{∅, {∅}, {∅, {∅}}} : Rage Against the Meat Grinder

After reading this, I changed this forum's title from "Math Diary" to "Why Mathematics?" ...   

Recently I’ve been working my way through several lower-division undergraduate math textbooks. Why? Why spend your spare time learning math, which is challenging and sometimes dry?

Because math is too beautiful, too powerful, and too important to be reduced to mere mechanical calculation the way most of us experience it in school. That is not what math is really about. What matters in math, and what gives it its beauty, is reasoning and connections between ideas.

Reading books at my own pace lets me try a subject out without fully committing to it and making it a necessity that I find work based off of it. It confers the full lightness of being a beginner, exploring in a free, untutored fashion. A degree program may be a good choice for some people. If that’s you, fantastic. This article is for people who can’t or won’t commit to a conventional academic program.

The full article is: A Software Engineer’s Adventures In Learning Mathematics

I know we don't care for the title, "Software Engineer".  It sounds pretentious.  I prefer the term "code monkey."   

Regardless of what Warren classifies himself as professionally, as a fellow student of Mathematics, the Queen of Science (with Number Theory as the Queen of Mathematics), I like his suggestions.  I can tell that he must have a similar passion [LIFELONG OBSESSION ?].  I want to lift some of his tips here in our thread about How to Attain a Studious Life, giving him the credit, of course.  My own objective is to strip the requirement of usefulness from the subject, as if something needs to be useful or career-oriented in order to be worthy of our devotion.

We already know that most worthwhile pursuits are lonely paths ... but it's good to chronicle some advice by fellow math junkie, even if he pays homage to military training and anti-slack concepts such as "discipline".  Myself, I would like to transform the "difficult nature" of studying mathematics into "slacking off" ...  I will see if we can come to some consensus on just what it is that makes an activity mentally painful in one psychological setting, and mentally stimulating in another psychological setting.

Cultivating Disciplined Habits While Walking A Lonely Road

There’s something going on when attempting any challenging course of study. We’re striving to build within ourselves the discipline to achieve a worthwhile, ambitious long-term goal in small, manageable increments. We are training ourselves to become disciplined, effective learners. We are sculpting our minds and emotions to become used to working hard in our spare time.

This is challenging in an unusual way: for the most part, we are alone.

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Making time to study with work and family life can be very challenging. We live in a noisy, busy world, and math demands the deepest concentration, preferably in large, uninterrupted blocks of time. Just finding a quiet place free of distractions can seem impossible.

If possible, do not procreate ... and try to avoid living in apartments where you might be bombarded by intruders.  It might help if you drop out of the work-force altogether like a Japanese Hikikomori.  Yes, resign from the species, and find time to think and reflect.  The Establishment would like to have a monopoly on mathematics education.  They just can't stand not to be making money off some poor sucker who just wants to understand mathematics better, and is not particularly fond of how corporate drones and a-s-s lickers manage to destroy "the love of learning" with their pressure and stress.  If you inherit a little 4 cylinder vehicle and need to insure it just to gather groceries, stocking the shelves at the grocery store may be necessary to keep the car legal.  For now, let's bypass the complications of keeping your organism fed and dry.   
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I like this section on Facing YOUR Demons ... [the "Why Bother?" demons?]:

Facing Your Demons

I’ve had to contend with many self-defeating mental blocks I wasn’t initially even aware were impacting me. I’ve thought at various times that I didn’t even have the right to try teaching myself because math is somehow the exclusive domain of established experts. If you aren’t already a master by now, don’t even bother, part of me thought. That “don’t even bother” sentiment paralyzed me for years.

I hope you give yourself permission to pursue your own interests, even if you don’t have the traditional background of experts in your field of interest.

Fortunately, as an old gortbuster warrior, I do not defer to the authority of the gort establishment.  So, it looks like I am good to go on the pursuit of my own interests.   

Average People Have Things To Add, Not Just Alpha Geeks

If you’re like me, the academic-industrial complex of research labs and paywalled research journals is a bit intimidating. There seems to be no room in such a place for mere mortals. And yet there are so many problems to solve in our world, and MIT-educated geniuses so few in number, that they will undoubtedly overlook things us average folk can be in a better position to actually do something about than they. Researchers often don’t focus on delivering complete solutions to problems their work may be useful in addressing; by necessity, they focus on the fundamental issues, and once those are figured out, they often move on to the next research problem. Valuable insights that could be useful to many languish in obscurity behind horrid paywalls. Let’s not make the established, traditional experts out to be more than they are, either; a lot of them are really only capable in their specific niche and lack a lot of valuable complementary skills you already possess.

It seems a great tragedy that many of our best and brightest in industry wind up working on better ways to sell ads online or allocate capital in financial markets. The amazing things they could do with their highly advanced skills go unrealized. Because of this, I think the wider group of intellectually curious amateurs have an opportunity to truly capitalize on the advances made in the sciences. [italics added by H]

[This next segment is simply beautiful ... This Warren character is a true math preacher!  Great stuff!]    [tears of enlightenment]

Advocation Of Autodidacticism In Math, Science And Engineering

To be honest, I feel nervous even publishing this. I left it sitting as a draft on Google Drive for well over a month after spending hours writing and editing it. What will the turbogeniuses who already know everything I aspire to learn and are also probably better software engineers to boot say? Many of them are several years younger than I am, already more accomplished in every way. I just have to learn to live with that.

The prize I have my eye on far overshadows any anxieties or reservations I have. A world of eternal truths and cold, subtle beauty awaits. We will fill whole notebooks with thoughts, scribbles, dead ends and epiphanies. We will construct a body of knowledge which we can truly claim for ourselves and which we can never be stripped of. Let us grant ourselves permission to be beginners, to be uncertain, to have more questions than answers, to be ignorant but motivated to learn. Let us dare to begin.

I’ve found searching Amazon and the wider Internet for books to be quite rewarding. You can be surprised by what you find.

Let us dare to begin!

More importantly, may we continually cultivate the Beginner's Mind by embracing our "not-knowing" state ...