[erlang-questions] Erlang and the learning curve

[Torben Hoffmann]

The only persons that do not fail are those that do nothing.

The irony of that is that that in itself is a mistake and probably leads to
failing...

Or as Wayne Gretzky puts it: You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.

Cheers to continuous failures!
Torben

On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 05:58, Ryan Zezeski <rzezeski@REDACTED> wrote:

> You're correct, the two ideas are different.  I just tend to think of them
> both at the same time.  My point was that practice (even if it's typing out
> something verbatim) is probably, pound for pound, the best way to learn.
>  Furthermore, practice includes trying different things, even if they don't
> initially make sense because by doing that you find out what works and what
> doesn't.  This means that you're going to fail, a lot.  But with each
> failure you gain knowledge and insight.  That's all I was trying to convey.
>  That and the fact that you shouldn't expect to learn something in a few
> weeks, or even months with any great depth.
>
> As for the citation, it comes straight from the horse's mouth in the
> documentary "Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride."
>
> http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0775438/
>
> -Ryan
>
>
> On Fri, Jan 14, 2011 at 11:17 PM, Toby Thain <toby@REDACTED
> >wrote:
>
> > On 11-01-15 12:40 AM, Ryan Zezeski wrote:
> > > Teach Yourself Programming in 10 Years! (or the next ones free)
> > >
> > > http://norvig.com/21-days.html
> > >
> > > Neat side story...For those of you who know the name Hunter S. Thompson
> > you
> > > might be interested to know the he learned to write by typing out
> > Hemingway
> > > word for word, letter for letter.
> >
> > Do you have a citation for that? Curious if true, but...
> >
> > I've used that fact as a reminder that
> > > the act of doing is the best teacher.  If you're not failing everyday,
> > then
> > > you're not trying hard enough.
> >
> > ...how can one "fail" at typing out Hemingway letter by letter, apart
> > from occasionally fat fingering a key?
> >
> > I think one probably _can_ learn a lot about writing by thoughtfully
> > copying out good writing. But there seems to be no "fail-retry-learn"
> > loop in it. That comes when one tries WRITING... :)
> >
> > --Toby
> >
> >  Success isn't nearly as insightful as
> > > failure.
> > >
> > > -Ryan
> > >
> > > On Sat, Jan 8, 2011 at 4:24 PM, Robert Virding <
> > > robert.virding@REDACTED> wrote:
> > >
> > >> This whole dscussion reminds a little of the Paul Graham essay
> "Beating
> > the
> > >> Averages", http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html , where he discusses
> the
> > >> Blub paradox.
> > >>
> > >> Robert
> > >>
> > >>
> > >
> >
> >
> > ________________________________________________________________
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> >
> >
>



-- 
http://www.linkedin.com/in/torbenhoffmann