just wait and see

Whenever I try to do something I aim to understand it. Unfortunately most of the things in this world are way too complex to completely understand (And, to completely understand you have to reduce everything to how atoms and quarks interact). So how does one decide the point where their understanding is good enough?

I guess I try to aim for an understanding that would allow me to theoretically reproduce it with simple everyday things. When pulling apart my car engine I eventually created a mental model of how gears and cogs interacted to become an engine. Gears and cogs (plus other things) are really simple, they are just solid pieces pieces of metal, but they are ingeniously used together to create something as complex and useful as an engine.

However a for me to have a further understanding I would need to investigate further into the chemical and physical properties of combustion. I am aware that petrol is pumped into the engine and mixed with a spark to make a controlled explosive force. But why petrol and not water?

Because petrol is explosive…

In this case I have replaced my lack of understanding with the label “explosive”. I have no idea what makes something explosive, but I do know that with consistent inputs (Explosive + Spark) I can get consistent outputs (Explosion). Here no understanding of internals are required.

Even the most experienced experts reach a point where they have to use a label, it is nothing to be ashamed of. The world is too complex to completely understand everything. But many beginners will accept a label as an understanding for a concept that they really should know. Then when they delve further into the subject they get stuck, their label can’t explain to them how to manipulate the concept and therefore they can’t apply it to more advanced subjects.

Yudkowsky pointed out that often when trying to learn something it is more useful to replace a useless label with “magic”. When saying something is magic you are admitting your lack of understanding. And the first step to becoming better is to admit that you have a problem.

In my case I should replace “Petrol is explosive” with “Petrol is magic”. You use petrol in a combustion engine because petrol is magic.