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Ask HN: How to retain core competency in math when your job doesn't require it?

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Re: Ask HN: How to retain core competency in math when your job doesn't require it?

#11

You spend a non-trivial amount of time learning calculus, for example, but how do you maintain that competency?

Which competency in calculus do you find hard to maintain, exactly? My job does require math, but only occasionally calculus (and even then we don't integrate anything by hand, there's Wolfram Alpha for this stuff).

If you can't remember the core intuitions about calculus (what does integrating a function mean, how to use the derivative or gradient to find local minima or maxima, which functions are continuous, which of those are derivable everywhere) then if you're like me and most people I know, you need to spend more time applying calculus.

You can read stuff in fields that benefit from application of calculus to get a better feel for it (geometry if you're doing anything with curves or curved surfaces; computational geometry is also quite fun, also in most engineering fields there is some calculus to model the application of the forces, if you like building things learning to simulate real-world structures and systems can be super motivating). Build a (very small) neural network without a framework, that'll make you work at grasping the concepts of measuring small variations in the output of a function in a way that is very goal-directed.

(I used your example of calculus because I think you're talking about being an adult with a day job who can't find a use for high school math. If you did math in university and are worried about losing your skill at writing proofs, you should find a job writing proofs. There is about zero overlap between proof writing and a developer career, and proof writing is tedious and difficult to gain the focus to do on the side.)

Re: Ask HN: How to retain core competency in math when your job doesn't require it?

#12
Simple answer is past-times. For example, I have a side interest in ODEs and PDEs, which I basically never get to apply for work.

So I'm working on 3 problems from orbital mechanics, control theory and investment science respectively, each which is interesting in itself but each which flexes my ODE and PDE muscles.

In short, just invent problems you find engaging and then scratch away at them on planes and trains, and in all those in-between times.

Re: Ask HN: How to retain core competency in math when your job doesn't require it?

#13
1. Khan Academy

2. Youtube (see: Professor Leonard, 3blue1brown, Gilbert Strang, etc.)

3. Books like:

https://www.amazon.com/Humongous-Book-Calculus-Problems-Book...

https://www.amazon.com/Calculus-Practice-Problems-Dummies-On...

https://www.amazon.com/Schaums-Solved-Problems-Calculus-Outl...

https://www.amazon.com/gp/slredirect/picassoRedirect.html/re...

4. And maybe not as calculus specific, but doing Project Euler problems might also be useful.

Re: Ask HN: How to retain core competency in math when your job doesn't require it?

#14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe you could compile a list of problems and use anki to regularly train yourself? There's also Schaums outline for Calculus You can also try going through Art of Problem Solving Calculus (though it's much more difficult than the typical calculus text)

> maybe you could compile a list of problems and use anki to regularly train yourself? That seems to favour rote learning instead of actually developing or keeping core competences.

Given that the OP has already learned the material and is mainly interested in retention, that shouldn't be a problem.

In my experience, it's the mechanical stuff that you forget most quickly without use, as opposed to the conceptual stuff.

Re: Ask HN: How to retain core competency in math when your job doesn't require it?

#15
post #4

I am not very good at classical mathematics. I am quite confident that there are better more intuitive ways of describing the same ideas, so until one such system emerges I tend to learn the concepts that are being expressed in mathematics and convert them away from mathematics to just a logical description of the operation. I haven’t run across anything in calculus for instance that I can’t describe in python with l…

You might be more comfortable with Python syntax than with standard mathematical syntax, but I wouldn't think of it as being closer to "just a logical description" or closer to being the "raw idea." You're just choosing to use different notation.

I would guess that most people comfortable with both representations would feel that standard mathematical notation is lighter and conveys the "raw idea" more directly.

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