Information Overload and Learning

February 27th, 2007 by Commoner ( 608 Views )

I think people are naturally curious and if we’re interested in something, we will want to know how it works and we’ll learn it. If we tried to know how everything works, or even just 50% of the things we use, we’d quickly have information overload.

I don’t think it matters whether you start with the load of information or with the basics, it just matters that you collect enough personally meaningful experiences to appreciate what you’re doing, and to develop the passion you need to master the stuff.

Basic information expands our minds in a way that enable other information to sink in that much faster (even if that info is completely unrelated). Yes, there may be tools that do these things for you and there may be too much info out there. But learning the basics is never a bad thing. Because if you let tools do all the basic stuff, your mind will never be in the proper state to learn new, more complex things when you get to important stuff.

To do useful work without getting bogged down, you need to define the perimeters of scope of your knowledge. Being able to build a computer from a large pile of transistors doesn’t make you a significantly better PHP programmer.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 27th, 2007 and is filed under Technology, Education and Careers .

Tagged with: Information Overload, knowledge, learning

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2 Responses to “Information Overload and Learning”

1

Saba Ali
February 27th, 2007 12:36 GMT
“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.” -Robert A. Heinlein
2

Imran
February 27th, 2007 14:41 GMT
Saba! But can we do all this.

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