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Learning Is Remembering

saveall.ai

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Re: Learning Is Remembering

#221

Post by jldugger »

cloogshicer wrote: post #116

There 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…

> There is a difference between remembering something (like a fact) and a deep understanding of a concept.

This is basically the Searl argument against AI, right?

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#222

Post by stonemetal12 »

taeric wrote: post #217
rhodin wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counter-anecdote time from Murray Gel-Mann, who did think names were important [1] [1] https://writings.stephenwolfram.com/2019/05/remembering-murr...

I don't think anyone in computers can purport to names being important. Shell's sort, Bloom's filter, awk, c++, Java vs JavaScript.... The number of names that are misleading or almost willfully obtuse is absurdly high. (I'm actually cheating for folks in my list, as I typically see it just shown as shell sort and bloom filter. Which hides that it is named for someone.)

At least Shell invented the sort named after him. In the sciences you have Stigler's Law (no scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stigler%27s_law_of_eponymy

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#223

Post by wahnfrieden »

necessary wrote: post #69

As 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…

The answer is yes. I’m working on it with https://reader.manabi.io which aims to enrich memorization with more colorful contextual anchoring. Working on a SwiftUI rewrite with Anki integration currently.

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#224

Post by jldugger »

inphovore wrote: post #117

Not really. There are different learning styles. I find memorization very difficult (poor passive recall), yet my comprehension is superior (aiding deduction.) I find many with “photographic memory” to be sadly inadequate at comprehending and exploiting interrelationships. There is something like dexterity which develops in the mind, an impression left which is not exactly remembering, yet definitely stored in the br…

> I find memorization very difficult (poor passive recall), yet my comprehension is superior (aiding deduction.)

So, the [learner's paradox](https://fs.blog/the-learning-paradox/) is that students do things that are easy and gratifying but have no lasting impact. Baseball players practicing batting should be practicing a random mix of pitch types but vastly prefer 'massed practice' sessions. I.e. 20 fastballs then 20 curveballs then 20 changeups or whatever. Yes, you can do very well on that 20th pitch, and perfecting it will be gratifying, but you come in tomorrow closer to pitch 1 than the person who mixed it up does.

It's worth pointing out that "Photographic memory" isn't durable (typically), and may in some ways impair a person -- like a guitarist who's so good at listening and replicating a song they never bothered to learn sheet music, they may end up using short term memory as a crutch and commit fewer things to long term memory in a way that impairs them in later life, especially versus someone who had studied other similar networks of concept in the past.

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#225

Post by taeric »

stonemetal12 wrote: post #222
taeric wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think anyone in computers can purport to names being important. Shell's sort, Bloom's filter, awk, c++, Java vs JavaScript.... The number of names that are misleading or almost willfully obtuse is absurdly high. (I'm actually cheating for folks in my list, as I typically see it just shown as shell sort and bloom filter. Which hides that it is named for someone.)

At least Shell invented the sort named after him. In the sciences you have Stigler's Law (no scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stigler%27s_law_of_eponymy

That is hilarious! Yeah, my qualm is less about Shell's sort being named after him, and more that many places present it as shell sort, where you can easily think there will be some form of shell game involved. Akin to thinking a bloom filter must be something about growth or flowers blooming.

I also don't mind algorithms named after people, and can understand some of how that gives provenance, at the least. The Knuth-Morris-Pratt algorithm is a good example of that. What makes things difficult is that many of the other sort algorithms were not after people's names. Unless there is a Merge that I am unaware of. :D

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#226

Post by creakingstairs »

necessary wrote: post #69

As 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…

> Is there something we can do when learning new information that will help make it "sticky"?

For me, a big part of learning a new word involves creating chunks. Those chunks then form bigger chunks. Let's use 辞書 as an example: 辞 is talking/words (and also used as kanji for quitting) and 書 is books. So word book = dictionary.

The kanjis are also broken down by radicals. 辞 is 舌 (tongue) + 辛 (spicy). There isn't a logical connection between the combination of radicals and the kanji, so I'd make a memorable story instead [1]. Thus the only things I have to purely memorize are the radicals.

I go through above process when I'm creating a card and I believe the process itself helps me learn the word much faster than just rote memorization. Of course, you need to start using the word in your daily life too!

Edit:

[1] When I create a story, I close my eyes and try to imagine the story happening as vividly as possible. I also have a rule where radicals in the story must appear in the same order as in the kanji

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#228

Post by sanderjd »

_yb2s wrote: post #197
cloogshicer wrote: post #116

There 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 sometimes have to google for the names of functions I've already used a hundred times This is why I have always been terrified of having to do a standard 'whiteboard' coding interview, and really don't want to ever participate in administering them to others. I know if I was ever tested in this way, I would be unable to remember the basic function names in languages I have used daily for years... and yet I have d…

Good whiteboard interviewers will happily stipulate that something like the thing you can't remember the name of definitely exists and you can call it whatever you want in your solution.

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#229

Post by Timpy »

cloogshicer wrote: post #116

There 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…

Curiosity got to me and I finally tried the GitHub Copilot free trial. My conclusion is that it's good for that stuff I would have googled, like "I can't remember, how do I get the date again?" or "Is it array.count() or count(array)?" Instead of typing it in Google I just type it in a comment. It's like having google in the IDE.

Re: Learning Is Remembering

#230

Post by p-christ »

victor106 wrote: post #136

saveall.ai looks really cool. I wish it were a paid product that I can download my cards from. I don't want to be in a position where I put in lot of effort to input my cards and then you shut it down. If the founder is here, do you plan to make this a paid service? If so, when? and will you provide the ability to export my cards? If this is not going to be a paid service do you plan to Open Source it?

It is partly paid already, you can pay for faster life generation in the quiz. We're almost profitable & very well funded so we aren't going to be shutting down. If we ever did shutdown we would automatically export everyone's cards and send them to you, we also will probably be adding in an export feature for you to do that yourself early next year.
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