In November 2025, while working as a writing coach at the experimental 2025 Inkhaven writing/blogging residency at the Lighthaven conference center, I was interviewed by Adam Mastroianni of Experimental History on where I get my ideas (of interest to Inkhaven participants, who were required to write >500 words⧸day) and develop my writings. It can be seen as a followup to my Dwarkesh Patel interview.

Topics include:

How recent poems emerged from LLM collaboration and happy accidents; incubation periods and waiting for ideas to “snap into place”; pathological curiosity and cross-domain reading; my Wikipedia apprenticeship; self-experimentation as easy science and statistics practice; the pipeline model of why small advantages compound into large output differences; mental tools like Feynman's algorithm and modus tollens reversal; “blog brain” and pattern-matching experiences to essays; the two directions of essay-writing (universal → concrete versus concrete → universal); and my preference for wikis over blogs, and treating publishing as just another edit.

Below is a lightly edited transcript of my interview and audience Q&A (to condense, clarify, and add references).

, modified by Gwern Branwen on 2026-01-30 using Google Nano Banana Pro for use as a page thumbnail, by zooming in, changing the color from sepia, and [...]

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Outline:

(03:13) Opening Speech

(05:34) Poems & Incubation

(11:54) Polymath

(13:52) The Apprenticeship

(16:49) Self-Experimentation

(20:46) The Writing Pipeline

(23:17) Tools For Thought

(28:10) Blog Brain: Thats A Post

(32:53) Essay Archetype: Universal ↔︎ Concrete

(37:01) The Voice: Ideas As Earworms

(38:37) Audience Q&A

(38:41) Modalities & Comparative Advantage

(41:49) Publishing Thresholds

(44:10) Wikis Vs Blogs

(51:00) LLM Followup Questions

The original text contained 4 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:
February 9th, 2026

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jLRvHG4KzLeLwFdS5/gwern-s-2025-inkhaven-writing-interview-1

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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Images from the article:

Cartoon mouse reading paper with coffee cup nearby.

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“Gwern’s 2025 Inkhaven Writing Interview” by gwern

LessWrong (30+ Karma)