4 ms·

Without evidence - I don't think it's that we don't forget how to ride but that an adult, any adult, can just get on a bike and ride it after operation is expla

Without evidence - I don't think it's that we don't forget how to ride but that an adult, any adult, can just get on a bike and ride it after operation is explained. Since everyone, or most everyone, rode one as a child we confuse this with "remembering" how to ride rather than having the adult reflexes and balance to naturally ride.

avip 8y ago
This is immediately falsified by grabbing an adult, any adult, and watch him learn a thing, anything, that relies on subtle balance and body control.
therein 8y ago
I imagine they'd have a hard time keeping the front bar straight. I remember that being the main issue when I was learning it as a kid. Had I not acquired that sense of balance associated with the front bar's alignment through practice, I don't think I would have been able to hear someone say "conservation of angular momentum", pick up a bike and start riding it.
grayrest 8y ago
An anecdote: I own a recumbent bike. Learning to ride it wasn't difficult, I was able to wobble around and had to regularly put my foot down the first couple minutes and got my balance for real within a day. I let other people ride it when they ask me about it and my experience seems fairly normal. By contrast, at one point I went 10 years without riding a bike. When I got back on, I could immediately ride. No wobbling, no learning curve. I've seen videos of other adults learning to ride bikes and it doesn't take them long to learn how to ride but it's not immediate.
Aaargh20318 8y ago
Adults who have never learned how to ride a bike can’t “just get on a bike and ride it” no matter how much explaining you do. It’s one of those things immigrants need to learn when they move to this country (the Netherlands) and it’s certainly not as easy as you suggest.
- black-tea 8y ago
  I taught an adult to ride a bike and he was pretty good after only an hour or so, to be honest. It's true that adults can't just do it, but it's also nowhere near as hard as it for children.
  - pbhjpbhj 8y ago
    We used a balance bike (well normal bike with seat down and pedals removed) on 3 occasions, probably a total of 1h30 at most. Then put pedals on and kiddo just set off and rode. There's probably a wide variance in these things.
mdp553 8y ago
Looking that the case of adult non-western immigrants learning to ride in places like the Netherlands or Denmark suggests it is not as easy as simply explaining the operation of a bike [0]. I'm not sure if they learn more quickly than children - that could be interesting to see. Tangentially, and anecdotally, I can see that children in Denmark (or at least Copenhagen) seem to learn more quickly than American kids to ride adult bikes because they never use training wheels. They first start on strider-type bikes that teaches them the balance needed, so once they graduate to pedal bikes they don't need the training wheel and pick it up fairly quickly - at least relative to my experience as a kid in the US. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/apr/28/utrecht-cycling-lessons-refugees-riding-bike-feel-dutch https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/apr/28/utrecht-cycli...

avip 8y ago

This is immediately falsified by grabbing an adult, any adult, and watch him learn a thing, anything, that relies on subtle balance and body control.

therein 8y ago

I imagine they'd have a hard time keeping the front bar straight. I remember that being the main issue when I was learning it as a kid. Had I not acquired that sense of balance associated with the front bar's alignment through practice, I don't think I would have been able to hear someone say "conservation of angular momentum", pick up a bike and start riding it.

grayrest 8y ago

An anecdote: I own a recumbent bike. Learning to ride it wasn't difficult, I was able to wobble around and had to regularly put my foot down the first couple minutes and got my balance for real within a day. I let other people ride it when they ask me about it and my experience seems fairly normal. By contrast, at one point I went 10 years without riding a bike. When I got back on, I could immediately ride. No wobbling, no learning curve. I've seen videos of other adults learning to ride bikes and it doesn't take them long to learn how to ride but it's not immediate.

Aaargh20318 8y ago

Adults who have never learned how to ride a bike can’t “just get on a bike and ride it” no matter how much explaining you do. It’s one of those things immigrants need to learn when they move to this country (the Netherlands) and it’s certainly not as easy as you suggest.

black-tea 8y ago
I taught an adult to ride a bike and he was pretty good after only an hour or so, to be honest. It's true that adults can't just do it, but it's also nowhere near as hard as it for children.
- pbhjpbhj 8y ago
  We used a balance bike (well normal bike with seat down and pedals removed) on 3 occasions, probably a total of 1h30 at most. Then put pedals on and kiddo just set off and rode. There's probably a wide variance in these things.

mdp553 8y ago

Looking that the case of adult non-western immigrants learning to ride in places like the Netherlands or Denmark suggests it is not as easy as simply explaining the operation of a bike [0]. I'm not sure if they learn more quickly than children - that could be interesting to see. Tangentially, and anecdotally, I can see that children in Denmark (or at least Copenhagen) seem to learn more quickly than American kids to ride adult bikes because they never use training wheels. They first start on strider-type bikes that teaches them the balance needed, so once they graduate to pedal bikes they don't need the training wheel and pick it up fairly quickly - at least relative to my experience as a kid in the US. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/apr/28/utrecht-cycling-lessons-refugees-riding-bike-feel-dutch https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/apr/28/utrecht-cycli...