Modern physics and lay-people.

[Schrödinger's hat]

Every time I see a physics analogy since seeing this, I think of it. Thought I'd share.

[ajb]

Now you understand why we can have so much trouble explaining things on this forum!

[swansont]

Nailed. It.

 

Going on my blog.

[michel123456]

Ce que l'on conçoit bien s'énonce clairement,

Et les mots pour le dire arrivent aisément. (Nicolas Boileau 1636-1711)

 

Translation: “That which is well conceived expresses itself clearly and the words to say it come easily”

[imatfaal]

Ce que l'on conçoit bien s'énonce clairement,

Et les mots pour le dire arrivent aisément. (Nicolas Boileau 1636-1711)

 

Translation: "That which is well conceived expresses itself clearly and the words to say it come easily"

 

Even in the 17th century that wasn't true - and with the 20th century dawn of incredibly counter-intuitive maths and physics it is even more untrue now

[michel123456]

Even in the 17th century that wasn't true - and with the 20th century dawn of incredibly counter-intuitive maths and physics it is even more untrue now

 

the citation was not intended to focus on physics or even science, it has a wider meaning. IMHO it holds true.

[swansont]

the citation was not intended to focus on physics or even science, it has a wider meaning. IMHO it holds true.

It's ironic that it was quoted in a foreign language. Because if you don't speak that language you won't understand it, and have to rely on someone else to translate it for you. Translations are often imperfect; they can leave out nuance that is in the original. There's plenty that I think is clearly expressed, and yet others complain about how hard it is to understand because they don't speak math. And somehow it's the fault of the translator when we try and express the concepts in English.

[insane_alien]

most scientific theories are easily explained by their creators however, this logically valid and grammatically correct can be difficult to understand to the layman to lack of vocabulary, and knowledge in physical concepts that the new theory depends on.

 

This is what makes the stuff at the forefront difficult to understand, to get what the physicist is saying, you need to understand all the prerequisites.

 

For instance, lets say we zap mr ugg from 20000BC and try to explain the wheel to him.

 

Us: It is a round object than can be moved easily by rotating it. (a perfectly good explanation)

Ugg: mrh?

 

Oh dear, ugg doesn't understand our language, a prerequisite of understanding our explanation. we spend a few years teaching him grammar and a basic vocabulary

 

Us:It is a round object than can be moved easily by rotating it.

Ugg: What is round? What is object? What is rotating?

 

Oh dear, seems we need to expand Ugg's vocabulary some more and maybe introduce the whole concept of rotation.

 

and so on.

 

so our explanation which was so simple to those who have the prerequisite knowledge to understand it can be hugely time consuming to explain to someone without the prerequisite knowledge.

 

And it would be the same the other way round, us, as the explainer would need to learn Uggs language and would probably still have to introduce new words and concepts to fully describe a wheel especially if he came from an area where round objects and rotating objects were rare. Much like the tribes with little mathematical vocabulary (1,2,many etc.).

 

If your entire thought process has been trained to treat quantities as 1,2 or many then you will struggle to understand concepts such as 3 or 100 and how they are different from 'many'. and thats only counting. then when we say there are things like calculus and polynomial equations! whew, overload.

 

any truely complete explanation would have to teach all preceding knowledge which would take almost literaly forever.

[Schrödinger's hat]

Ce que l'on conçoit bien s'énonce clairement,

Et les mots pour le dire arrivent aisément. (Nicolas Boileau 1636-1711)

 

Translation: "That which is well conceived expresses itself clearly and the words to say it come easily"

Even in the 17th century that wasn't true - and with the 20th century dawn of incredibly counter-intuitive maths and physics it is even more untrue now

 

I think you both have a point there.

The less well you know a topic, the harder it is to explain to someone else.

This relation is, of course, not one-to-one. There are many other factors.

 

Every now and again we get a Feynman who can explain complicated things in simple terms, but this is rare, and there are limits on how much a concept can be simplified and retain meaning.

 

On top of this, explanation (both in general and in the specific) is a technology that improves with time. In the 19th century electromagnetism was considered a very hard subject. This mystified me until I got hold of an EM textbook from 1908 (I do not know when the first edition was published).

The author either had little knowledge of, or had to assume that the reader would have no knowledge of, linear algebra and vector calculus (let alone tensors).

All of the equations were in component form and it was extremely hard to follow compared to modern books.

Edited September 14, 2011 by Schrödinger's hat

[Appolinaria]

LOL. that's like me