Learning vs. Innovation

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I would have probably evaluated the clear box and tried a more "efficient" method than the one taught to me earlier. Wouldn't you? I think if kids on the spectrum were given this test, they would use their analytical, system making ability, instead of performing the needless ritual to please the "teacher."

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us7q6brPAPA&feature=relmfu[/youtube]

By the way, I have never been evaluated to be AS or NT. I know I have some mild traits. I am in my 50's so my school days when an evaluation might have happened were after AS was recognized. I mention this in case you check my "status" and are confused.

I'd try to find a more efficient method. With being taught in general, I tend to question those teaching often - I also question what they teach me. I really prefer to teach myself, rather than learn from someone else. I seem to learn much better that way.

To me, it seems obvious. The only motivation to blindly follow the exact method shown by the teacher is to please the teacher. Does that sound right? The kids tested in this experiment were not told what to do. They were just shown by the teacher.

I have had some teachers who encourage creative thinking, or even critical thinking by challenging what the teacher presented. Other teachers downgrade anything other than a repetition of what was taught by them.

The answer is simple, apes have higher IQ than children.

I can't answer what I would have done as a child, but as an adult, I would probably investigate every inch of the object...unless I were super hungry, like those poor starving apes.

I was repeatedly scolded as a young child for not following instructions exactly. But I didn't care, the instructions were often stupid. I did what made sense, damn the rest.

Ahh, that reminds me, they really had to pound into my head that I had to show how I reached the right answer in math(equations with more than one unknown and the likes). Usually I just did it in my head and wrote the answer, why make it complicated?

Had problems with the teacher there too as I could solve those in my head but would have a hard tome explaining it.

First instance of this was in kindergarten when they were teaching how to form numbers, with the number 5. I had been writing numbers since a toddler so i drew them as i saw them, so i started drawing the 5 from the upper right and continued it in one motion, When they said to start in the upper left, draw the lower part, lift the pencil then draw the top line, i thought that was the stupidest thing ever and would not do it as being inefficient.

In the wild, if you are too slow to access a food source, you often don't get to access that source, since someone else will get it. This disproves the simplistic notion of "monkey see monkey do!" It turns out to be more true of humans ("the naked ape"} than some other primates.

The other and far more common motivation to copy the exact method is the assumption that the way you are being shown is the right way to do it. This is not always true, but it is true often enough to be a worthwhile approach. This does not lead to innovation but it does lead to the rapid dissemination of knowledge and allows for the accumulation of knowledge. The human race could not have spread succesfully all over the planet if every kid had to figure out on their own how to start a fire or make a spearhead or which berries were safe. The impulse to copy exactly allowed this information to be transmitted effectively.

Of course innovation was also needed, or else nobody would have figured out how to start a fire or make an arrowhead without somebody to copy. Both things are needed by the human race. Innovation allows new knowledge to be created. Exact copying allows that information to be transmitted accurately and efficiently across large geographic areas and through the generations, with new innovations being added on and accumulating. Copying without innovation leads to stagnation. Innovation without copying leads to having to literally reinvent the wheel constantly and also stagnation (because the innovations are lost and must be perpetually rediscovered). Both impulses are needed. That both impulses exist in the human race collectively (if not individually) is how we conquered the planet.

Got in trouble for this in the lower grades for not using the teachers methods in mathmatics because they were flawed and slow to book. I heared this one till I was in nineth grade Show you're work its wrong even if the answers right without the work being wrote out. Then I would Id get that not the formula you were taught.

I don't do standard touchtyping, because I optimized from it and have a quicker method of typing. People who realize how I'm typing look at me weird because my hands don't stay in the same place, but wander all over the keyboard.

Good point. One could always memorize the taught method, and then later try to improve it. I always hated memorization. I found the process boring. However, it is often advantageous to do so.

This is like the difference between MBTI/Jungian personality functions Sensing vs Intuition.

Sensors copy, Intuiters innovate.

I had a very similar experience, writing letters. Apparently it makes more sense to cross Ts and dot i's at the end of a sentence, and you have to practically relearn how to write when you join up, because that's so different.

Instead, I actually write with individual, not joined letters, but move them close enough together that they appear joined up. I think I can get away with this, because when I'm really concentrating, my writing gets really tiny.

Just because I'm anal-retentive; I didn't write this, don't quote me on that please.