Learning vs. Memorization

[dougo]

I'm good at learning new things, but I'm bad at remembering how I learned them. I'll never be a good teacher, because once I've learned something I can't reconstruct the steps for someone else to follow. Driving, for example, is not a conscious process for me, it's almost all intuition and muscle memory. If I had to teach someone how to drive it'd be like asking the centipede how to walk. Similarly, when I read or hear something, I internalize the meaning but forget the form. I can never remember exact quotes from song lyrics or movies, for example. Memorizing poetry in school was nearly impossible.

I've recently noticed that this also applies to my opinions. If I encounter (or construct) an argument that convinces me to form an opinion about something, then I will hold the opinion long after I stop being able to reconstruct the argument from memory. This makes me uncomfortable when someone challenges my opinion, because I can't defend it and it makes me look irrational by holding indefensible opinions. But I also don't want to just change my opinion because I can't remember the original argument.

One example that made me think about this is a recent debate about proprietary software with mshonle. There are two anti-proprietary camps: the open source people think that proprietary software is bad because it leads to poor quality, and open source software will win in the long run because it is better equipped to compete. The free software people think that proprietary software is unethical and should be fought more directly, ultimately through a constitutional amendment but in the meantime by copyleft. At some point I became convinced to belong to the latter camp, but I don't actually remember the argument that convinced me. And it's frustrating that I have to do research to find an argument that I've already been convinced by. (I remember reading The Libertarian Case Against Intellectual Property Rights, which might have been part of it, but I haven't gotten around to re-reading it yet.) (There is also an economic argument against intellectual property but my recollection is that it's more in line with the open source camp: it's an argument that copyright is not necessary, but not that it's harmful.)

Another example is the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms. It never made much sense to me until at some point I became convinced that guns should not be illegal (though I personally want nothing to do with them). But whenever I come up with some way to explain it to someone it sounds ridiculous, like all the NRA bumper sticker slogans like "guns don't kill people, people kill people" and "when guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns". I actually agree with both of those sentiments but it's hard to avoid making them sound vapid. (And they are not the arguments that convinced me.)

At some point I will embark upon a project of self-explanation, to figure all of these things out and write them down so I don't forget them again. But for now I'll just start with this self-meta-explanation.

Comments

[emmacrew.livejournal.com]

I'm good at learning new things, but I'm bad at remembering how I learned them.

Meee, toooooo. And because I know a lot of random stuff, people tend to assume I'm good at memorizing things, when I'm really just hopeless at it. Dates in particular I'm awful with, I can sort of remember a general timeline, but specific years that things happened, not a chance.

I think the opinion thing is probably true on some level for a lot of people, at least for opinions formed early on. When opinions change, though... it's interesting to think about.