Problem-Solving and Memory

Learning is the goal of schools. Yet, learning has its own components: memory, understanding, application. The first step, memory, precludes all others. A person with no memory of the “something” can never learn much about it. From memory, a student has a chance of understanding through various mechanisms, not the least important of which is analogy through previously understood concepts. Thus, understanding is a bootstrapping process. But now comes the most important stage of learning, and that is problem-solving. We conclude…

The greatest learning engine is problem-solving. Give a lecture and only a fraction remember. Call for a group discussion and more remember. Ask them to solve a problem, and all remember - and learn.

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Human Simulation is Possible - by Humans

Human Simulation: Agent-Based Modeling and the Computational Case for Our Reality 1. Introduction In the essay, we introduce the notion that humanity could be a deliberate simulation based on an extremely simple single-celled organism, hardly anything more complex than that. This will allow an (apparently) new interpretation of the notion that humanity is simulated, but that there is no master engineer at a massive number of dials and switches, responsible for every twist and turn of our universe and lives. We begin with the notion that the universe exists and operates under its own laws. So, given the Earth [2] , when and where life first began, it was infused with a living agent, self-actualized, reproductive, and with other basic rules for its operations, interactions, and much of what single-celled organisms do today. The idea from this occurred some years back when writing code in ActionScript (formerly Flash), I was able to create...

The Calculus of Ideas and Patterns

Introduction. When dealing with ideas, patterns, intuition, and brainstorming, we need operations or rules not unlike those of arithmetic. The goal is not proof, a finished device, or a fait accompli , but rather a foundation for further investigation and study. In some cases, these operations may yield a proposition, that is, something capable of being proved. In this sense, they form a practical logic of intuition. The article concludes with a few select examples from a variety of venues. Setting. We are working with a given idea, problem, or project, or simply just thinking. Our aim is to discover pathways, patterns, or conceptual connections that may be useful. The following operations describe ways in which ideas and patterns can be generated, transformed, or refined. These also work toward understanding the imagination. Yet, this framework is distinguished from formal logic and proof. We are tempted to call them as “soft logic” because while nothing is proved, reasons...

Hugging your pet.

There are two kinds of pet people: Those who love their pet and hug it to show affection, and those who hug themselves with their pet. By the way, in the photo below, you see a baby echidna. They are called puggles.

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