Key Takeaways

A must-read for anyone doing AI research. John Schulman shares practical advice on how to choose research problems, develop taste, and maintain productive research habits.

Choosing Problems

• Work on problems that are important and where you can make progress
• Develop good taste by reading broadly and deeply

Research Habits

• Maintain a research notebook
• Read papers actively, not passively
• Seek out the simplest possible experiments

Building Expertise

• Go deep on a topic before going broad
• Implement things yourself to build intuition
• Don't be afraid to work on "unfashionable" problems