3 ms·
I think you are sort of missing the point here. The idea is that when you are the 3rd of 4th person down the line of "do it like $THIS, it's the best way", the
by sophacles 16y ago
I think you are sort of missing the point here. The idea is that when you are the 3rd of 4th person down the line of "do it like $THIS, it's the best way", the $THIS has usually morphed. Most of the time that morphing is going from a generalized, loose rule to a strict procedure. But it can also take the form of dogma (goto is always bad, vs the original goto is bad except those few cases where it is the RightThing). Sometimes it is good to challenge the status quo for just that reason, the original good ideas may be lost in the noise, or the initial assumptions may have become invalid. So the point is that beginners don't know that this stuff is "always good" or "always bad", allowing them to look at it from a fresh perspective. This often allows for breakthroughs.
As for the worry thing, I submit to you this:
1. The Beginner is an ideal beginner. As such, this Beginner is expected to make mistakes, as it is part of the learning process. (S)He is expected to struggle while grasping the difficult concepts -- they are difficult. (S)He is expected to wander down "wrong" paths, as exploration is part of the road to mastery.
2. Worry almost always comes down to some underlying fear. Usually a fear of something being taken away, be it a job or a possession or something else tangible, or something less tangible like a reputation or a status, perhaps this is tied to one's personal estimation of self worth.
3. An expert has to fear his expert status, or at least his respect as such, being taken away. This is the worry aboyt mistakes that the article was talking about, an expert who makes mistakes is not long for being expert.
Given these, I am of two minds on this thing you said. First, perhaps the beginner worry comes from not understanding the role of beginner, that mistakes are expected and should probably be encouraged. Second, perhaps the beginner on one thing is an expert in a related thing, and thus is worried about losing status all along. For instance, if a child is the expert at school, he worries about losing his wunderkind status, even when facing his first maths class. If a programmer is really good with Java and and has a rep for being fast a picking up new languages, but has only faced down basic OO stuff, perhaps Haskell would cause a big worry in him?
- wccrawford 16y agoEveryone makes mistakes, but they should never be encouraged. Beginners should be encouraged to explore, though. I disagree about fear being only of something being taken away. I don't fear for my job because I know I am good enough. Instead, I fear what repercussions my mistakes will have on others, such as the company I work for. I suppose you could argue that it's still somehow something being taken away, but it's much less tangible and I can't put it into words if that's so. I also worry that I'll spend more time and effort on something than it deserves. It's rather a silly worry, but it does keep me efficient at my job, so it turns out to be useful after all. (Unlike my fear of heights and water which haven't helped me at all so far.) I agree that third-hand "That's bad!" is often misleading, but I think those things are great for beginners. It lets them avoid the most troublesome mistakes while they learn. After they learn the basics, they can start breaking those rules. Art is much the same way.
- sophacles 16y agoMistakes should be encouraged, then when they are made, they should be presented as learning opportunities. As in: "this is incorrect, here are some things you can do instead, lets look at why you thought this, and how we can get you to a different frame of mind". Please re-read my statement number 2. I said worry is usually rooted in fear of something being taken away. I never said anything regarding the nature of fear, either its causes or effects. I'll try to put those repercussion fears into words for you: you are afraid that your mistakes will have the company go out of business and your job will be taken, that your friends and colleagues will no longer associate and respect you as a result (taking away those relationships), that future employment will be harder to find (taking away security). Is this on the right track? I have those fears too, I just try not to let them rule my life. As for the other side of this why worry about inefficiency? Are you afraid you might have your reputation for no-nonsense constant work taken away? Do you fear you won't get enough money? Whats the big deal about learning something that takes a bunch of time but doesn't return as well as you'd hoped? Why worry about it? Sometimes inefficiency in the small leads to gains in the large, and vice-versa. As for 3rd-hand "thats bad": I have yet to meet anyone who is both good at something and blindly accepts these "truisms". The good ones question it from the get-go, they may end up agreeing to the principle, but they don't just blindly accept and move on, instead they try to understand it. This is different than the dogma and hard rules I was talking about. edit: When I say mistakes should be encouraged I don't mean saying "yay you made a mistake! Here is a gold star." Or "Johnny you didn't make a mistake, no star for you". Instead I mean students should be told "It's ok to make mistakes, learn from them, it is a natural result as you gain understanding" Because in the end, humans learn by experience, both positive and negative.