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No matter who I try to explain it to, and no matter how many times I try to explain it...


InDefenseOfPOMO

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InDefenseOfPOMO

Nobody ever understands it. They have no idea what I am talking about.

 

For me it is Russell's Paradox. The minute I was first introduced to Russell's Paradox, I completely understood what it says. But whenever I have tried to explain it to anybody else, they have not understood anything I say.

 

What is it for you?

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njosnavelin
24 minutes ago, InDefenseOfPOMO said:

Nobody ever understands it. They have no idea what I am talking about.

 

For me it is Russell's Paradox. The minute I was first introduced to Russell's Paradox, I completely understood what it says. But whenever I have tried to explain it to anybody else, they have not understood anything I say.

 

What is it for you?

Ever watched Interstellar? Even the trailers make no sense

 

All everyone said about it, "Dude you have to watch it."

 

No one could explain it. 

 

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KuraTheChibiSleepingBeauty

^It makes sense to me. But, then, weird and the fantastic are my first nature. 

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RakshaTheCat

Paradox is understandable, but it seems quite useless in day to day life, so maybe that's why not many people care enough to try to understand it?

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1 hour ago, njosnavelin said:

Ever watched Interstellar? Even the trailers make no sense

 

All everyone said about it, "Dude you have to watch it."

 

No one could explain it. 

 

I watched interstellar.  It did not make sense. I'm sorry Kip Thorne was involved in such a mess - but assume he did it for free computer time to do the black hole image. 

 

the move was not only a bad plot, it contained a large amount of completely incorrect physics.  (speaking as a physicist)

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2 hours ago, InDefenseOfPOMO said:

Nobody ever understands it. They have no idea what I am talking about.

 

For me it is Russell's Paradox. The minute I was first introduced to Russell's Paradox, I completely understood what it says. But whenever I have tried to explain it to anybody else, they have not understood anything I say.

 

What is it for you?

The english language version is just a case of showing the incompleteness of language.  The mathematical version (set of all sets which do not contain themselves) is deep set theory math and I know I don't know enough to comment. 

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InDefenseOfPOMO
3 hours ago, Marcin said:

Paradox is understandable, but it seems quite useless in day to day life, so maybe that's why not many people care enough to try to understand it?

 

It is not that they cannot or do not want to see a paradox. I simply cannot successfully get anybody  to understand what it says.

 

I can explain things that I do not completely understand, such as the Double Slit Experiment and people who previously had no knowledge of them will at least then have a basic understanding of what is going on, being said, etc.

 

But if I try to explain Russell's Paradox nobody has any idea what I am saying. They try to understand, but communication fails.

 

I think that it is funny. Something that seems straightforward to me is hieroglyphics to everybody I try to explain it to.

 

On the other hand, if they ever try to explain anything from chemistry to me we will probably be even--I probably won't understand one word that they say.

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Why would you expect random persons to understand set theory?  Or care to understand it?  

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Ace of Mind

Explaining the reasoning behind my views that AI will never actually become self-aware or generally intelligent usually loses people. It's difficult to find reasonable lies analogies to illustrate the math behind it, and the math itself is virtually impossible to discuss without sounding like a snob. They're on the same page as me when I open with the fact that there are some very real dangers involved, but when I break down what forms I feel those dangers are likely to take and the idea that none of those dangers actually involve intelligence or intent, things usually dissolve into "But SKYNET..."

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RakshaTheCat
15 minutes ago, Ace of Mind said:

Explaining the reasoning behind my views that AI will never actually become self-aware or generally intelligent usually loses people. It's difficult to find reasonable lies analogies to illustrate the math behind it, and the math itself is virtually impossible to discuss without sounding like a snob.

I'm actually curious about it, what is needed for self-aware and generally intelligent things that current technology lacks? I don't know much about it, I only know current technology is actually super dumb (but is obviously over-hyped like everything is), AI can barely process images and not nearly as well as hoomans, so would obviously need much more processing power and better learning. But other than that?

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There are plenty of things I have trouble wrapping my head around. Most often because I lack enough foundational knowledge of the matter and/or because I haven't encountered a more concrete example or approach or an analogy that helps me conceptualize it.

 

I think it's not uncommon for people outside one's field to have a difficult time "getting it", and found that to be the case when I tried to explain what I used to do in my studies or in my work or hobbies.

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1 hour ago, daveb said:

I think it's not uncommon for people outside one's field to have a difficult time "getting it", and found that to be the case when I tried to explain what I used to do in my studies or in my work or hobbies.

Agreed.  I was a paralegal; the underlying concepts of law are extremely difficult for people to understand also; they think it's simple because they're coming at it from an extremely individual point of view (what they think it should be), and are often angry when their opinions are in dispute.  I've given up spending too much time on explanations, especially in the US, wher although our legal system is built upon English common law, all our states have differing overlays upon that system.  

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InDefenseOfPOMO

I have tried to educate myself in music theory. But when I, oh, read the first few pages of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Music Theory I can't even grasp the author's portrayal of the concept of tone, and apparently everything on every succeeding page builds on that concept. Another hopeless cause, it seems.

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2 hours ago, Sally said:

Agreed.  I was a paralegal; the underlying concepts of law are extremely difficult for people to understand also; they think it's simple because they're coming at it from an extremely individual point of view (what they think it should be), and are often angry when their opinions are in dispute.  I've given up spending too much time on explanations, especially in the US, wher although our legal system is built upon English common law, all our states have differing overlays upon that system.  

Oh, yeah. The laws don't always match our personal senses of justice and right and wrong. As a layman when it comes to the field of law I know I probably have a distorted view from tv shows, too.

 

One of the best pieces of advice I have come across is to remember that I am as ignorant of fields outside my areas of expertise as others might be of mine. So I try to think of how it is from my point of view as someone who is fairly knowledgeable about certain subjects when talking with people who aren't, and that I'm in their shoes when the tables are turned.

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Maybe your putting the cart before the horse, when I first looked over the Russell’s  paradox I didn’t understand at all, then I looked up set theory and after I read what it’s about several times I understood what it meant, then went back to the Russell’s paradox and looked it over several time and I “think” I understand.

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InDefenseOfPOMO

I use "teachers" in the broadest sense of the word. If you only think of formal classroom schooling you are missing the point.

 

Some teachers have a condescending outlook and act like they are kings in possession of knowledge that only a select few are in possession of, and that most of those not in possession of it are incapable of grasping it.

 

Other teachers act humbled and honored to be lucky enough to be in a position where they are shepherds/stewards of knowledge and wisdom that anybody is capable of completely understanding and appreciating.

 

Most teachers are probably somewhere in between.

 

It is not difficult to find people reminding you that law, evolutionary biology, macroeconomics, quantum physics, technology, etc. are things that most people, like you, are incapable of understanding. Some of those same people then lament the dumbing down of the population, mass ignorance, anti-intellectualism, lack of critical thinking in society, etc.

 

It is a collective phenomenon as well. Entire civilizations/societies act like they have nothing to learn from civilizations/societies they consider "barbaric".

 

Honestly, if somebody's attitude is "people like you just don't get it", I feel like he/she probably has little to offer anyway.

 

The best teachers, in my humble opinion, understand that they themselves know very little and believe that they can learn from their students as much as their students can learn from them. I have been blessed to have some of those teachers.

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Uu

22 minutes ago, InDefenseOfPOMO said:

 Ot is not difficult to find people reminding you that law, evolutionary biology, macroeconomics, quantum physics, technology, etc. are things that most people, like you, are incapable of understanding. Some of those same people then lament the dumbing down of the population, mass ignorance, anti-intellectualism, lack of critical thinking in society, etc.

 

 

UUUM is this for me?

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39 minutes ago, CJN said:

Tone is just frequency; frequencies which are harmonically related are perceived as harmonious. That’s all there is to it.

wooosh!

(that's the sound of that going over my head :lol: )

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See, the op is already giving a clue what is happening here. You mention Russell's paradox, but haven't bothered to even try to explain what it is. So I looked up the Wikipedia article, which is so incredibly dull that I didn't read even half-way through the definition. The art of explaining science is to split it up into manageable pieces and make those interesting for your audience. Feynman did this all the time, that's why all his works are still so famous. You've chosen your audience with the title. It's a very generic one that doesn't even mention Russell's paradox. So your target audience is a general one and you need to address it. Unfortunately with mathematics that includes bringing it to life, because for most people mathematics isn't very interesting as such. Example of a title that addresses a technical audience: "The origins of Russell’s paradox: Russell, Couturat, and the antinomy of infinite number." (Moore 1995)

 

To be clear I've been guilty of this too. I've overwhelmed people with slides and slides of tensor mathematics. I'm still learning how to do an interesting presentation, but I'm slowly getting there. I'm even starting to replace some of my beloved 2d black and white plots that have all the meaningful statistics with colourful 3d figures that are mostly meaningless. I do that because it takes time for an audience to get familiar with an unfamiliar abstract idea. And I can assure you that this is true for senior academics as much as for lay persons. The difference is it might take a lay person an hour to figure it out,  whereas the senior academic might understand it within only 5 minutes. Which is just the same if you're doing a 10 minute presentation and have only 30 seconds to explain this concept. In that kind of situation you have a choice: impress people with all your in-depth knowledge that must be right because you got through the peer review process, or actually tell people something they can digest. The former is far more common, but those who take the latter approach are more likely to get anywhere with their careers (not least because the people who decide about funding applications haven't got a clue what you're actually doing, so they're grateful for something understandable and convincing).

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InDefenseOfPOMO
23 hours ago, N8LV3y said:

Maybe your putting the cart before the horse, when I first looked over the Russell’s  paradox I didn’t understand at all, then I looked up set theory and after I read what it’s about several times I understood what it meant, then went back to the Russell’s paradox and looked it over several time and I “think” I understand.

 

I randomly grabbed a philosophy textbook--full of handwritten notes in the margins, highlighter-covered lines, etc.--in a used bookstore, bought it, took it home, randomly read a chapter in the middle of the book, and was first introduced to Russell's Paradox. I immediately understood what it was saying. And I am someone who struggled to meet the minimum university math requirement for graduation--certainly not somebody with more than minimum prior knowledge of set theory.

 

I am sure that you are correct about how to formally teach somebody a potentially confusing idea/concept.

 

But in informal spontaneous conversation in the middle of work, riding the bus home from work, etc., the most refined teaching techniques are rarely employed, if you know what I mean. Therefore, the response to my attempts to explain Russell's Paradox have been the look of a deer in headlights. It is funny. You can laugh about it too. I won't tell anybody. :)

 

On the other hand, I have usually had success explaining topology, the Double Slit Experiment, and other concepts/ideas. Therefore, I am not a complete failure at communication.

 

Maybe Russell was also a comedian who created practical jokes.

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@InDefenseOfPOMO I sure your explaining it right but if your someone who struggled to meet the minimum university math requirement for graduation I’m like way below that I’m just okay at comprehending things if I read about it enough. 😁

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Just about every paradox is a human creation.  All they illustrate is the limitations of our languages and our brains.

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On 7/12/2019 at 5:42 PM, Ace of Mind said:

Explaining the reasoning behind my views that AI will never actually become self-aware or generally intelligent usually loses people. It's difficult to find reasonable lies analogies to illustrate the math behind it, and the math itself is virtually impossible to discuss without sounding like a snob. They're on the same page as me when I open with the fact that there are some very real dangers involved, but when I break down what forms I feel those dangers are likely to take and the idea that none of those dangers actually involve intelligence or intent, things usually dissolve into "But SKYNET..."

robot_future.png

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
InDefenseOfPOMO

I can't forget the sport of American football. Any time someone says they do not understand the game and I try to explain it to them, they do not understand anything I say.

 

On the other hand, if you try to explain to me how to watch competitive tennis I probably will not understand anything you say, especially about the scoring.

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  • 3 months later...

Reading this, I was reminded of the Dunning-Kruger effect. The more one knows, the more they are aware of the immensity of their own ignorance. 

As a side note, I happen to understand Russell's paradox. Or I think. I doubt my level in math is sufficient to assess whether I really do. 

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