From: Robert J. Bradbury (bradbury@aeiveos.com)
Date: Tue May 16 2000 - 22:40:27 MDT
On Tue, 16 May 2000, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote:
> "Robert J. Bradbury" wrote:
> >
> > There is an old saying...
> > "Those who tell don't know, and those who know don't tell".
> >
> > That is because the wisdom of some things is meaningless
> > if you don't discover it for yourself.
>
> Aw, c'mon, can't you just say "That is because, for some types of
> knowledge, the process of discovery results in richer cognitive
> structures than hearing an explanation?" 'Cause otherwise it sounds a
> bit, you know, mystical.
Well, when I say it my way, I hear music and feel the universe
'gasp' in awe. When I say it your way, it sounds like I'm a crusty
old professor giving a lecture in cognitive neuroscience to
humanities freshman in a psych class they were forced to take to
fullfill a distribution requirement.
A quote, I love, that I will attribute to Todd Rider, perhaps
the smartest person I've ever met (his PhD degree was from MIT
in nuclear physics), went like -- "The reason we should solve the
problem of human aging is because the approach of cutting off
people's heads is well.... so damn messssy".
But, to part of me, the sword crossing, head chopping,
lightening flashing, etc. has so much more appeal than
the nuts and bolts of science and engineering.
What can I say?
R.
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