Anurag_Bishnoi comments on The Truth About Mathematical Ability - LessWrong

61 Post author: JonahSinick 12 February 2015 01:29AM

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Comment author: elharo 14 February 2015 05:57:16PM *  7 points [-]

I'll let you in on a secret: almost everyone hits the limit in Calculus 2. For that matter, most people hit the limit in Calculus 1 so you were ahead of the curve. That doesn't mean no one understands calculus, or that you can't learn it. It just means most students need more than one pass through the material. For instance, I don't think I really understood integration until I learned numerical analysis and the trapezoidal rule in grad school.

There's a common saying among mathematicians: "No understands Calculus until they teach it."

Comment author: IlyaShpitser 14 February 2015 06:41:47PM 7 points [-]

I didn't understand a lot of math I aced until much later.

Comment author: gjm 14 February 2015 11:40:06PM 14 points [-]

most people hit the limit in Calculus 1

Well, yes.

Comment author: JoshuaZ 14 February 2015 07:40:23PM 2 points [-]

This may just be that you don't really understand any area of math well until you've taught it.

Comment author: Epictetus 14 February 2015 08:50:04PM 5 points [-]

I've known professors who decided that the best way to learn a new topic was to teach a class in it.