4 ms·

Socrates was obviously wrong but not entirely. I think that we tend to underestimate how much of generational knowledge is lost. Writing can help, but not muc

Socrates was obviously wrong but not entirely. I think that we tend to underestimate how much of generational knowledge is lost. Writing can help, but not much. Most of what we know is uncommunicable with words, especially at the expert level.

vbezhenar 4y ago
Everything is communicable with words.
- anadem 4y ago
  That's not my experience; it sounds like a glib rejoinder.
  - spindle 4y ago
    Agreed, especially since it's a well known topic in the philosophy literature and one generally agreed to be contentious. See Frank Ramsey's famous rejoinder to Wittgenstein, "What you can't say you can't say, and you can't whistle it either." FWIW, I think Ramsey was wrong (for once), but my point is that it's clearly a very difficult topic.
  - aussiesnack 4y ago
    It's so manifestly false, the only charitable assumption is that they're making an offbeat point. Perhaps it could be defended by simply defining 'everything' as 'all propositional knowledge'. Or maybe you could say true 'communication' is only possible between people who already share the concepts they're communicating, in which case words are only a Kripke-esque pointers, excluding the obvious cases of purported difficulties communicating with words. A bit of a stretch perhaps. At a minimum, it's a tad gnomic without some expansion.
- philipswood 4y ago
  It would seem that way, but some human skills are widely regarded as "unexplainable". One example would be chicken sexing - determining the gender of a young chick. Check: https://commoncog.com/chicken-sexing-and-perceptual-learning-as-a-path-to-expertise/ https://commoncog.com/chicken-sexing-and-perceptual-learning... for a nice view on it. Another rich field of examples come from sport training. There even if you can explain a skill, the explanation is often not much use in learning it effectively.
- stephc_int13 4y ago
  Ask a pro tennis player to explain everything about his play. Anyone attaining true mastery in a field has obviously learned a lot, but they can rarely describe what it is, they see it, they feel it, they can show, but they can't explain.
  - vbezhenar 4y ago
    That's the problem with tennis player, not problem with words.
    - yywwbbn 4y ago
      You’re implying that if there was a hypothetical ‘perfect’ manual on tennis written by someone you could become a world-class player just by reading it, and with no interaction with other players?
      - vbezhenar 4y ago
        Of course not. You need genes. You need muscles. You need muscle memory. You need reflexes. Basically genes and trainings.
        yywwbbn 4y ago
        Sure. You’d have all of those things and the book. You can also have robot that’s very good at tennis to train with.
- nathias 4y ago
  not at all, google dispositional knowledge
visarga 4y ago
> I think that we tend to underestimate how much of generational knowledge is lost. Not anymore. We can record and distill it into models, the past knowledge gets to have a second life. Models can capture even what cannot be precisely put into words.

vbezhenar 4y ago

Everything is communicable with words.

anadem 4y ago
That's not my experience; it sounds like a glib rejoinder.
- spindle 4y ago
  Agreed, especially since it's a well known topic in the philosophy literature and one generally agreed to be contentious. See Frank Ramsey's famous rejoinder to Wittgenstein, "What you can't say you can't say, and you can't whistle it either." FWIW, I think Ramsey was wrong (for once), but my point is that it's clearly a very difficult topic.
- aussiesnack 4y ago
  It's so manifestly false, the only charitable assumption is that they're making an offbeat point. Perhaps it could be defended by simply defining 'everything' as 'all propositional knowledge'. Or maybe you could say true 'communication' is only possible between people who already share the concepts they're communicating, in which case words are only a Kripke-esque pointers, excluding the obvious cases of purported difficulties communicating with words. A bit of a stretch perhaps. At a minimum, it's a tad gnomic without some expansion.
philipswood 4y ago
It would seem that way, but some human skills are widely regarded as "unexplainable". One example would be chicken sexing - determining the gender of a young chick. Check: https://commoncog.com/chicken-sexing-and-perceptual-learning-as-a-path-to-expertise/ https://commoncog.com/chicken-sexing-and-perceptual-learning... for a nice view on it. Another rich field of examples come from sport training. There even if you can explain a skill, the explanation is often not much use in learning it effectively.
stephc_int13 4y ago
Ask a pro tennis player to explain everything about his play. Anyone attaining true mastery in a field has obviously learned a lot, but they can rarely describe what it is, they see it, they feel it, they can show, but they can't explain.
- vbezhenar 4y ago
  That's the problem with tennis player, not problem with words.
  - yywwbbn 4y ago
    You’re implying that if there was a hypothetical ‘perfect’ manual on tennis written by someone you could become a world-class player just by reading it, and with no interaction with other players?
    - vbezhenar 4y ago
      Of course not. You need genes. You need muscles. You need muscle memory. You need reflexes. Basically genes and trainings.
      - yywwbbn 4y ago
        Sure. You’d have all of those things and the book. You can also have robot that’s very good at tennis to train with.
nathias 4y ago
not at all, google dispositional knowledge

visarga 4y ago

> I think that we tend to underestimate how much of generational knowledge is lost. Not anymore. We can record and distill it into models, the past knowledge gets to have a second life. Models can capture even what cannot be precisely put into words.