←back to thread

Everyone is capable of, and can benefit from, mathematical thinking

(www.quantamagazine.org)
669 points sonabinu | 1 comments | 21 Nov 24 01:45 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
Show context
gsabo ◴[21 Nov 24 05:19 UTC] No.42201370[source]▶
I agree with the sentiment of this. I think our obsession with innate mathematical skill and genius is so detrimental to the growth mindset that you need to have in order to learn things.

I've been working a lot on my math skills lately (as an adult). A mindset I've had in the past is that "if it's hard, then that means you've hit your ceiling and you're wasting your time." But really, the opposite is true. If it's easy, then it means you already know this material, and you're wasting your time.

replies(18): >>42201667 #>>42201721 #>>42201729 #>>42201821 #>>42201915 #>>42202008 #>>42202194 #>>42202777 #>>42202780 #>>42202880 #>>42203292 #>>42203429 #>>42203649 #>>42204501 #>>42204671 #>>42206252 #>>42208029 #>>42219658 #
tgv ◴[21 Nov 24 11:37 UTC] No.42203292[source]▶
I cannot agree. It's just "feel-good thinking." "Everybody can do everything." Well, that's simply not true. I'm fairly sure you (yes, you in particular) can't run the 100m in less than 10s, no matter how hard you trained. And the biological underpinning of our capabilities doesn't magically stop at the brain-blood barrier. We all do have different brains.

I've taught math to psychology students, and they just don't get it. I remember the frustration of the section's head when a student asked "what's a square root?" We all know how many of our fellow pupils struggled with maths. I'm not saying they all lacked the capability to learn it, but it can't be the case they all were capable but "it was the teacher's fault". Even then, how do you explain the difference between those who struggled and those who breezed through the material?

Or let's try other topics, e.g. music. Conservatory students study quite hard, but some are better than others, and a select few really shine. "Everyone is capable of playing Rachmaninov"? I don't think so.

So no, unless you've placed the bar for "mathetical skill" pretty low, or can show me proper evidence, I'm not going to believe it. "Everyone is capable of..." reeks of bullshit.

replies(7): >>42203591 #>>42203975 #>>42204030 #>>42204224 #>>42204460 #>>42205681 #>>42205961 #
1. Barrin92 ◴[21 Nov 24 16:06 UTC] No.42205681[source]▶
You don't need to be able to run 100m in less than 10 seconds. But almost everyone probably could run a marathon in three and a half hours. How many people do you think have actualized their physical potential, or how far is the average person removed from it?

If someone's smart enough to get into a psychology class they are smart enough to be thought basic undergrad math. It wasn't your teaching failure necessarily, but it was someone's teaching failure at some point.

Not everyone can play Rachmaninov like Lugansky or do math like Terence Tao, but there is absolutely no doubt that almost all people are magnitudes away from their latent potential in almost all domains. I'm fairly certain you could teach any average person how to play Rachmaninov decently. You could bring any person to a reasonably high mathematical level. You can get any person to lift a few hundred pounds.

Most people today read at a 7th grade level, can't do basic math, and are out of air after 3 flights of stairs. "Everyone can do everything" is maybe not literally right but directionally right given how utterly far removed we are from developing practically anyone's potential.