Re: The nature of "understanding"
- From: Dean <damarkley@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 21 Oct 2009 06:46:59 -0700 (PDT)
On Oct 19, 12:29 pm, Frogwatch <ohara...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I was s'posed to sail my boat about 36 miles west today to get her
painted but the N wind has the tide so low I cannot even get out of
the slip so you will just have to be tortured by my frustrated
musings.
In another thread, we (Arved and I) were discussing understanding
complicated concepts. Well, I know for a fact that i am only just a
little higher than average intelligence so when I found myself in
Physics grad school, I was constantly frustrated at how easily these
other guys grasped this stuff. It drove me crazy until I realized
they may not actually "understand" it although they could do the
math. "Understanding" took something else that many of them did not
have so they were unable to apply what thye knew. They could do the
math whereas I could make it work.
Today, years later, I still see the same thing. There are two PhD
physics guys working for me and I envy their ability to set up a
problem and solve it (most recent example, a thermally conducting disc
with a heat source along its axis, for various boundary conditions,
what is the temp for any position). I can do this stuff but it is
difficult for me whereas they do it quickly. OTOH, they are disasters
in the lab getting very little done. What is the diff here? How can
we best exploit that difference?
My understanding of things is generally by way of analogy to things I
am familiar with whereas they rely first on the equations which seems
to distance them from reality. Which is the more common form of
"understanding". Is there some way that technology will eventually be
able to turn on peoples brains to better understand? Is
"understanding" simply familiarity or does it go deeper?
Even if one is familiar with mathematics, one can go thru an
explanation for something and agree with every step and still not
understand the result although you could apply the result (my heat
flow problem). What is the missing piece of "understanding".
My wife is a teacher with two advanced degrees so I asked her, all I
got was a blank look and "that is waaay too theoretical".
Having a calculator and a computer to do symbolic math does not make
me any smarter, what would it take to make someone smarter, more
memory? Well, I have an office full of books as extended memory and
that does not make me smarter, what would make us smarter?
Any theories out there? How do YOU understand complicated things?
Quite often, a lot of technical concepts can be understood through
mathematics. Now, i am a professional chemist and yet I hated
mathematics right through my third semester of calculus. Once I
started working as a chemist, I was amazed at how much math I actually
did.
As far as understanding complicated things? I find it helps to break
them down into discrete units and then connect them. For an example
that is actually on topic here, consider early dreadnought
construction. These things were very complicated technically but to
understand why you can break them down into technology modules: 1.
Armor, 2. Armament, 3. Propulsion, 4. Ergonomics (habitability).
When you look at each of these seperately, it is much easier to
understand why different countries built different dreadnoughts.
Does that make sense?
Dean
.
- Follow-Ups:
- Re: The nature of "understanding"
- From: Frogwatch
- Re: The nature of "understanding"
- References:
- The nature of "understanding"
- From: Frogwatch
- The nature of "understanding"
- Prev by Date: Re: RIP: Ludovic Kennedy
- Next by Date: Re: The nature of "understanding"
- Previous by thread: The nature of "understanding"
- Next by thread: Re: The nature of "understanding"
- Index(es):
Relevant Pages
|
