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Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

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Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#71

Post by alisonkisk »

jama211 wrote: post #19
aurareturn wrote: post #17

I know it must be obvious but this proves to me that biological intelligence hasn't nearly reached its peak. If we select for pure intelligence, biological brains can get much smarter. Imagine if we had 5 million geniuses as smart or smarter than Tao doing quantum physics. But life doesn't select for pure intelligence, it selects for survival. In the Dune books, they banned computers so they bred super mentally capab…

Not sure it works like that, I think his biggest superpower was intrinsic motivation. Any child who read maths textbooks with enthusiasm for 3-4 hours a day for years could in theory at least get close to doing what he did, but what kid had that level of motivation?

There are probably hundreds of people on this site who had the same enthusiasm for math and time dedication as Terence Tao, but lacked his extreme outlier fluid intelligence, processing speed, perfect memory, and even handwriting talent(!). Terence Tao mastered calculus at an age when most future-mathemician geniuses weren't yet strong readers of chapter books.

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#72

Post by ChaitanyaSai »

Fascinating read! And very interesting in the light of recent advances in AI to think about what makes this ability possible. How far can we go with increasing long-term memory and working memory? Does increasing comprehension follow with competence?

Long-term retention is is hard when encountering new symbols. He seemed quite comfortable at that age absorbing the new stuff and manipulating it. Where does that comfort come from? Is there a way to test that explicitly? Finally, there is the ability to take the new and use it well. What about creating new shorthand? Being able to divine hidden patterns and articulate them?

Ramunujam seems to have had this.

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#73

Post by baxtr »

aurareturn wrote: post #17

I know it must be obvious but this proves to me that biological intelligence hasn't nearly reached its peak. If we select for pure intelligence, biological brains can get much smarter. Imagine if we had 5 million geniuses as smart or smarter than Tao doing quantum physics. But life doesn't select for pure intelligence, it selects for survival. In the Dune books, they banned computers so they bred super mentally capab…

Interesting thought experiment.

The question is: what do we want to optimize for?

Minimize pain and suffering for humans? The spread of mankind throughout the universe?

I’m pretty sure your idea would help with the latter. Not so sure about the former tbh.

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#74

Post by alisonkisk »

impossiblefork wrote: post #28

I like that test where some of the questions are wrong and wonder whether we should have that kind of thing in maths textbooks. I think people need to be trained to be more confident in what they know, and if we gave them that kind of thing we could maybe train them to become so.

I didn't see that in the document. What page is it on?

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#75

Post by alisonkisk »

mmooss wrote: post #63

I wonder if Terence agreed to have this published. This is an intimate look into the private life of an eight year old, written up as something like a lab report; it's not research on bacteria or monkeys or anonymous study subjects. It's possible that he did give permission, of course.

He was 7 years old, so it was impossible for him to give consent for anything. His parents gave consent on his behalf.

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#76

Post by plastic-enjoyer »

jonahx wrote: post #69
jama211 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I simply disagree. Yes, they could. Same with adults. Basically no one does. Also I didn’t say innate ability doesn’t exist. But in my opinion is a small multiplier on top of effort. That’s why I said close to.

There are many, many people (math majors, competitive programmers, chess players, etc) who devote incredible effort to becoming better, and simply cannot reach elite levels. And while in most cases elite players are also putting in a lot of effort, there are many cases where it is still relatively less than their peers who are trying harder but still lagging them. Would you ever be tempted to make such a claim (that…

Your post reads like someone is bitter because he is a midwit

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#77

Post by cm2012 »

jama211 wrote: post #19
aurareturn wrote: post #17

I know it must be obvious but this proves to me that biological intelligence hasn't nearly reached its peak. If we select for pure intelligence, biological brains can get much smarter. Imagine if we had 5 million geniuses as smart or smarter than Tao doing quantum physics. But life doesn't select for pure intelligence, it selects for survival. In the Dune books, they banned computers so they bred super mentally capab…

Not sure it works like that, I think his biggest superpower was intrinsic motivation. Any child who read maths textbooks with enthusiasm for 3-4 hours a day for years could in theory at least get close to doing what he did, but what kid had that level of motivation?

There is a massive body of research showing this is not true

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#78

Post by Markoff »

Terence Chi-Shen Tao FAA FRS (born 17 July 1975) is an Australian and American mathematician. He is a Fields medalist and a professor of mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he holds the James and Carol Collins Chair in the College of Letters and Sciences. His research includes topics in harmonic analysis, partial differential equations, algebraic combinatorics, arithmetic combinatorics, geometric combinatorics, probability theory, compressed sensing, analytic number theory and the applications of artificial intelligence in mathematics.[4][5]

...

A child prodigy,[18] Terence Tao skipped five grades.[19][20] Tao exhibited extraordinary mathematical abilities from an early age, attending university-level mathematics courses at the age of 9. He is one of only three children in the history of the Johns Hopkins Study of Exceptional Talent program to have achieved a score of 700 or greater on the SAT math section while just eight years old; Tao scored a 760.[21] Julian Stanley, Director of the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth, stated that Tao had the greatest mathematical reasoning ability he had found in years of intensive searching.[7][22]

Saved you a click...

Re: Terence Tao, at 8 years old (1984) [pdf]

#80

Post by defrost »

Markoff wrote: post #78

Terence Chi-Shen Tao FAA FRS (born 17 July 1975) is an Australian and American mathematician. He is a Fields medalist and a professor of mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he holds the James and Carol Collins Chair in the College of Letters and Sciences. His research includes topics in harmonic analysis, partial differential equations, algebraic combinatorics, arithmetic combinator…

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