Given comments about using memorization for code etc, wanted to share this other article about how that can be incredibly effective:
https://senrigan.io/blog/chasing-10x-leveraging-a-poor-memor...
Learning Is Remembering
161–170 of 241 posts
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#162There is a difference between remembering something (like a fact) and a deep understanding of a concept. Let me give you an example in programming: I sometimes have to google for the names of functions I've already used a hundred times. Sometimes extremely simple functions (just a while ago it was list.size() in Java), only because I can't remember the name of the function, but of course I understand the concept - th…
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Re: Learning Is Remembering
#163Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it feels different because that knowledge is more deeply ingrained with what you already know. That knowledge has many connections and relationships with other knowledge you have. Whereas the name of a function is more like a leaf node, it isn't connected to very much and i think this is the source of the different feelings you describe. To expand on this a bit - our memories maintain "schemas" of knowledge a…
I'm not sure I agree. I think what I tried to describe above couldn't be classified as "knowledge" at all. To be honest, I think we (humans) don't understand this type of understanding very well. Which is somewhat ironic :-) Edit: But thanks for the suggestion about searching for schema, will definitely take a look!
The keyword embodied may be fruitful — there is a lot of noise around the term but embodied understanding is closer to what you want, I think. You may have to relax some ideas about how things work for a while in order to absorb/integrate it.
The knowledge defined in the article is very rational and reductionist in its presentation. I don’t mean that derogatorily, but it does mean it can’t account for all the emergent features of our existence. The reductionist approach can be useful as a set of signposts for locating reliable mechanistic constraints.
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#164Earlier quoted context omitted.
that's really interesting, can you explain this bit a bit more? Or let me know what to google to learn more about this? "The process of simulating actions is the process that changes the structure of your mind"
I would point you to two different motivating examples: * Childhood development. A child who has had early childhood adverse experiences mind is effected. A fMRI or chemical detection can see physical differences in the brain. But the brain is plastic (it can change) over time. Works on this subject have been published by Dr. Dan Siegel https://drdansiegel.com/books among others. The key insight here is that academic…
> Writing is important because with it we can overcome our natural memory limitations.
Very interesting. Is the theory here that by writing things out on a page we are then able to manipulate the ideas in our head without the usual limits of our working memory? Working memory is still limited but because all the information is so nearby and within view we can quickly put things in and out of our working memory so its limit doesn't impede us as much?
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#165Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure I agree. I think what I tried to describe above couldn't be classified as "knowledge" at all. To be honest, I think we (humans) don't understand this type of understanding very well. Which is somewhat ironic :-) Edit: But thanks for the suggestion about searching for schema, will definitely take a look!
The keyword embodied may be fruitful — there is a lot of noise around the term but embodied understanding is closer to what you want, I think. You may have to relax some ideas about how things work for a while in order to absorb/integrate it. The knowledge defined in the article is very rational and reductionist in its presentation. I don’t mean that derogatorily, but it does mean it can’t account for all the emergen…
Thank you for that keyword! A quick search brought me to the wikipedia article [1], which sounds quite promising.
I agree completely with your analysis of the article by the way. Beautifully said!
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#166There is a difference between remembering something (like a fact) and a deep understanding of a concept. Let me give you an example in programming: I sometimes have to google for the names of functions I've already used a hundred times. Sometimes extremely simple functions (just a while ago it was list.size() in Java), only because I can't remember the name of the function, but of course I understand the concept - th…
I think you've touched on two different ideas:
(1) That a deeper understanding of something can make it simpler/easier to remember. One way to look at this is that you remember a model of the world. That complexity of that model determines the quantity of information you need to remember. If you can find a simpler model, your mind needs to store less information to cover everything you need to know.
(2) That a concept and its name are different things. You understand the concept of an array-length-giving function, but you don't remember the name attached to it. It could go the other way: you could know there is a function with a certain name but not remember what it does. Or you could know what it does and what it's named. (This seems at least tangentially related to linguistic relativity (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity), a.k.a. the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. The question is basically to what degree our minds build ideas on words/language and to what degree we form ideas independently of language.)
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#167As someone who has been using Anki for the past 4 years to learn Japanese and now Chinese, I've recently found that the initial "learning" step is not that hard. (i.e., given 辞書, I remember "dictionary") What is hard is keeping the content I've learned, _learned_, for more than a day. So now I'm wondering, is my initial "learning" process wrong? Since definitions are fairly simple and I find them easy to remember at…
To learn a word or character, you need to be able to understand it immediately and be able to form a sentence with it without delay (at least not more than the occasional "uh..."). Remembering the meaning after some fiddling is not good enough. That has to be achieved by actually practicing the language, either via listening, speaking, or writing. Anki is there to help after that step by keeping you refreshed with th…
A friend who is amazingly good at languages made the analogy, you can't read about how to play a musical instrument and get better at playing it. You actually have to play it.
Anki might help some, maybe reading, but speaking and listening require actually speaking and actually listening.
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#168There is a difference between remembering something (like a fact) and a deep understanding of a concept. Let me give you an example in programming: I sometimes have to google for the names of functions I've already used a hundred times. Sometimes extremely simple functions (just a while ago it was list.size() in Java), only because I can't remember the name of the function, but of course I understand the concept - th…
You still have to remember your understanding. That's something you realize when it has been a long time since you took a class on something back in college.
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#169Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've resisted co pilot and auto complete because when interview time comes and you have to write code outside of your toolset, you'll realize you haven't committed things so well to memory. This bit me earlier on in my career after working in visual studios for a long time. I now code almost exclusively in vim. I'm not saying you shouldn't use it, but before you go into technical parts of interviews I would recommend…
Not saying that your advice in any way wrong, but it's a bit sad that the only thing holding people back from such a productivity multiplier, innovation or even completely new way of coding is the inane interview process of this industry ...
The paradox of copilot is that anyone who is skilled enough that they can be responsibly trusted to use it doesn't need it.
Re: Learning Is Remembering
#170Calling learning remembering, is like calling a computer a hard drive. Sorry, but, remembering is just one part, although important part of learning. There is loads of difference between remembering the words of a foreign language and fluently speaking it. The process of learning is complicated, eg. good teaching is not giving the final answers to learner, which should seem faster, but letting the learner arrive at t…
There's an old saying in Asian cultures about learning. - You do not truly understand until you "forget" what you've learned. I know, it's weird and opposite of what Feynman Said. But it makes sense.
Does this mean you've internalized it?
I think that generally is a characteristic of something who's mastered something.
It does make sense, but I don't think it's strictly true. You can understand something without making it second nature.