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Study Tips from Richard Feynman

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Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#41

Post by dominotw »

yarky wrote: post #17
throwawayboise wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there are some (perhaps many) people who just don't have this level of passion in themselves. When I was younger, I liked working in software. It was fun, and interesting, but did I "love" it? Honestly I don't think so. Looking back on my time as a student, I can't think of any subject that I loved so much that that studying was something I wanted to do. It was always a chore, always something I did because i…

> Everything I do day-to-day is either stuff that I need to do to pay the bills and support my family That's the universal trap. > people like Feynman are born with a burning passion for learning that most people just don't have. I am not sure about that. I'd say most people lose sight of their true passion. Mine happened to be programming, which now helps me pay my bills. But I'd be screwed if my true passion was dr…

> That's the universal trap.

What do you mean by 'trap'. Its something people have to do no?

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#42

Post by dominotw »

felix318 wrote: post #16
willis936 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Richard Feynman might disagree. https://youtu.be/IIDLcaQVMqw

I didn’t believe in talent until after I spent over ten years trying to learn music, and then seeing 5 year-olds on YouTube doing stuff I can only dream of. True, some, perhaps most of it is hard work, but talent makes the process a lot easier.

easier to learn as a kid

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#43

Post by dominotw »

throwawayboise wrote: post #28
yarky wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everything I do day-to-day is either stuff that I need to do to pay the bills and support my family That's the universal trap. > people like Feynman are born with a burning passion for learning that most people just don't have. I am not sure about that. I'd say most people lose sight of their true passion. Mine happened to be programming, which now helps me pay my bills. But I'd be screwed if my true passion was dr…

> if you were older (say 80), what would yo regret not having even tried ? I would imagine it would be the same answer as today: nothing comes to mind. I honestly cannot think of anything that I regret never trying. I mean, it seems almost tautological. If I had that much of a drive and/or passion for something, I would have tried it or be doing it.

isn't it usually the opposite. You try it and then develop a passion for it. Not other way around.

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#44

Post by harles »

yeetsfromhellL2 wrote: post #21
pkoird wrote: post #3

There's the famous Feynman method i.e. Study hard, Teach it to others, Identify the gaps in your own knowledge, and Simplify/Synthesize. But people often also forget that there is another method associated with Feynman aka The Feynman Algorithm (which was outlined by his colleague Murray Gell-Mann, a noble prize winning physicist himself). This method goes as follows: 1. Write down the problem. 2. Think real hard. 3.…

A lot of his intellectual capacity seems to come from his ability to visualize a problem and make something difficult and complicated easier to conceptualize. He credits his dad with showing him how to visialize a problem, but he definitely refined the ability and trained his intuition for non-intuitive problems.

I’d also credit likely dyslexia for his ability to visualize.

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#47

Post by forgotmypw17 »

paulpauper wrote: post #12
pkoird wrote: post #3

There's the famous Feynman method i.e. Study hard, Teach it to others, Identify the gaps in your own knowledge, and Simplify/Synthesize. But people often also forget that there is another method associated with Feynman aka The Feynman Algorithm (which was outlined by his colleague Murray Gell-Mann, a noble prize winning physicist himself). This method goes as follows: 1. Write down the problem. 2. Think real hard. 3.…

Like an MLB player telling you if you want to get better at baseball to throw the ball faster . thanks.

This reminds me of this poem I read somewhere:

===

Are you willing to put in the time

to learn to throw the ball faster,

even if it takes hours and hours of

throwing that ball over and over again?

Or will you say that it's only for those who

are good at throwing the ball very fast

and submit voluntarily to being average?

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#48

Post by forgotmypw17 »

dominotw wrote: post #41
yarky wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everything I do day-to-day is either stuff that I need to do to pay the bills and support my family That's the universal trap. > people like Feynman are born with a burning passion for learning that most people just don't have. I am not sure about that. I'd say most people lose sight of their true passion. Mine happened to be programming, which now helps me pay my bills. But I'd be screwed if my true passion was dr…

> That's the universal trap. What do you mean by 'trap'. Its something people have to do no?

The belief that it is something you have to do is how the trap works.

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#49

Post by Shugarl »

solveit wrote: post #26
willis936 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well if you consider him brilliant then perhaps you would believe him when he says that talent isn't nearly as important as studying.

Lots of people study really hard. Few go on to become Feynman.

"Study" is also a pretty vague word, that could describe a lot of different activities. Lots of people study hard, buy how many follows the exact same process as Feynman ? Not every studying techniques are equally effective, the same is true for problem solving techniques. Not to say his genetics didn't have _any_ impact, but we don't know the extent of the impact it had

Re: Study Tips from Richard Feynman

#50

Post by supportlocal4h »

paulpauper wrote: post #33
sydthrowaway wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no such thing as smart, only time and learning.

so what accounts for variability in ability, outcomes when you control for time & practice?

I'm not sure those things have ever been controlled.

I have been around many many many smart people. So many of them seem naturally gifted. It's effortless how easily they solve things. But if you hang around long enough, it's also impressive when they reveal their magic: they just used so-and-so's technique from some discipline I've never heard of. Oh. Of course! How easy, when you put it that way.

How long did it take them to read, digest, and master all those techniques? Hard to say. Nobody followed them around with a stopwatch 24x7x365 for years.

So, lacking data, I fall back to antecdotes. I personally know very intimately a handful of valedictorian smartest person in the room type people. The kind that everyone knows is just naturally smart. I know their family life intimately. I know that none of it came without enormous time and effort.

We have the testimony of the man himself about the price he paid. I'd be interested in anyone at his level in any endevour who claimed they were just born with it.

I do believe that different people are born with different abilities. But I have seen those "smartest person in the room" people fail elementary math, then spend 100s of hours drilling flash cards to master simple arithmetic tables. I have seen them with reading (I hate the word disabilities) challenges spend 10 years reading 100s of books, then get perfect scores on college entrance exams. I have seen in person some poor child spend 3 hours every single night for a year to master 5 spelling words a week. Just to be average. Then have people think they were born knowing the dictionary.

I believe that if you randomly choose any 20 students from any elementary school in the United States and let me select 10 people from that group, then subject them to what I have seen... those students will graduate high school with perfect grades and nearly perfect standardized test scores. I am certain of it. But I do not condone doing such a thing.

Of course, that doesn't make them Feynman. But I believe Feynman when he says that he was once ordinary and that time and effort transformed him.

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