number of valuable insights, largely around the Dreyfus Model of Skills (Shu Ha Ri from the martial arts world) but also extending into Right/Left brain, how to learn, & how to focus.

I saw immediate areas, largely work related, where my 'mental models' were incorrect and deficient and were preventing me from communicating with and motivating/influencing those I work with.
...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

11/29/08

Garrett rated it:

Read in November, 2008

recommends it for: Everyone (Everyone should be learning more)

This is an awesome collection of information about the way our mind works and how to get the most from it. Much of the information was not new to me. It even mentioned many things that I do personally. The real value came from:
Having all this material collected into one location with a decent Bibliography to learn more.
A single text that I can share with others so that we are all on the same page so to speak.

I just wish I could keep my hands on my copy of the book for mor...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

07/29/08

Nathan rated it:

bookshelves: brain-cogsci-behavioural-economics, science-fact

Read in July, 2008

Andy Hunt's Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware (Pragmatic Press; 2008) teaches programmers how to master a subject, strategies for using your brain to its fullest, systems for learning, and the best ways to practice. The result is a grab-bag of pop-psych systems, practical strategies, and good old-fashioned inspiration that will give most programmers more footholds as they climb the tree of knowledge. I had expected the book to be about thinking more than learning (it's not) ...more Andy Hunt's Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware (Pragmatic Press; 2008) teaches programmers how to master a subject, strategies for using your brain to its fullest, systems for learning, and the best ways to practice. The result is a grab-bag of pop-psych systems, practical strategies, and good old-fashioned inspiration that will give most programmers more footholds as they climb the tree of knowledge. I had expected the book to be about thinking more than learning (it's not) and to be a more rigorous in separating scientifically tested theories from speculation, but despite these disappointments I still recommend the book to any programmer who wants to become better. The book is still in beta, so the final version may yet address my concerns.

The book begins with an explanation of the Dreyfus Model of Skills Acquisition, which identifies and describes five stages we pass through as we master a skill. We begin as novices, who lack a conceptual model of the problem space and also lack the basic skills. Consequently, novices need recipes or rules that specify "if X then Y" in great detail. We then moved to "advanced beginners", who can try tasks on their own but still need help troubleshooting. They're starting to formulate principles, and can reuse techniques in similar contexts (if only just) but still don't have the Big Picture. Then we become "competent", when we can troubleshoot problems and solve new ones. After that comes "proficient", when we seek out the Big Picture and, most significantly, are able to correct our previously poor performance—we can look back at what we did and revise our approach. Finally, we become "expert" with the world view and skills so ingrained that we have phenomenal instincts that let us zen in on the answer immediately without higher-level analysis.

The Dreyfus model isn't a "scientific truth", it's a philosopher's construction that has some traction in the AI world and a lot of traction in the nursing world. Indeed, this is one of the places where I feel the book presents something that's useful without acknowledging that it's not necessarily an absolute truth. However, the general point is that once we have a map, however grainy, we can find where we are and the map will show us what we must do to make progress.

The rest of the book is concepts and skills for moving towards mastery. First Andy tells us the left brain-right brain story (left brain linear and rational, right brain random access and kludgy) and gives advice for engaging the correct side of the brain when you need them. This is where things start to get a bit weird. Andy talks about "free form journaling", "morning pages", and advice to park on the other side of the road. It's here that I feel he's furtherest from useful programming-related ground, although he does attempt to intersperse this rather woo-woo advice with thoughts on pair programming and typesetting code.

Then comes a quick romp through the ways in which we fail to think accurately, a chapter cleverly titled "Debug Your Mind". He covers the standard fare of behavioural economics: fundamental attribution error, anchoring, the imbalance between gaining and losing, our nonlinear sense of risk vs reward. This is the stuff I like (and have read way too many books on lately) but it's coupled with a discussion of demographics and archetypes of which I was, frankly, very suspicious. Sentences like "I am among the eldest of Generation X, on the cusp of the Boomers, I tend to identify with the Gen-X characteristics, especially survivalism, pragmatism, and realism" sound awfully close to a cold reading. And don't even get me started on the Myers-Briggs test that comes next ....

In Chapter 6 we're back onto more solid ground, learning how to learn. Some of this was familiar to me from my highschool days when I read everything I could on how to study (amusingly, this was a procrastination technique so I wouldn't have to study). Andy talks about setting SMART objectives (Specific Measurable Achievable Relevant Time-boxed), and treating your education like an investment plan by making regular active contributions to a diverse portfolio of skills. Then we're into specific learning techniques like SQ3R, spacing retrieval, mind maps, and (my favourite) learning by teaching. I've been working hard lately on purposeful reading as I habitually skim, and I found this whole chapter useful.

The final chapter in the draft I read was "Gain Experience". This is about purposeful exercise of skills. Andy wants us to choose projects that keep our interest but also productively extend our skill set. This means dealing with failure, and Andy has a great line here: "it's not important to get it right the ﬁrst time, it's important to get it right the last time". He talks about unit testing and version control in the context of purposeful play: we should have the freedom to experiment but without losing the ability to backtrack to a stable state, and the ability to demonstrate progress. He's better here at bringing the pedagogy back to the real world of a programmer, moving seamlessly from the Inner Game of offline practising to a discussion of scaffolding and the benefits of C++ and Ruby programmers learning each others' languages.

Andy's thesis is that we can master a subject faster if we know how to get better at it rather than taking random walks through the manual and problem space. He does a good job of laying out useful techniques and concepts—perhaps too good. While he industriously attempts to connect the abstract theories to the concrete life of a programmer, this reviewer was left with the feeling of too much theory and too many techniques too choose from. Despite this, the book still remains a rewarding read and the only book that tackles these subjects from a programmer's point of view. Recommended.(less)

Like this review? yes

add a comment

02/08/09

Sami rated it:

bookshelves: productivity, programming

Read in February, 2009

I learnt a lot of things from this book. I never thought about the skills of thinking and learning in such a way. I have noted down the tips and made enough notes to make each tip a bit clearer.

Although I think this review is too early to give, as I have not started practising the new idea I have just learnt of it yet. But I would recommend this book to any programmer, maybe not to non-programmers as they may find this book a little too much or a bit weird.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

12/03/08

Andrew rated it:

The only thing I learned was that it's helpful to imagine a task being much, much harder than it actually will be, and when I do the task it won't feel as bad as it otherwise would. This is like in baseball, how they swing a bat with weights before batting in the game for real.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

02/08/09

Ruth rated it:

bookshelves: car-books, productivity

Read in February, 2009

I'm an educator, not a programmer, but I found all kinds of practical techniques for thinking and learning in this book that I'm already applying with great success! You'll think about learning and productivity in a whole new way after reading this book.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/15/09

Warner is currently reading it

bookshelves: currently-reading

So far I love this book and am slowly integrating some of the techniques into my daily routine. Some of the topics are familiar to me, but the techniques are not.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

05/20/09

Nate rated it:

Read in June, 2009

I had never really looked into the difference between the left and right brains and how they work. This book has emphasized the importance of allowing your right brain to take over from time to time. Many breakthroughs and 'ah-hah' moments come from the creativity of the right brain. This is a more difficult for computer people like myself, who tend to be very linear.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/17/09

Richard rated it:

Read in January, 2009

A great book that I will use some of the ideas to start reworking how I work. This book should not be limited to programmers but to to thinkers.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/19/09

fbuser1173323480 rated it:

Read in January, 2009

Fun, practical guide to improving thinking, reading, studying, and learning. Ideal for computer oriented folk.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

12/23/08

Andy added it

Read in January, 2009

This is a great book, he suggests lots of techniques for learning and furthering yourself. It isn't a collection of "102 tips to make your life awesome!" they are techniques backed with real studies and empirical evidence that they work.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

04/24/09

Josh Brown rated it:

bookshelves: read-2009

Read in June, 2009

Interesting book. New things to try as a result of reading it:
- create mind maps to take notes
- use a wiki to manage knowledge and information
- always carry a pen and paper
- meditate

Do one thing at a time. Multitasking reduces productivity significantly.

Learn by playing - it's more fun and more effective.

"Capture all ideas to get more of them."

Pay attention! Increase self-awareness.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

02/02/09

Thomas rated it:

Read in April, 2009

A very good book I almost gave it five stars. It can help with more than just programming.... I found some of its suggestions very helpful for me in my family life. Very good information really helped me to understand my strengths and weaknesses as a programmer.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

10/24/08

Mike rated it:

Read in November, 2008

I'm reading this one pretty quickly, and frequently while on the stationary bike at the gym, so I'm already planning on a reread. It is making me think about "thinking and learning" which is not something I typically do. It's definitely interesting.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

03/03/09

Steve rated it:

Read in March, 2009

Some of this is too general. However, when it's good it's really good and very informative. Especially the analysis of skill acquisition and developing intuition for a skill.

Like this review? yes

add a comment