6 ms·
Related, but this reminds me of the story by Richard Feynman [1] when he practices counting up to 60 seconds in his head, and after many experiments around what
by NalNezumi 3mo ago
Related, but this reminds me of the story by Richard Feynman [1] when he practices counting up to 60 seconds in his head, and after many experiments around what he can do simultaneously conclude that he can simultaneously count and read but not speak. Later sharing this to John Tukey, he's told that Tukey can't read while counting but could speak while counting.
Turns out Tukey is visualizing looking at a tape, while he counts, while Feynman imagined himself talking to himself, so he couldn't speak while counting but Tukey couldn't read while counting
>By that experience Tukey and I discovered that what goes on in different people's heads. when they think they're doing the same thing - something as simple as counting - is different for
different people. And we discovered that you
can externally and objectively test how the brain works: you don't have to ask a person how he
counts and rely on his ownobservations of him-self; instead, you observe what he can and can't do while he counts. The test is absolute.
There's no way to beat it; no way to fake it.
>It's natural to explain an idea in terms of
what you already have in your head. Concepts
are piled on top of each other; this idea is taught
in terms of that idea, and that idea is taught in
terms of another idea, which comes from count-
ing, which can be so different for different
people!
>I often think about that, especially when I'm
teaching some esoteric technique such as integrat-
ing Bessel functions. When I see equations, I
see the letters in colors-I don't know why. As
I'm talking, I see vague pictures of Bessel func-
tions from Jahnke and Emde's book, with light-
tan j's, slightly violet-bluish n's, and dark brown
x's flying around. And I wonder what the hell it
must look like to the students.
[1] https://calteches.library.caltech.edu/3591/1/Feynman.pdf https://calteches.library.caltech.edu/3591/1/Feynman.pdf
- hoppp 3mo agoI can also count while reading, I just tried it. But I can't write while counting. I can have one interpretation and one generative task running at the same time.
- BetterThanSober 3mo agoI can count while reading and it's fairly easy The sentence below will be written when I'm counting to 60 Let me try counting while writing, it's hard with tons of mistakes and typo (like switching count with write), it's also demonstrably slower with this whole sentence taking more that 60 count. Verbalizing the count is way harder and I need frequent stops to gather my thoughts
- laxpri 3mo agocounting aloud or in mind
- BetterThanSober 2mo agothe former is harder but still doable
- SwtCyber 3mo agoIt really does feel like reading and counting can occupy separate lanes, while writing and counting are both trying to use the same internal narrator
- inigyou 3mo agoA CPU designer might call them execution ports.
- dfgsdfgfgd 3mo agoWell, FWIW, I can easily write and count. It's actually way easier than I thought and takes no effort. Perhaps due to automatic touch typing while talking and thinking about something else etc? I can actually type and think about something else, never really noticed that before. Reading and counting is harder for me. I can do it, but it's tiring. Those feel like they share lanes to me.
- hoppp 3mo agoWith touch type it would work if I buffer the work ahead of time and then I can type out the buffer while I count. Sort of like: I think what I will type then when I start typing I start counting. I do not generate what I type while I count, but think of it before I do it.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- SwtCyber 3mo agoThis is a nice example of using interference as a window into representation
- shortercode 3mo agoInteresting, I experimented a bit with this when my daughter was younger. I used to walk around the room with her in my arms singing to get her to sleep. To ensure she would be settled I would then count 300 steps before putting her in the cot. I discovered I could count and sing at the same time by visualising the number in my head, instead of using my inner monologue. But it requires more focus to maintain. Thankfully these days she can get herself to sleep. But I miss it sometimes
- yakbarber 3mo agoIf you miss it, maybe she does too. You can still do it even though she doesn’t need it
- fooqux 3mo agoMaybe. But as a parent, sometimes you have to make sacrifices (or force them to make sacrifices) as otherwise they won't have space grow.
- Waterluvian 3mo agoUgh, yeah. It’s the worst. It’s the best.
- dfgsdfgfgd 3mo agoIt reminds a bit of musicians tracking rhythm. You can somehow feel a beat after a bit practice even when not directly paying attention to it and it's not too hard to associate it with an increasing counter (somehow). It sounds hard, but it is quite doable.
- 486sx33 3mo ago[dead]
- ghurtado 3mo ago> You can somehow feel a beat If you play in an orchestra, you might have the visual memory of the conductor and their time signature motions helping you along. The somewhat jarring tick tock of a digital metronome can also be encoded into a sort of background track that plays more or less automatically in your head.
- imzadi 3mo agoI've noticed something similar. I can listen to audiobooks and follow/absorb what is going on without really paying attention, as long as I am not trying to read something. I can't follow an audiobook and read at the same time. This is probably because I subvocalize when I read. I have taken speed reading courses but I don't enjoy reading that way. I like feeling every word as I read.
- inigyou 3mo agoI read by imagining a voice saying the words. Is that not how everyone reads?
- yetihehe 3mo agoI have two modes of reading - when I read a story to enjoy, I read it to myself with inner voice saying the words (like internal audiobook). When I read to gather information quickly, I try to just absorb as much keywords as possible by quickly glancing at text and trying to directly absorb the text, rereading where needed.
- rtkwe 3mo agoNo, I can do both but absorb much better when I internal monologue it but can read much faster when I don't. Some people don't internal monologue it at all. If you're in the market for another "wait I thought everyone did it X way?!" surprise look up aphantasia where some percentage of people can't mentally "picture" items and there's a whole spectrum of vividness. I've yet to find someone not surprised by this no matter where they are on the spectrum.
- margalabargala 3mo agoIt is not.
- dfgsdfgfgd 3mo agoNot at all. I can do it, but I have to actively produce it. Don't see much use for it except when reading quality fiction. It's dog slow IME. You are a fast reader? You might wonder how I read and it's a bit like how you can watch an intersection and know what to do without verbalizing "there is a bike", "there is a car". You just get the situation and understand it. Sentences are like that as well.
- vindex10 3mo ago> while Feynman imagined himself talking to himself ironic )
- vegavis 3mo agoThis has everything to do with the fact we have two brains. The left and right brain (more specifically the left and right hemispheres of the Cerebral Cortex) hold different functions cognitively, control the motor movements of the opposite sides of the body, and communicate thru the Corpus Callosum. Your full consciousness, or thought, is almost like a 'stream' created at this meeting point of the two brains where the neural traffic is so dense (more like my own theory...). However, if you were to find a patient where this connection is severed, like an epileptic patient whos Corpus Callosum was surgically bisected to cure them of chronic seizures, you would then have someone with 2 separate brains that cant talk to one another. This is split brain theory. I wrote a paper on this in undergraduate and id have to pull up a ton of other details, but essentially go watch videos on Michael Gazzaniga and Dr. Roger Sperry's experiments with these people. They would experience the right brain reaching for one outfit to get dressed in the morning while the left brain "thought" the idea of another outfit, so they would be very confused. Its very revealing to the mapping of our brain and all the different human functions, and how we learn! Then you lead down the rabbit hole of Bicameral Mind... but anyways, i believe thats why everyone can count in their left brain, and then from there its up to each brain system to figure out how to map the second task to the right brain so they can enter the consciousness stream simultaneously. There is an internal mechanism everyone develops themselves and Feynman is showing you can test that. Its probably right around most humans cognitive limit to use the right brain to help either reading OR speaking as the left brain is the primary handler of all of these (math, reading, speech). I also think thats why Feynman saw colors with his math; his right brain was assigning a unique identifier (color) to his logical problem being worked out in his left brain (all the different symbols and letters). Fascinating.
- jannyfer 3mo agoThe article's EEG images don't seem to suggest this is due to two brain hemispheres.
- vegavis 3mo agoThe original comment is talking about a related phenomena from Richard Feynman's own thought experiment. The article itself is talking about how the brain pays attention to 2 other people speaking at them; its not the same thing. Article focused on monitoring and listening, the comment is talking about one's own brain trying to complete 2 simultaneous tasks consciously.
- jayd16 3mo agoI wonder how musical counts interact with this.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- forgotaccount3 3mo agoHow do we know, or would Feynman know, that they can count while reading and not just that counting and reading are simple enough tasks broken down into discrete steps that our brains can context swap in an unnoticeably short unit of time? Just trying to read your post while counting at a consistent pace I associate with roughly 1 second per number, it didn't feel like I was reading words but instead scanning them and understanding them after the fact from memory. Usually when i read I hear the words 'in my head' but not while counting at the same time.
- JackFr 3mo agoHonestly my takeaway from this is that simple experiments like this are very important in identifying how brains work. I am admittedly a fanboy of Feynman, but I believe these kinds of questions are worth a dozen EEGs or fMRIs asserting how the brain works.
- wincy 3mo agoInteresting, I often sing a good night lullaby to my kid and have discovered it’s trivial to read while doing so. But I just tried talking while counting in my head and it felt like a brick wall was blocking me.
- xscott 3mo agoSinging and playing guitar was super painful for me. Got easier after the first song, so now it's just painful to the people hearing me. I remember a story about people who stutter not stuttering while singing.
- mega_dean 3mo ago> I remember a story about people who stutter not stuttering while singing. “Everybody's sayin' that the Scatman stutters But doesn't ever stutter when he sings But what you don't know, I'm gonna tell you right now That the stutter and the scat is the same thing” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John
- Traubenfuchs 3mo agoTry counting by imagining fingers in your head and talking at the same time. (-;
- iamanllm 3mo agoi wish i could do syntax highlighting in my head
- bana-io 3mo agoI liked your post and I enjoyed reading it, who doesn't enjoy reading about Feynman? But let's get scientific about this, you say: > The test is absolute. There's no way to beat it; no way to fake Where's the proof of that?
- laxpri 3mo agoI dont know why I cant work or read or focus while listening to music , is this the reason why.(or music takes all my attention)