- #1
kelvinng
Do you agree with Feynman? Can anyone aspire to be a physicist?
There Are No Miracle People
Kelvin
There Are No Miracle People
Kelvin
Last edited by a moderator:
kelvinng said:Do you agree with Feynman? Can anyone aspire to be a physicist?
Ivan Seeking said:There are people who struggle just to get past one or two algebra classes for their majors.
CDTOE said:Maybe there weren't interested enough, or didn't study well, so that's why they struggled. We go back to Feynman's main argument in this video, time devotion and interest.
simpy said:... We all have equal abilities ...
CDTOE said:Brown people are incapable.
Ivan Seeking said:No. Anyone can grasp the ideas involved, but I think the notion that anyone can get past the math needed to be a physicist is incorrect. As a physics student, I worked my butt off just to be above average. And this stuff is far easier for me than most people I know. There are people who struggle just to get past one or two algebra classes for their majors. I know. I tutored some of them. And I was often struck by the difficulty they had doing things that seemed obvious and simple to me. So I think the claim that anyone can do this shows a clear loss of perspective - too much time spent in the ivory tower!
bamahabir said:If your really interested in learning about something, you'll learn it. Doesn't matter who you are or what your intelligence is. Granted it'll take longer for some to get that "AHA!" moment where all the pieces come together but with dedication it's not some impossible magical feat.
phinds said:It's very egalitarian of you to say so, but it is blatant nonsense. How do you respond to Ivan's post #7?
BobG said:I disagree. It has as much validity as saying anyone could play basketball as well as Michael Jordan if they just put in the time and effort.
The only difference between the two is that differences in physical ability (height, for example) tend to be obvious, while differences in mental ability are physically indistinguishable.
That doesn't mean that the average person can't master shooting or dribbling a basketball, nor does it mean the average person can't master (or understand) a lot about physics. It just means there are a lot of people that are never going to excel at physics.
I still remember the guy in electrical engineer that finally passed the electronics "weed out" course on his third try - and then promptly switched majors. He wasn't going to be defeated, but it was also obvious to him that he just wasn't cut out to be an electrical engineer. Wise choice.
Lavabug said:Let's not compare anatomic barriers to mental/psychological barriers... The limitations of the brain are nowhere close to an exact science as it might be for the musculo-skeletal system
AlephZero said:I'm not sure what you are saying, except that "psychology" in its present state is arguably barely a science at all (though it's a very profitable commercial operation - expecially child psychology that is marketed as a way to fix educational problems.)
Giving a few "happy-clappy" examples doesn't prove anything much IMO, and if you are arguing that the human brain somehow works outside of the laws of physics, you need to give some convincing proof of that.
Lavabug said:The onus of proving anything is on the people who claim "some just can, some can't", which as of yet hasn't extended beyond anything other than anecdotal examples either. I'm not putting lower or upper bounds on the achievement potential of anyone without some solid evidence behind it, just like nobody puts a lower or upper bound on the mass of an elementary particle without a ton of measurements and a sound theory behind it. Let's be humble about what we don't know.
That was the extent of my argument, I thought it was clear.phosgene said:Before we start arguing about who can and can't, we really need to define what we mean here. It seems to have gone toward 'can everybody get a degree in physics?'. Which I think the answer is clearly yes.
phosgene said:But I'm not convinced that our default position should be that 'everybody can do it'. I mean, we've had the extreme examples, but don't tell me that you've never seen people that aren't brain-damaged do their best and fail at it? Just because one position hasn't been 'proven', doesn't mean the alternative is the default.
Lavabug said:And I'm not convinced it is going to swing either way. My anecdotes are just as good as yours. But what is stated without evidence ("some can't") can also be dismissed without evidence. What you're advocating is making an assertion based on a hunch and not data or a testable model, as I said, not a very objective scientific way of approaching this. What I'm saying is: let's stop pretending that we can make clear-cut predictions for people, measuring intellectual ability and achievement potential isn't a perfected science by any stretch.
AlephZero said:Giving a few "happy-clappy" examples doesn't prove anything much IMO, and if you are arguing that the human brain somehow works outside of the laws of physics, you need to give some convincing proof of that.
Ivan Seeking said:No. Anyone can grasp the ideas involved, but I think the notion that anyone can get past the math needed to be a physicist is incorrect. As a physics student, I worked my butt off just to be above average. And this stuff is far easier for me than most people I know. There are people who struggle just to get past one or two algebra classes for their majors. I know. I tutored some of them. And I was often struck by the difficulty they had doing things that seemed obvious and simple to me. So I think the claim that anyone can do this shows a clear loss of perspective - too much time spent in the ivory tower!