Posted by Reilly Atkinson on August 10, 1999 at 19:13:12:

In Reply to: Re: Knowledge can not be transferred, but can be replicated. posted by Richard on August 02, 1999 at 21:09:34:

Richard -- You make many good points. With respect to kids and language, there's point at which, I think, the role of "The Language Instinct" declines--Steve Pinsker's book & account of Choamsky's theories, etc..At that point, parents by example and by instruction become the most dominant source of info -> knowledge for spoken language. Parent's examples and teaching prior to that point clearly matter, but possibly trigger strong neural pattern development.Nature and nurture are complexly intertwined from moment zero, who knows?

I was a total klutz in lab courses, my ineptitude almost caused me to flunk out of graduate school. I learned predominantly from lectures, books, discussions and lots of homework. Learning styles can vary greatly. It seems to me that I did gain knowledge through my study of written and spoken language, and written mathematics - if I had not, I never would have passed my orals.

The conversion of info to knowledge? Often, to me at least, there's magic involved -- all of a sudden I understood the formal concept of electron spin, or of finally being able to ski parallel turns, or of playing bebop on the piano.
I like this kind of magic -- it's probably explainable in terms similar to creating magnetism by global alignment of spins, that is a whole bunch of carefully selected neurons all fire in the proper sequence. And, probably, this happens due to replication (experience) and some kind of reinforcement - goal seeking.

Regards,
Reilly

---

Follow Ups:

---

Click Here to Post Follow Up in New Forums

    Knowledge Management Think Tank (New)

  

 Subject: 

Message: