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I've heard that advanced math has a similar problem, that some subjects are quite deep that only a handful of people really understand the topic and passing the

I've heard that advanced math has a similar problem, that some subjects are quite deep that only a handful of people really understand the topic and passing the knowledge down to younger mathematicians is not a given.

alpaca128 3y ago
I guess in IT it's the other way around, where you can start with advanced abstractions and frameworks without bothering what kind of rabbit hole is underneath (at least while it's going smooth), it gets deeper as you go closer to the hardware. While in maths you need to understand the basics to even know what's going on with more advanced areas. And this already applies to the fundamentals too, where in school it's expected you understand the stuff from previous years. At least that's my impression as a non-mathematician. And then there's the mix between the two in languages that rely heavily on powerful type systems.
- oldsecondhand 3y ago
  No, you can do the same in math. It just means ignoring the proofs and just using the theorems as they are. However sometimes the application and proof requires similar ways of thinking, and you kind of miss out by skipping the proof. But the same can be occasionally true for software engineering.
bongobingo1 3y ago
Are there good historical examples of this happening, where foundational knowledge is completely lost? I know I have read about it in books as a fiction, but I assume it must have already happened here before. Maybe its an oxymoronic question to ask, seeing as if its lost we might not even know its lost, but more in the vein of "We put the lime in the mortar because this is what we have always done", unaware of the actual properties of lime when interacting with concrete.
- everdrive 3y ago
  >Are there good historical examples of this happening, where foundational knowledge is completely lost? Usually following the fall of empires. Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) wrote: "Perhaps they have written exhaustively on this topic, and their work did not reach us. There are many sciences. There have been numerous sages among the nations of mankind. The knowledge that has not come down to us is larger than the knowledge that has. Where are the sciences of the Persians that ‘Umar ordered to be wiped out at the time of the conquest? Where are the sciences of the Chaladaeans, the Syrians and the Babylonians, and the scholarly products and results that were theirs? Where are the sciences of the Copts, their predecessors? The sciences of only one nation, the Greeks, have come down to us, because they were translated through Al-Ma’mun’s efforts. He was successful in this direction because he had many translators at his disposal and spent much money in this connection."
- Mordisquitos 3y ago
  > Are there good historical examples of this happening, where foundational knowledge is completely lost? Maybe not quite in the context you were asking, but philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre argues as the premise in his book After Ethics that this is what happened to the philosophy of ethics after antiquity. Copypasting from its Wikipedia article [0]: > [After Ethics] begins with an allegory suggestive of the premise of the science-fiction novel A Canticle for Leibowitz: a world where all sciences have been dismantled quickly and almost entirely. MacIntyre asks what the sciences would look like if they were re-assembled from the remnants of scientific knowledge that survived the catastrophe. > He claims that the new sciences, though superficially similar to the old, would in fact be devoid of real scientific content, because the key suppositions and attitudes would not be present. "The hypothesis which I wish to advance", he continues, "is that in the actual world which we inhabit the language of morality is in the same state of grave disorder as the language of natural science in the imaginary world which I described." Specifically, MacIntyre applies this hypothesis to advance the notion that the moral structures that emerged from the Enlightenment were philosophically doomed from the start because they were formed using the aforementioned incoherent language of morality. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_Virtue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_Virtue
- spacebacon 3y ago

alpaca128 3y ago

I guess in IT it's the other way around, where you can start with advanced abstractions and frameworks without bothering what kind of rabbit hole is underneath (at least while it's going smooth), it gets deeper as you go closer to the hardware. While in maths you need to understand the basics to even know what's going on with more advanced areas. And this already applies to the fundamentals too, where in school it's expected you understand the stuff from previous years. At least that's my impression as a non-mathematician. And then there's the mix between the two in languages that rely heavily on powerful type systems.

oldsecondhand 3y ago
No, you can do the same in math. It just means ignoring the proofs and just using the theorems as they are. However sometimes the application and proof requires similar ways of thinking, and you kind of miss out by skipping the proof. But the same can be occasionally true for software engineering.

bongobingo1 3y ago

Are there good historical examples of this happening, where foundational knowledge is completely lost? I know I have read about it in books as a fiction, but I assume it must have already happened here before. Maybe its an oxymoronic question to ask, seeing as if its lost we might not even know its lost, but more in the vein of "We put the lime in the mortar because this is what we have always done", unaware of the actual properties of lime when interacting with concrete.

everdrive 3y ago
>Are there good historical examples of this happening, where foundational knowledge is completely lost? Usually following the fall of empires. Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) wrote: "Perhaps they have written exhaustively on this topic, and their work did not reach us. There are many sciences. There have been numerous sages among the nations of mankind. The knowledge that has not come down to us is larger than the knowledge that has. Where are the sciences of the Persians that ‘Umar ordered to be wiped out at the time of the conquest? Where are the sciences of the Chaladaeans, the Syrians and the Babylonians, and the scholarly products and results that were theirs? Where are the sciences of the Copts, their predecessors? The sciences of only one nation, the Greeks, have come down to us, because they were translated through Al-Ma’mun’s efforts. He was successful in this direction because he had many translators at his disposal and spent much money in this connection."
Mordisquitos 3y ago
> Are there good historical examples of this happening, where foundational knowledge is completely lost? Maybe not quite in the context you were asking, but philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre argues as the premise in his book After Ethics that this is what happened to the philosophy of ethics after antiquity. Copypasting from its Wikipedia article [0]: > [After Ethics] begins with an allegory suggestive of the premise of the science-fiction novel A Canticle for Leibowitz: a world where all sciences have been dismantled quickly and almost entirely. MacIntyre asks what the sciences would look like if they were re-assembled from the remnants of scientific knowledge that survived the catastrophe. > He claims that the new sciences, though superficially similar to the old, would in fact be devoid of real scientific content, because the key suppositions and attitudes would not be present. "The hypothesis which I wish to advance", he continues, "is that in the actual world which we inhabit the language of morality is in the same state of grave disorder as the language of natural science in the imaginary world which I described." Specifically, MacIntyre applies this hypothesis to advance the notion that the moral structures that emerged from the Enlightenment were philosophically doomed from the start because they were formed using the aforementioned incoherent language of morality. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_Virtue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_Virtue
spacebacon 3y ago