3 ms·

But then by your definition, name-dropping is what Feynman does during the entire series of videos. How does the train stay on the tracks? Any question asked b

by chm 11y ago

But then by your definition, name-dropping is what Feynman does during the entire series of videos. How does the train stay on the tracks? Any question asked by the interviewer could have been answered in a lot more time than Feynman took. It just always felt odd to me that he stuck with this particular one. And notice that in the rest of the series we don't always hear what the question was.

wtallis 11y ago
> How does the train stay on the tracks? Since you picked that example: which necessary concepts do you think he mentioned, left unexplained, and aren't familiar from everyday life?
- chm 11y ago
  I was satisfied with his answer. But along his own logic, answering "why does the train stay on the tracks" is a very much more involved question than at first appears, because our intuition and what we now know about gravity are not always in sync. I still don't understand how you consider talking about "magnetic fields, spin and electrons" is name dropping in the case of magnetism, but is perfectly acceptable in the rest of the series :/
  - wtallis 11y ago
    > I still don't understand how you consider talking about "magnetic fields, spin and electrons" is name dropping in the case of magnetism, but is perfectly acceptable in the rest of the series The distinction is in whether you are pretending to explain those concepts, or merely referring to them as the causes. When answering some other question, you can mention those concepts and then go on to explain the consequences they have. In this case, after mentioning those concepts there's nothing more to say unless you're going to explain those concepts. There are no layers of understanding to be built up from unexplained assumptions about those concepts, because the original question is the very next layer up. And the next layer down is university-level. He didn't balk at giving an explanation about trains, because there was useful progress to be made there. That wasn't the case for magnets. The fact that you can keep digging into either subject given sufficient study is irrelevant.

by chm 11y ago

wtallis 11y ago

> How does the train stay on the tracks? Since you picked that example: which necessary concepts do you think he mentioned, left unexplained, and aren't familiar from everyday life?

chm 11y ago
I was satisfied with his answer. But along his own logic, answering "why does the train stay on the tracks" is a very much more involved question than at first appears, because our intuition and what we now know about gravity are not always in sync. I still don't understand how you consider talking about "magnetic fields, spin and electrons" is name dropping in the case of magnetism, but is perfectly acceptable in the rest of the series :/
- wtallis 11y ago
  > I still don't understand how you consider talking about "magnetic fields, spin and electrons" is name dropping in the case of magnetism, but is perfectly acceptable in the rest of the series The distinction is in whether you are pretending to explain those concepts, or merely referring to them as the causes. When answering some other question, you can mention those concepts and then go on to explain the consequences they have. In this case, after mentioning those concepts there's nothing more to say unless you're going to explain those concepts. There are no layers of understanding to be built up from unexplained assumptions about those concepts, because the original question is the very next layer up. And the next layer down is university-level. He didn't balk at giving an explanation about trains, because there was useful progress to be made there. That wasn't the case for magnets. The fact that you can keep digging into either subject given sufficient study is irrelevant.