My guest for this short episode of The Knowledge Project is a man who wears many hats.

Ali Almossawi is a San Francisco-based author of books on critical thinking and computer science education, and the creator of An Illustrated Book of Bad Arguments. He is also a principal engineer at Apple and was formerly employed as a data visualization engineer by Mozilla.

His books have been read by 3 million readers, translated into 20 languages, and have sold over a quarter million copies in print.

This interview is only 20 minutes along, but there was a lot I wanted to cover, so we move pretty fast. Specifically, we cover:

The unique format Ali chooses when writing a book to help people understand the concepts more deeply
The place for empathy in algorithmic thinking and how we can be more empathetic in our daily interactions with each other
Ali’s note taking process and how he tracks the ideas and topics he’d like to explore
Ali’s daily routine and the “algorithms” he uses to make the most of his day
The single habit that has the most profound impact on Ali’s day to day
The cost/benefit of sharing on social media and the impact it has on society as a whole

And more.

If you’ve ever wanted to improve the way you process information, think more clearly and make better decisions, you won’t want to miss this interview.

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#38 Ali Almossawi: Thinking in Algorithms

The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish