4 ms·

> I'm fifteen years old with good knowledge of mostly high school level math, and may have missed some parts. Kabir, Great work on getting this done. I wonder

> I'm fifteen years old with good knowledge of mostly high school level math, and may have missed some parts. Kabir, Great work on getting this done. I wonder if looking around for and mentioning the similar "You Could Have Invented Monads"[0] would be a good move [0] http://blog.sigfpe.com/2006/08/you-could-have-invented-monads-and.html http://blog.sigfpe.com/2006/08/you-could-have-invented-monad...

celeritascelery 7y ago
They say the best teacher is a recent novice.
- westoncb 7y ago
  That’s interesting—I’ve noticed my ability to explain programming concepts to newcomers seems to have degraded. I think you can maintain it by continually teaching, but in my case I had a gap of 5 years or so, and trying again afterward I feel less of an understanding of the mind of a newcomer, which is instrumental in teaching...
- mjlee 7y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge has some good sources on studies done on this concept.
charles_f 7y ago
I know "20y of professional practice in the industry expert"s who would look at you with a blank stare for such mastery of non-trivial abstractions, and yet not get it. Good job is what I mean
- kreetx 7y ago
  I sometimes wonder if the "old" are just so set in their ways that they (unconsciously) don't want to learn anything new. Will has great power.
  - charles_f 7y ago
    I don't know, but I have noticed two trends: for people who have worked x years, some have x years of experience, some have x times the same year.
- kbr 7y ago
  Thanks haha, I had exposure to computers from a very early age, and I try to make functions/systems representing things I'm curious about. It's helped me grasp ideas and come up with new ones, and I should probably write about them more :P
- rhizome31 7y ago
  As one of these guys (not yet 20 years experience but close), I concur. I don't accept defeat though as I'm actually trying to learn FP for the third time! I bookmarked this blog post for when I get to monads again. Actually I'm fine with "lightweight" FP like Scheme or Elixir (HOFs, recursion, immutable data, etc.) but still struggle with "real" FP like Haskell or functional Scala (algebraic data types, monads, lenses, etc.) By the way I couldn't help to notice that the blog also features a CSS centering article. The author really is into esoteric concepts!
  - charles_f 7y ago
    Humility and self awareness is always inspiring. As well as starting to learn new concepts 20y in. Kudos!
  - scns 7y ago
    for a good explanation what ADTs are useful for watch Effective ML by Yaron Minsky from 18:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J8YyfrSwTk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J8YyfrSwTk
kbr 7y ago
Thank you! I'll mention "You Could Have Invented Monads" along with a couple of other great resources that helped me at the end of the post.
- rswail 7y ago
  Great article and it started to grok for me by the end. Although that happens every time I read an article on Monads... getting it to stick in my head is the problem. I think I need a UnderstandInTheFuture Monad in my head that maintains the state of my understanding. :D

celeritascelery 7y ago

They say the best teacher is a recent novice.

westoncb 7y ago
That’s interesting—I’ve noticed my ability to explain programming concepts to newcomers seems to have degraded. I think you can maintain it by continually teaching, but in my case I had a gap of 5 years or so, and trying again afterward I feel less of an understanding of the mind of a newcomer, which is instrumental in teaching...
mjlee 7y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_knowledge has some good sources on studies done on this concept.

charles_f 7y ago

I know "20y of professional practice in the industry expert"s who would look at you with a blank stare for such mastery of non-trivial abstractions, and yet not get it. Good job is what I mean

kreetx 7y ago
I sometimes wonder if the "old" are just so set in their ways that they (unconsciously) don't want to learn anything new. Will has great power.
- charles_f 7y ago
  I don't know, but I have noticed two trends: for people who have worked x years, some have x years of experience, some have x times the same year.
kbr 7y ago
Thanks haha, I had exposure to computers from a very early age, and I try to make functions/systems representing things I'm curious about. It's helped me grasp ideas and come up with new ones, and I should probably write about them more :P
rhizome31 7y ago
As one of these guys (not yet 20 years experience but close), I concur. I don't accept defeat though as I'm actually trying to learn FP for the third time! I bookmarked this blog post for when I get to monads again. Actually I'm fine with "lightweight" FP like Scheme or Elixir (HOFs, recursion, immutable data, etc.) but still struggle with "real" FP like Haskell or functional Scala (algebraic data types, monads, lenses, etc.) By the way I couldn't help to notice that the blog also features a CSS centering article. The author really is into esoteric concepts!
- charles_f 7y ago
  Humility and self awareness is always inspiring. As well as starting to learn new concepts 20y in. Kudos!
- scns 7y ago
  for a good explanation what ADTs are useful for watch Effective ML by Yaron Minsky from 18:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J8YyfrSwTk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J8YyfrSwTk

kbr 7y ago

Thank you! I'll mention "You Could Have Invented Monads" along with a couple of other great resources that helped me at the end of the post.

rswail 7y ago
Great article and it started to grok for me by the end. Although that happens every time I read an article on Monads... getting it to stick in my head is the problem. I think I need a UnderstandInTheFuture Monad in my head that maintains the state of my understanding. :D