I don't think separating "trivia" from the "fundamental realities" is as easy as we hope it is.
I have a very hard time convincing myself I could be as effective a programmer (and learner) without all the "trivia" I accumulated. And this is coming from someone that dislikes trivia with an - at best - average memory.
I think this could be a fundamental problem with intelligence in general. You cannot just build towers of abstraction and live on the highest plane only. All layers co-operate and mingle chaoticly. Every little seemingly random patch of pixels in your field of vision could correlate highly with the highest of abstract concepts you are capable of mentating. Knowing what is "trivia" and what is not is itself too a very hard problem.
I have a very hard time convincing myself I could be as effective a programmer (and learner) without all the "trivia" I accumulated. And this is coming from someone that dislikes trivia with an - at best - average memory.
I think this could be a fundamental problem with intelligence in general. You cannot just build towers of abstraction and live on the highest plane only. All layers co-operate and mingle chaoticly. Every little seemingly random patch of pixels in your field of vision could correlate highly with the highest of abstract concepts you are capable of mentating. Knowing what is "trivia" and what is not is itself too a very hard problem.