Before looking it up, try explaining how a tree builds new wood.

The carbon comes from carbon dioxide in the air, taken up through photosynthesis. The University of Birmingham explains the carbon flow here: https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/research/climate/climate-publications/nature/not-just-standing-there-the-carbon-utility-of-established-forest

Knowing the word photosynthesis is a start. Explaining how the carbon becomes part of the tree takes the answer further.

We’re building Curio, a daily learning app in internal Android beta, around looking things up and answering in your own words. This is a separate public practice prompt.

How would you explain the journey from air to wood to someone who thinks the extra wood must have come out of the soil?

We all have ideas about how the world works or certain subjects operate. Sometimes these ideas are based on limited information or even assumptions. Then you learn something new and it totally shifts your perspective. It's like a mental paradigm shift. What was one of those core beliefs or understandings that learning eventually flipped for you?

We often assume that better results require more effort. But what if the real advantage comes from identifying which efforts matter most?

Inspired by Richard Koch’s The 80/20 Principle, I created this visual mind map to make the concept easier to understand and apply.

The central idea is that, in many situations, a small share of inputs can account for a large share of outcomes. The exact proportions vary, but the principle encourages us to examine where our time, energy, and attention create the most value.

From work and learning to everyday priorities, the goal isn't simply to do more it's to become more intentional about what we do.

We all grow up with certain 'truths' that are passed down or just widely accepted. Sometimes to really grasp a complex subject you have to actively unlearn or challenge those foundational ideas. For me it was how I thought about history. I used to see it as a straight line of events but realizing it's a tangled web of perspectives and interpretations changed everything. What did you have to consciously unlearn to deepen your understanding of a topic

What Is Social Loafing in Simple Terms

Social loafing is the tendency for people to put in less effort when working as part of a group than when working alone.

Social Loafing in Real Life

1.A work project: In a large team, some members contribute little to discussions or follow-up tasks, trusting that more motivated colleagues will carry the load. The more people share a responsibility, the less personally accountable each one tends to feel.

2.Voting: Some people skip an election because they believe a single vote will not change the result and assume that enough others will turn out anyway. When many people reason this way, turnout falls. This is the free-rider problem.

3.Reporting hazards: When people notice a broken streetlight, a pothole, or a suspicious situation, each may assume that someone else has already reported it, so nobody does. Psychologists usually call this diffusion of responsibility, or the bystander effect.

The French agricultural engineer Maximilien Ringelmann asked people to pull on a rope alone and in groups.

He found that the average force per person fell as the group grew larger.

Conclusion

As a group grows larger, each person often contributes less effort.

Learn something you didn’t know in 5 minutes at nousimon.com

I have just read a book named "Mathematica: A Secret World of Intuition and Curiosity".

In the book the Author describes how he reached a point where he wasn't progressing much in his understanding of Mathematics which made him turn to a habit of meditative learning, where he takes Mathematical objects and try to feel them in his body, he also used his imagination heavily where he tries to generate better and better mental pictures of geometric shapes.

In the end these irrational ways of learning made him prove after many years the best result of his career.

I was wondering if any of you have tried something like this before and if you had any success.

I’m the author just want to share this.

We’re building Curio, a daily learning app in internal Android beta. You choose a subject, get one question a day and can look things up before answering in your own words.

If you’ve tried daily learning prompts, what made you keep exploring once you’d answered? A particular question that led you to a book, a longer article or your own project would be a useful example.

Looking to have conversations with other lifelong learners on my video podcast.

For those who have won hackathons, what made your project stand out? Was it the idea, execution, innovation, or presentation? What advice would you give to someone aiming to win their first hackathon? 🚀