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Proof you can do hard things

blog.nateliason.com

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Re: Proof you can do hard things

#221

Post by EliRivers »

alpaca128 wrote: post #211
constantcrying wrote: post #179

I really despise all the "why you should care about math" takes. The question is never asked about any other school subject and only mathematics has to justify itself that way. I had to learn about categories of plants and animals, interpret 20th century literature, learn about events from a thousand years ago, I did presentations on the demographics of European countries, how certain chemicals react and much, much m…

> I see no reason why it should have to justify itself in any way If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Though weirdly schools tend to be very surprised in my experience. And yes, this question is absolutely asked in other subjects too, but less often as they're not as abstract and usually related to things people enco…

And thus left as exercise to the reader?

Zing! I feel you'd want to know some of your readers get it :)

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#222

Post by ethanbond »

roflyear wrote: post #51
Medh_Suk wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It costs you nothing to believe in yourself. But it will cost you everything if you don't." Discipline is a muscle. Go Build it. Key is to understand different activities require different muscles. Be mindful of picking your activities, but dont keep on waiting.

I've never gotten anything out of discipline itself.

IMO the most disciplined thing to do is build systems that don't depend on discipline.

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#223

Post by LunaSea »

constantcrying wrote: post #215
alpaca128 wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I see no reason why it should have to justify itself in any way If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Though weirdly schools tend to be very surprised in my experience. And yes, this question is absolutely asked in other subjects too, but less often as they're not as abstract and usually related to things people enco…

>If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Nobody told me why I should learn about ancient history or 20th century literature. >usually related to things people encounter every day. Basically nothing I did in school had anything at all to do with things I encountered every day. I played video games and hung out with friend…

> Yes. I assumed that most people on this website understand the inherent value in abstract thiking and broadly applicable problem solving techniques.

This absolutely doesn't match what is thought in elementary and secondary schools.

You are thought how to apply things and not how to think (in an abstract way or not).

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#224

Post by maccard »

constantcrying wrote: post #179

I really despise all the "why you should care about math" takes. The question is never asked about any other school subject and only mathematics has to justify itself that way. I had to learn about categories of plants and animals, interpret 20th century literature, learn about events from a thousand years ago, I did presentations on the demographics of European countries, how certain chemicals react and much, much m…

> The question is never asked about any other school subject and only mathematics has to justify itself that way

Hard disagree here. When I was in school, there were constant discussions among the teenagers about "why do I need to learn a dead language (irish)", "why do I need to learn french/german, they can all speak english", "why do I need to study geography, I'm never going to need to be able to categorise volcanic vs fold mountains".

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#225

Post by mtVessel »

constantcrying wrote: post #215
alpaca128 wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I see no reason why it should have to justify itself in any way If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Though weirdly schools tend to be very surprised in my experience. And yes, this question is absolutely asked in other subjects too, but less often as they're not as abstract and usually related to things people enco…

>If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Nobody told me why I should learn about ancient history or 20th century literature. >usually related to things people encounter every day. Basically nothing I did in school had anything at all to do with things I encountered every day. I played video games and hung out with friend…

Oh, you mean the kind of abstract thinking and problem solving skills you develop from reading history and literature and applying them to the events of the day? Yeah, I totally understood that. Still not sure where Calculus fits in, though.

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#226

Post by RugnirViking »

lucideer wrote: post #176
hardware2win wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no license required for using math. Yea, if you dont want, then you will not use math. But, if you dont have some mental block, then you may find ways to apply math to your problems. Abstract thinking is really useful during arguments, even about politics, religion, etc.

> If you dont have some mental block The "mental block" you're referring to here is a combination of individual aptitude, capacity, access to educational resources & time-/effort-budgeting over a lifetime. This isn't some free casual object people are refusing to collect on their travels, it requires investment.

It does indeed require investment of mental effort. But that's it. I'd argue maths is one of the cheapest monetarily skills it is possible to pick up - there have been several great contributions from people with little or no formal schooling. It's not like it's available only to a select few, I think pretty much everyone that gets deep enough in to be able to apply it continues to do so throughout their life. It can be used to fill in for all sorts of problems. I've been a tutor and ive long been a strong advocate for yes you can do it. I've met so many diverse people with excellent spacial reasoning that for whatever reason decided they weren't smart enough or couldn't understand it, yet when given a zealous advocate to encourage them picked it up just as quickly as any stereotypical maths genius

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#227

Post by maccard »

hardware2win wrote: post #141

>You know they will never use it in adulthood, outside of certain career choices. If somebody says stuff like this, then they do not understand math, imo. Im a little bit sad whenever somebody argues for math by using "no phone available at the moment" argument. Math is insanely powerful world modeling tool. Starting from calculating right amount of fence for your garden, to estimation of 500km route arrival time whi…

They're not everyday things for a lot of people though.

I was in a shop this weekend where the price per 250g of coffee was displayed, but the woman in front of me only had a 175g container. Neither her, the person serving her, or the other person working in the café knew how much to charge her. It's 175/250 * £PRICE_PER_250.

In supermarkets, prices of items are displayed beside each other - a sharing bar of chocolate is £x/100g, but the multipack is £y/item, and each item is z grams. Which is better value?

Cooking - I have a recipe in a book that serves 2 people, but I'm cooking for 3. How much X do I need?

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#228

Post by constantcrying »

LunaSea wrote: post #223
constantcrying wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Nobody told me why I should learn about ancient history or 20th century literature. >usually related to things people encounter every day. Basically nothing I did in school had anything at all to do with things I encountered every day. I played video games and hung out with friend…

> Yes. I assumed that most people on this website understand the inherent value in abstract thiking and broadly applicable problem solving techniques. This absolutely doesn't match what is thought in elementary and secondary schools. You are thought how to apply things and not how to think (in an abstract way or not).

Yes, math education is generally bad.

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#229

Post by constantcrying »

mtVessel wrote: post #225
constantcrying wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Nobody told me why I should learn about ancient history or 20th century literature. >usually related to things people encounter every day. Basically nothing I did in school had anything at all to do with things I encountered every day. I played video games and hung out with friend…

Oh, you mean the kind of abstract thinking and problem solving skills you develop from reading history and literature and applying them to the events of the day? Yeah, I totally understood that. Still not sure where Calculus fits in, though.

>Yeah, I totally understood that. Still not sure where Calculus fits in, though.

If I need to tell you how one of the most important theories in mathematics, with broad applicability to all data-based academic fields and all careers which have to do with manipulating and investigating data, is important, then the entire school system has failed you. And I am not sure what you are doing on a site like this.

>Oh, you mean the kind of abstract thinking and problem solving skills you develop from reading history and literature and applying them to the events of the day?

lol

Re: Proof you can do hard things

#230

Post by jodrellblank »

constantcrying wrote: post #215
alpaca128 wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I see no reason why it should have to justify itself in any way If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Though weirdly schools tend to be very surprised in my experience. And yes, this question is absolutely asked in other subjects too, but less often as they're not as abstract and usually related to things people enco…

>If you cannot justify to children why you force them to sit in school for hours every day you shouldn't be surprised by the consequences. Nobody told me why I should learn about ancient history or 20th century literature. >usually related to things people encounter every day. Basically nothing I did in school had anything at all to do with things I encountered every day. I played video games and hung out with friend…

> "Nobody told me why I should learn about ancient history or 20th century literature."

Did you ever ask?

I assume not, since you claim nobody ever asks that question about ancient history - so why would anyone have told you? If you did ask, doesn't that rather undermine your claim that nobody ever asks this question about other subjects and people only ask it about mathematics?

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