Jack Arcalon

the explanation project



  

Could you build an advanced technical university in central Congo? Could there ever be a space program there - or is that fundamentally impossible, as proponents of the controversial human biodiversity theory are claiming.
I think it would be impossible to have these things there, at least without a method to reprogram brains, which is impossible with our current knowledge.
Ignorance is mankind's safe mode, a stable state that takes a lot of energy to override. Learning new things is physically painful, as if it were brain damage.
The highest barriers to learning may be at the start. Often, as with legal and medical questions, the only way to get certain answers is to hire a "gatekeeper" protecting a lucrative monopoly.

If only there was a way to inject information directly into the brain, from home repair to software to science to law to bureaucracy. This hypothetical method could rapidly explain any subject, starting from any level of ignorance, all human knowledge precisely documented in logic.
Wikipedia articles are written at a high level of abstraction, while sites like simple.wikipedia.org are mostly too simple.
Few people are obsessed with explanations for their own sake. Those who become knowledgeable in their fields are less able to communicate their knowledge than total outsiders.

The best one-word solution for the problem of education may be: metaphors. Any effective explanation project should focus on high-level, exaggerated and simplified metaphors. Like visualizing gravity as a distorted sheet, or imagining higher dimensions by imagining lower ones.
It would begin with the essence of any subject, using partial truths to impose as much information as possible. There would be different explanations for different comprehension levels. Most explanations would leave out most of the truth.
Explanations could be edited by competing experts to explain common misconceptions. They would make assumptions about what the intended reader knows, and leave out extraneous stuff to focus on core confusions.

There is a long list of subjects currently not explainable in writing. A lecturer would have to explain thousands of confusions in person.
This list is not limited to:

  • The number e.
  • Quantum theory interpretations.
  • The theory of special relativity (does a lightbeam traveling front to back really take as long as a beam going back to front, or is that just an interpretation?).
  • The weak nuclear force, responsible for radioactive decay.
  • American football rules. Unlike Sheldon Cooper this has always baffled me. All I know is there are three kinds of sports: The winner is decided before the contest (professional wrestling), after the contest (gymnastics), or during the contest (soccer). BTW, are the pitcher and catcher on the same team or different teams?
  • The Higgs field: whatisit? It appears to be the most fundamental force.
  • Negatively curved space is 'saddle shaped' what?
  • What are Java, Perl, Python etc? What EXACT term and concept replaced GOTO?
  • DNA: why is it a spiral? I made up an explanation but is it correct.
  • Airfoils and jet engines.
  • Economics and the international financial system.
  • Evolution.
  • How does video compression work? As clever as persistence of vision, it has something to do with overlapping blocks making smaller blocks.

    All the most popular explanations end just before they're about to get interesting.
    Ideally, any language could be used to explain any concept, no matter how complex. Education could be made faster by making it slower, but removing redundancy. That sure sounds good . . .
    Succinct explanations could overcome social frictions. The hardest part of learning any new subject happens before the learning can even begin.
    Some will say that education requires pain and frustration to be effective. The alternative certainly hasn't been tried yet.




    The best hard SF novel ever written: Infinite Thunder by Jack Arcalon.
    Buy the book
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