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That seems like a very engineering-skewed perspective on knowledge. I'm not sure how that advice could apply to a philosophy or sociology student. If doing mean

by tw1010 9y ago

That seems like a very engineering-skewed perspective on knowledge. I'm not sure how that advice could apply to a philosophy or sociology student. If doing means writing research papers, then that is going to be a hugely inefficient way to learn all the things they need to learn. They won't have the resources to write a paper on everything they read. Some of it needs to just go down the subconscious, rapidly and in large quantity, for quick reference later on.

marnett 9y ago
I think philosophy and sociology are still poor examples - for the most part those subjects are reading, writing, and thinking. When I think of tedious fields that require mostly memorization, I think of medicine and law.
giardini 9y ago
So you get students who can parrot what they memorize but cannot think, reason and solve new problems. Maybe that's OK for philosophy and sociology, but in other fields students will be actually asked to contribute to the world and so must be trained to do rather than to memorize. Except for scholars (who are primarily historians) what of philosophy and sociology is worth remembering anyway? Most of philosophy was written before Darwin and certainly before any significant brain science research was done. Much of sociology is also questionable: https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&q=half+of+sociology+studiea+are+wrong&sourceid=opera&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&q=half+of+sociolo... The only reason education focuses on memorization is because in 1892 a committee chaired by the President of Harvard decided that high school education in the USA should prepare students for collegiate study in particular subjects of his choosing. Should we, today, continue to follow the direction of those professors, who were only interested in ensuring that, when students arrived at their departments, they were sufficiently indoctrinated to be scholars in their fields? https://kamccollum.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/school-is-profoundly-broken-roger-schank-visits-byu/ https://kamccollum.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/school-is-profou...
trentmb 9y ago
> I'm not sure how that advice could apply to a philosophy or sociology student. Do reading assignment, discuss/argue about it in class with a TA or professor to mediate and clarify stuff, maybe write a paper afterwards. Engaging with the content is kind of a universal way to learn by doing.

by tw1010 9y ago

marnett 9y ago

I think philosophy and sociology are still poor examples - for the most part those subjects are reading, writing, and thinking. When I think of tedious fields that require mostly memorization, I think of medicine and law.

giardini 9y ago

So you get students who can parrot what they memorize but cannot think, reason and solve new problems. Maybe that's OK for philosophy and sociology, but in other fields students will be actually asked to contribute to the world and so must be trained to do rather than to memorize. Except for scholars (who are primarily historians) what of philosophy and sociology is worth remembering anyway? Most of philosophy was written before Darwin and certainly before any significant brain science research was done. Much of sociology is also questionable: https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&q=half+of+sociology+studiea+are+wrong&sourceid=opera&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&q=half+of+sociolo... The only reason education focuses on memorization is because in 1892 a committee chaired by the President of Harvard decided that high school education in the USA should prepare students for collegiate study in particular subjects of his choosing. Should we, today, continue to follow the direction of those professors, who were only interested in ensuring that, when students arrived at their departments, they were sufficiently indoctrinated to be scholars in their fields? https://kamccollum.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/school-is-profoundly-broken-roger-schank-visits-byu/ https://kamccollum.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/school-is-profou...

trentmb 9y ago

> I'm not sure how that advice could apply to a philosophy or sociology student. Do reading assignment, discuss/argue about it in class with a TA or professor to mediate and clarify stuff, maybe write a paper afterwards. Engaging with the content is kind of a universal way to learn by doing.