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eli_sennesh comments on Is Scott Alexander bad at math? - LessWrong
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I'm finding this discussion very interesting because of my personal background. The general population would describe me as "good at maths". I would describe myself (because of context) as "bad at maths". I was one of the best all the way through high school and then started an undergraduate maths course known for being challenging. After a few weeks I completely hit a wall and couldn't progress any further with it. (I changed course to music.) My sister, father and brother-in-law all completed a whole undergraduate course in maths - I couldn't finish the first year. So I think I am bad at maths.
Following on: I think I have a much deeper aesthetic understanding of music than my father and sister. They, the "better" mathematicians, are excellent musicians, but in a functional sense. I'd say that I, the "worse" mathematician, have a much more profound insight into music than they do.
And I failed my first go at Machine Learning, and nearly failed my first go at Intro to Statistics!
(Because I hadn't taken continuous probability first, and was depressed.)
What was it like from the inside, hitting that wall? Math is a particularly easy subject to hit a wall in, because if you're lacking a prerequisite of some sort, all of a sudden everything you're seeing turns to apparent nonsense.
Actually I found it very difficult to understand how it had happened. At school I was one of the best, I enjoyed maths, I understood the concepts and mostly found it easy. At University that all reversed: I was one of the worst, I couldn't do the assignments, I found the lectures boring, and I thoroughly disliked it. I found it very hard to comprehend how such a complete reversal had happened. And more than 15 years later, I still don't really get it... It's rather destabilising when you can't do the thing you expected to devote three years of your life to!