Why do children explore and adults take classes? was Re: public demand for information technology

[Kragen Javier Sitaker]

On Mon, 23 Oct 2006 14:09:20 -0500, Shae Matijs Erisson wrote:
> Kragen Javier Sitaker <kragen at pobox.com> writes:
> 
> > Thanks for the link --- I'd heard about the project some years ago,
> > but didn't know what they were up to these days.  Do you have
> > hypotheses for this difference between children and adults?
> 
> Have you read about Ritual Addicted on reciprocality.org?
> 
> The website appears to be down, but it's in google's cache[1].
> 
> It reads like the website of an internet crank, and the first few
> times I ran across it I immediately dismissed it for that very
> reason.
> 
> But the basic principle as I see it is that most people don't learn
> new things unless they are forced to do so.
> 
> In general, workers will not put in any effort to learn new things
> unless their survival depends upon it.

I'll take a look, but mostly what you've written above is merely a
repetition of the description of the problem --- it doesn't really go
into where it comes from or how to fix it.

> Relevant points are
>  * the popularity of http://www.whomovedmycheese.com/
>  * The Pragmatic Programmer specifically covers learning portfolios
>  * Hamming's "The Art of Doing Science and Engineering, Learning to Learn"

That sounds interesting.  I really enjoyed his "You and your research".

>  * Disruptive change. When trying harder is part of the problem[2]
> 
> In my experience, most people do not know how to handle a situation
> unless they've been told how to do so by someone else.

Usually not even then --- they have to have practice --- but that's
not true of everyone.  And it's situational.  My researchy friends are
totally competent handling new academic learning situations, but not
new self-defense situations, and most police officers aren't that
great with academic learning situations either.

The question that interests me is this: how can we increase the number
of people who can cope with new situations?

> Psychological research into learning has shown that a conscious
> effort to improve is the only requirement. I suspect most people
> don't stand back and look at their lives from that perspective.

You think it's just a matter of viewpoint, then?