Your Education

[T-Nemesis]

I'm 15 and interested in Science, I'm slowly learning one or two things within my fields of interest (Mainly Cosmology, and Physics in general); but when I come to this forum I look around and I'm overwhelmed with some of the knowledge you guys have. What I want to know is were you very smart all of your life or did you just persevere and learn?

 

I want to know this because I'm interested in Science but I don't know if I could have a future in it.

[insane_alien]

just study and you'll pick it up even if you think you aren't. or do what i do, get drunk and watch the discovery channel.

 

NOTE: OK maybe you shouldn't get drunk as your only 15 so errr... yeah...

[Bluenoise]

Hey some of us got drunk at 15 and turned out just fine!!

*Disclaimer* not that I'd recomend it either way of course. To each his own.

 

Anyways initially in most fields the information is fairly overwhelming. Seems like a bottomless bit, and meeting someone who has an answer to most every question is pretty intimidating.

I know in my field (Biochemistry) I was doing little than accumulating info for the first years. I definatley understood it, but it was hard to see how it all fits together and is usefull, and it was hard to imagine that there was a limit to the information. Then eventually you pass a threshold of information where everything kinda "clicks" and it all fall together. It's almost like you wake up one day and are able to comeup with an explaination for pretty much anything related to the field, even stuff you've heard nothing about. Well that's how it was for me.

There is a logic to these things science is what is it for a reason. It's not just random memorisation like history. Once you get familiar with these patterns, it's not hard to pull solid predictions out of your ass.

 

Really everyone starts off knowing nothing, and those that know alot are defiantley far ahead of you in understanding. But persist and you'll catch up and most everyone ends up on the same level. It's like the standard learning curve.

 

Keep it up, work hard, and most importantly be more interested in it than anyone else, and I'm sure you can be smarter than anyone else here.

[5614]

As far as me and physics go... I think I started getting involved when I was about your (T-Nemesis's) age.

 

I'd agree with Bluenoise's "be interested". It's very true. If you want to find out stuff you probably will, ie. If you want to know lots about physics you've got the motivation and then there are books/internet/here where you can learn loads.

 

I started off reading stuff here, and I spose though I wasn't that aware of deliberately doing so, whenever I read something and I didn't know what it was I'd try and find out about it. I'd look for keywords in the thread and find out what they meant.

 

As for looking around and seeing knowledge. Well, many people here are at uni and a few are even qualified professionals... and at the same time there are school students. This site isn't intended for 2 years old but we're always happy to teach someone who wants to learn, regardless of age/current knowledge

[T-Nemesis]

Okay, great. Thanks for the feedback everyone. I'm definetely very interested, so with any luck I hope everything just fits together like you said.

 

This site isn't intended for 2 years old but we're always happy to teach someone who wants to learn, regardless of age/current knowledge

 

That's why I don't post much. In 6 months I've only posted 23 times,

[Tigerbeam]

i'm not much older than you, but i do know that i learned more from reading hard science fiction than from physics class.

[swansont]

Note that being smart and having knowledge are not the same thing. Intelligence and experience are different things, though experience is sometimes mistaken for intelligence.

 

Consider an example of people who are able to memorize a lot of facts, but can't apply them. Knowledge without a corresponding level of intelligence. Chances are that someone in any given classroom is smarter than the teacher, but the teacher is the teacher because of his/her experience - he/she already knows what the students are still learning.