4 ms·

The funniest to me was when he was 5 he read about 150 books: "I hit first grade, and I already knew the teachers were lying to me"

by 6510 3y ago

kragen 3y ago
he elaborates on how concepts and ideas and schooling are misleading by nature quite a bit in the talk, though if he says that sentence i haven't gotten to it yet. (i've seen him say it elsewhere) https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=8m33s https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=8m33s 'our minds are like theaters. (...) we treat our beliefs as reality. that is the worst thing about human beings. and these theaters are tiny; we can only think of a few things at once, it's hard for us to take in larger things. (...) we grow up in whatever culture we were born into. (...) our conclusions tend to be societal—that's a disaster!' https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=57m9s https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=57m9s 'because our brains want to believe, rather than think, these can turn into something like a religion. the reason we don't want to come up with blind belief: there's always more, and what it is, is something that we can't imagine. so when we give a name to something, we (...) hurt our ability to think more about it, because it already has a set of properties, it already is the thing the word denotes.' (beautifully illustrated in the video) https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=60m https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=60m 'school is the best thing ever invented to keep you from thinking about something important for more than a few minutes' perhaps unsurprisingly, when i explained this on here two days ago, it got downvoted to -2, because hn's comment section is kind of the intellectual antithesis of alan kay: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39586470 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39586470 i keep being optimistic but you people make me so sad
- lproven 3y ago
  > i keep being optimistic but you people make me so sad This is so very true. I am not a hippy, but I can't immediately thing of a better phrase than the immense toxic "negative energy" of HN comments. And yet, when I say this to people outside of HN, they tend to react with astonishment. "But it's my favourite place online! I love it! I learn so much!" etc. I don't think the site even realises, but its negative responses to this (deeply unwise and ill-considered) "Ask HN" question changed the direction of what was the most innovative company in the Linux space: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14002821 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14002821
- 6510 3y ago
  It is hard to imagine a discovery so profound as banging 2 rocks together. Why would you do it? Where are todays rocks?
  - kragen 3y ago
    i have some in my head, do you want some?
djmips 3y ago
I read more books before I was 12 than I read between 12 and 20... I certainly shared his dismay for what I was being taught. (and I have consumed less (books) each decade. :/)

The funniest to me was when he was 5 he read about 150 books: "I hit first grade, and I already knew the teachers were lying to me"

by 6510 3y ago

The funniest to me was when he was 5 he read about 150 books: "I hit first grade, and I already knew the teachers were lying to me"

kragen 3y ago

he elaborates on how concepts and ideas and schooling are misleading by nature quite a bit in the talk, though if he says that sentence i haven't gotten to it yet. (i've seen him say it elsewhere) https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=8m33s https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=8m33s 'our minds are like theaters. (...) we treat our beliefs as reality. that is the worst thing about human beings. and these theaters are tiny; we can only think of a few things at once, it's hard for us to take in larger things. (...) we grow up in whatever culture we were born into. (...) our conclusions tend to be societal—that's a disaster!' https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=57m9s https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=57m9s 'because our brains want to believe, rather than think, these can turn into something like a religion. the reason we don't want to come up with blind belief: there's always more, and what it is, is something that we can't imagine. so when we give a name to something, we (...) hurt our ability to think more about it, because it already has a set of properties, it already is the thing the word denotes.' (beautifully illustrated in the video) https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=60m https://youtu.be/dZQ7x0-MZcI?t=60m 'school is the best thing ever invented to keep you from thinking about something important for more than a few minutes' perhaps unsurprisingly, when i explained this on here two days ago, it got downvoted to -2, because hn's comment section is kind of the intellectual antithesis of alan kay: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39586470 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39586470 i keep being optimistic but you people make me so sad

lproven 3y ago
> i keep being optimistic but you people make me so sad This is so very true. I am not a hippy, but I can't immediately thing of a better phrase than the immense toxic "negative energy" of HN comments. And yet, when I say this to people outside of HN, they tend to react with astonishment. "But it's my favourite place online! I love it! I learn so much!" etc. I don't think the site even realises, but its negative responses to this (deeply unwise and ill-considered) "Ask HN" question changed the direction of what was the most innovative company in the Linux space: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14002821 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14002821
6510 3y ago
It is hard to imagine a discovery so profound as banging 2 rocks together. Why would you do it? Where are todays rocks?
- kragen 3y ago
  i have some in my head, do you want some?

djmips 3y ago

I read more books before I was 12 than I read between 12 and 20... I certainly shared his dismay for what I was being taught. (and I have consumed less (books) each decade. :/)