Relations (like in Notion) not linked references

[banglogseq]

TL;DR at the bottom
link to Logseq subreddit post
link to Logseq forum post

I have tried almost all note-taking apps (Notion, Obsidian, Roam Research, Remnote, Anytype, etc. and Logseq (what I’ve settled for now)) and something about them always confused me. I now realize that it might be because of this:

We go into using note-taking apps because we want to see the relations/connections/links of notes, basically what’s being represented in the graph view, right? Well the way note-taking apps go about it, using linked references, is not actually doing that.

Here’s what I mean in the context of a current Logseq graph. When you embed a block or paste its reference inside/under another block, what you get is two things:

• a first block that has a second block inside/under it, and
• the second block that just has information saying that it is inside or under the first block (a linked reference)

I realized that this is what hurts our brains when we’re note-taking. Because this is not the same as what’s being shown in the graph view. This creates a one-wayness or hierarchy in our minds where there isn’t supposed to be:

What we actually want to see is this:

The way to solve this is to have a new “relation” feature or property. This is the page relation property in Notion but up to the block level.

Why a new “relation” feature? I realized that it’s because a relation/connection/link is fundamentally two-way/bidirectional. In our minds, when an object is “related” to a second object, it means that the second object is also, equally, at the same level, “related” to that first object. Whether that relation is hierarchical or not, they have an equal relation/connection/link to each other. This is what’s shown on the graph view. This is what we actually want to see when we’re using note-taking apps like Logseq.

So in a Logseq graph with the new relation feature, there won’t be linked references. When you embed a block or paste its reference inside/under another block it instead creates a relation, which you can see in both blocks. You get:

• a first block that has a second block inside/under it with a relation saying it’s related to the second block, and
• the second block that has a relation saying it’s related to the first block

(Though, it would be best if the automatic creation of a relation when referencing a block is just an option you can turn on or off.) Also, you can relate a block to another block without making a reference, which removes clutter. This is what it could look like:

another example:

Notice how “I watched a video about [[philosophy]]” references the “philosophy” page, while “I read a book about philosophy” doesn’t but both have a relation to “philosophy”

We can maybe then sort and filter these relations or even have a label that the relation is a reference, or hierarchy (parent or child), but that’s for another time.

Another benefit of having this separate relation feature, in the context of Logseq and other outliners, is that it frees each block to be its own thing. There can be no “real” hierarchy of blocks. The outline view can simply be used to visually show hierarchy like, “by the way this block can be viewed as being lower in this arbitrary hierarchy I made with this other block.”

What do you think?

TL;DR What’s been confusing me about Logseq and note-taking apps is that I’ve been trying to see the relations/connections/links of notes, a two-way relationship, through linked references, a one-way relationship. The solution is to have a new relation feature like the page relation property in Notion but up to the block level.

[banglogseq]

I just want to say two things are related. The problem is I have to reference one inside the other to do so.

Though they are “related” or “connected” as it would show in the graph view, the very nature of referencing makes it not bi-directional.

Plus, what you get visually is one block that has a reference of the second block, and the second block that just has information saying that it was referenced in the first block. This makes them look and feel not equal/not bidirectional which is the nature of a relation/connection/link.

[banglogseq]

Hi I posted this video: https://www.reddit.com/r/logseq/comments/1eivzs7/what_i_meant_in_my_previous_post_about_relations/ to help clear things up on what I’ve meant on all of my previous posts

[meowkman]

Consider using I watched a [video]([[name of video]]) about [[philosophy]] instead.

Automatic unlinked reference is indeed beneficial for a variety of use cases. The other parts of your argument, in my opinion, can be satisfactorily accommodated by the current version of Logseq.

[mentaloid]

• Please don’t open the same topic in multiple threads.
• If you insist that the topics are different enough, at least link to them, so as to avoid repetitions.
• From the way you describe the issue, it is obvious that you are still exploring it, identifying the difficulties, but still not suggesting a solid alternative.
  • Logseq addresses many workflows, while you are experimenting with just one.
  • The relationship between philosophy and a video about philosophy is not on equal terms.
    • The video depends on philosophy, while philosophy doesn’t depend on the video.
    • This is because they are different entities:
      • Philosophy is a general concept.
        • As such, it can participate in multiple graphs.
      • While the video about philosophy is a specific instance of video.
        • It can participate only in a few graphs where videos are meaningful.
        • If I have a whole collection of videos on philosophy, should not link philosophy to each one of them.
          • That would produce plenty of useless noise.
          • Should rather tag them as members of that collection and link only the collection to philosophy.
            • And even that link should be nothing more than a simple reference.
    • Peer relationships are among same entities:
      • You can have peer relationships among videos.
      • You can have peer relationships among concepts.
      • But you cannot have peer relationships between a concept and a video.
        • Forcing a one-directional reference into a full relationship causes at least as many problems as doing the inverse.

[banglogseq]

@mentaloid

• That would produce plenty of useless noise.

I never get why you’re adamant about lessening noise. Isn’t the main reason we use Logseq is to be able to put down the “noise” in our brain on to the page? We gain the ability to navigate it because it’s finally tangible?

@mentaloid

But you cannot have peer relationships between a concept and a video.

But they are both thoughts in our mind? If you actually reduce a video and a concept down, they’re both objects. Maybe one is concrete and the other is abstract, but they’re both objects. Everything is an object. Therefore, you can have anything have a peer relationship with anything.

[mentaloid]

• Tangible noise is still noise.
  • Its main effect is that it makes useful information hard to find.
  • The goal is always to filter the noise out.
    • Granted that many people use Logseq to simply dump some noise from brain to page.
      • But this is not Logseq’s true potential, as witnessed by many other people.
• Maybe you are confusing linking with indexing?
  • Indexing simply puts things into buckets, where they can be easily found.
    • Finding something doesn’t automatically produce any value.
      • The ability to easily find all the mentions of a word (e.g. philosophy) is useful only as part of a bigger workflow.
        • But for this type of finding we don’t need linking (or a PKM in first place), indexing is enough.
      • Navigating search results is useful, but very basic and time-consuming.
        • Some results are simply too many to bother browsing.
  • Linking goes beyond finding.
    • Linking should tell us where the most interesting places to go next are.
      • It is a little like when some space gets full, so we add a link to some other space.
        • That is to indicate that the two spaces are meant to be treated together.
    • It is about adding extra info, that is not already present in the individual notes.
      • We don’t link to indicate the appearance of something inside something else.
        • This is usually already obvious.
        • Things inside the same bucket don’t relate to each-other.
      • We link to indicate an actual relationship.
        • Things in a relationship interact with each-other.
• Generalizations don’t help much.
  • It is obvious that you are oversimplifying things to make your point.
    • This is a known problem facilitated by the looseness of the human language.
  • Not everything is an object.
    • It can be seen as an object, but that just leads to more objects than we can manage.
    • When we reduce e.g. a subject into an object, we actually lose information.
  • Not everything is a thought.
    • We can conceive it as a thought, but we better know whether we can do more with it than just think it.
  • Something can be many things in our perspective, but it is only one thing in its nature.
    • A video and a concept are different entities, because their natures have very different structures and abilities.
      • For example, a video can be recorded, bought, copied etc., while a concept cannot.
    • In contrast, two videos share the same nature, they only differ in some of their properties (title, date etc.)
    • Peer relationships require compatible structures and abilities.
      • Just because I can draw a line from one thing to another, I cannot force a relationship between them.