- #1
Jason7754
- 2
- 0
Hi, thank you for reading.
Since pattern recognition skill is (I'm assuming) highly important to a career in physics, I'm just curious how poorly suited I am for studying physics given my complete lack of natural skill in this area. I am a high schooler with only basic mathematics training, so I don't know whether higher level math training/familiarity with certain mathematical concepts or certain “mental models" as Feynman called them, would help me recognize patterns more efficiently, although I seriously doubt it since these tests are designed to be administered to children as well as adults.
Here is a series of Mensa style pattern recognition tests I found online:
https://benvitalenum3ers.wordpress.com/2014/09/30/my-collection-of-mensa-puzzles/
So let me be very clear and honest. Where I look at these problems, I see nothing. No patterns emerge, not even after looking at them for 45 minutes.
I also have a very slow cognitive tempo. The problem with the red, yellow and blue circles for example - I can feel myself s l o w l y trying to assign numbers to each color, count to see if it works, no, nothing, try again, nope. Again, nope.
There's clearly a more efficient way to figure that problem out, but the point really is that *I can't see it.*
I'm not trying to sound overly negative here, just objective and honest. I can feel myself running up against the limits of my own biology when trying problems like these. It just *doesn't click.*
Perhaps there's training out there to help someone identify the best ways to solve problems like this, so that person can improve somewhat, but I feel like my principle problem, which would hold me back from ever contributing anything meaningful to research, for example writing algorithms to find gravitational wave signals amongst noisy data, is that I can't identify solutions to simple pattern recognition tests like this *on my own.* In physics research there is no one holding your hand, showing you the best way. There's no manual. No step by step instructions. That's what your supposed to be doing.
Maybe in the future technologies like neural lace/brain implants will allow a kind of democratization of intelligence, allowing more of the population to contribute to the sciences. Or maybe it will become only more competitive, with AI replacing mid-tier be researchers leaving only the truly exceptional.
Since pattern recognition skill is (I'm assuming) highly important to a career in physics, I'm just curious how poorly suited I am for studying physics given my complete lack of natural skill in this area. I am a high schooler with only basic mathematics training, so I don't know whether higher level math training/familiarity with certain mathematical concepts or certain “mental models" as Feynman called them, would help me recognize patterns more efficiently, although I seriously doubt it since these tests are designed to be administered to children as well as adults.
Here is a series of Mensa style pattern recognition tests I found online:
https://benvitalenum3ers.wordpress.com/2014/09/30/my-collection-of-mensa-puzzles/
So let me be very clear and honest. Where I look at these problems, I see nothing. No patterns emerge, not even after looking at them for 45 minutes.
I also have a very slow cognitive tempo. The problem with the red, yellow and blue circles for example - I can feel myself s l o w l y trying to assign numbers to each color, count to see if it works, no, nothing, try again, nope. Again, nope.
There's clearly a more efficient way to figure that problem out, but the point really is that *I can't see it.*
I'm not trying to sound overly negative here, just objective and honest. I can feel myself running up against the limits of my own biology when trying problems like these. It just *doesn't click.*
Perhaps there's training out there to help someone identify the best ways to solve problems like this, so that person can improve somewhat, but I feel like my principle problem, which would hold me back from ever contributing anything meaningful to research, for example writing algorithms to find gravitational wave signals amongst noisy data, is that I can't identify solutions to simple pattern recognition tests like this *on my own.* In physics research there is no one holding your hand, showing you the best way. There's no manual. No step by step instructions. That's what your supposed to be doing.
Maybe in the future technologies like neural lace/brain implants will allow a kind of democratization of intelligence, allowing more of the population to contribute to the sciences. Or maybe it will become only more competitive, with AI replacing mid-tier be researchers leaving only the truly exceptional.
