Tag: quora

Reasons For Hope Under Trump

A few days after the November election, I wrote on Quora the following reason for why I am hopeful, even under the Trump administration. And today, on Inauguration Day, I still believe it’s true.

Should Donald Trump be trusted?

No, he cannot be trusted.

But that might be a good thing. I say this as a Clinton voter.

Here’s what I mean:

Trump can’t be trusted to be firm on any political position. He has claimed countless conflicting stances in the past, encompassing the entire political spectrum (for/against Iraq, for/against reproductive rights, etc.).

Having such an unpredictable President means that we, the American people, will feel compelled to stay vigilant in politics. We’ve already seen that this is a significant motivator for political engagement. Just take a look at the past couple of days — we’ve seen much more political engagement in the days following the election than ever before, especially among young people.

And that’s precisely why Trump’s untrustworthiness is a great gift for American citizens who commit to an active role in shaping their country — their efforts, whether liberal, conservative, or otherwise, will actually make an impact.

That’s right. You can be black, white, Hispanic, Asian, native, immigrant, LBGTQ, Muslim, Catholic, rich, or poor — and you can actually make an impact.

The downside, of course, is that if Americans let their collective guards down over the next 4 years, the result will be utterly unpredictable.

You see, Presidents never truly rule the United States.

The American people do. And it’s time we realize that.

In a way, President Trump may have been what the Founding Fathers intended.

(I will say that a lot of Trump’s past behavior is difficult to explain to kids. And my heart goes out to those of you that have personally faced bigotry in your lives both before and after the election. However, if public engagement since the election is any indication, I’m hopeful for a more active and informed American people.)

Glitches In The Universe

Below is one of my more fun answers on Quora. Most of the things I mentioned are fully explained by science, but in the spirit of the question, it’s more entertaining to call them glitches.

If, as Elon Musk suggested, we’re all part of an alien video game, can you identify any potential “glitches” they’ve made?

Below are just a few glitches I can think of:

  • How bicycles stay upright is a mystery [1]
  • Boiling water freezes faster than cold water in some cases [2]
  • Negative temperature is somehow infinitely hot [3]
  • There’s a lot more matter than antimatter in the universe [4]
  • Dark matter [5] and dark energy [6]
  • The universe is expanding at an accelerating rate, and recently discovered to be even faster than previously expected [7]
  • Almost anything to do with magnetic materials (ferromagnetism, superconductors, etc.) [8]
  • Quantum entanglement (affect one entangled subatomic particle, and observe instantaneous effects on its entangled twin many miles away) [9]
  • Quantum tunneling (subatomic particle has nonzero chance of suddenly being on other side of “impenetrable” barrier) [10]
  • Saturn’s hexagonal polar storm [11]
  • Space, time, matter, and energy may all be quantized, like pixels [12]

Sources:

[1] A Bicycle Can Be Self-Stable Without Gyroscopic or Caster Effects

[2] Mpemba effect

[3] Atoms at negative absolute temperature: The hottest systems in the world

[4] Baryon asymmetry

[5] Dark matter

[6] Dark energy

[7] Hubble Finds Universe Expanding Faster Than Expected

[8] Superconductivity

[9] Quantum entanglement

[10] Quantum tunnelling

[11] This weird hexagon on Saturn has puzzled scientists for decades

[12] Is time quantized? In other words, is there a fundamental unit of time that could not be divided into a briefer unit?

Learning (Part 2)

In the previous post, I showed you all a Quora answer I gave about learning based primarily on learning facts. Below is another question I answered that focused on learning concepts and developing a correct intuition. It’s arguably more powerful.

What is the best way to learn and remember information?

The ultimate goal of learning is to take information that exists outside of your mind, and create a robust, recallable, and useable representation of it inside your mind.

Everyone is certainly aware of the “inside your mind” component. But how often do we consider “robust,” “recallable,” and “useable” when we try to learn? When I was a university teaching assistant, I saw that most students barely gave any thought to these.

If a student’s learning strategy consists only of memorizing whole passages of books and lecture notes via repetition, would they do well?

The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west…

Perhaps…at first. But what happens when the material grows in size and complexity? Over time, this strategy is doomed.

Let’s return to the main goal of learning; we are not satisfied just with any mental representation. We need a great one. Our goal is to fix it in your brain so well that it becomes as real and readily accessible to you as any physical tool in your hand.

Breaking it down:

  • For your learning to be robust, it needs to be connected to your world view. The concept needs to be real beyond all doubt, no matter how you look at it.

Sunrises and sunsets are determined by the motion of the earth. People wake up in New York before they wake up in Los Angeles. Sundials are oriented northward, and their shadows’ movement inspired the design of clocks (clockwise). This all only makes sense if the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.

  • To make your learning recallable,  you need to have the ability to pull it from your memory without any external cues to the answer. Be honest with yourself and consciously avoid illusions of competence.

I just heard the above sunrise/sunset explanation from a friend, and it makes sense. I should see if I can reproduce my friend’s explanation after lunch. If I can’t honestly do it at that point, I’ll review and try again after dinner.

For your learning to be useable, you need to apply it to problems. Furthermore, you must monitor how easily you were able to employ that concept and arrive at the correct conclusion. An example problem: which direction (east or west) should you direct a rocket that is deploying a satellite in orbit around the earth?

A satellite needs to go at high speeds to maintain orbit. The earth is already rotating in a particular direction, so that is an automatic boost in speed; if the rocket goes in the same direction, it can use far less fuel, so the rocket can be much smaller and cheaper. Since we know the sun rises in the east and sets in the west, the earth must be rotating eastward. Therefore, the rocket should be directed east.

This is how you learn.

A final word on learning — your mind works just like a muscle, and therefore it needs to be exercised. Space out your learning and use it often.

Now go and be unstoppable.

Learning (Part 1)

I was an ineffective learner for a long time; my study habits were nonexistent when I started college. Since then, I have been steadily training myself to become a better learner. I’m not sure if I’ll ever become a learning expert, but I’m going to try.

A person on Quora asked me the following question, and it deeply resonated with me. It’s what I would have loved to tell myself a decade ago.

 

Why can’t I learn anything? Or why do I feel that I don’t learn?