Richard Hamming: “The teacher must prepare the student for the student’s future, not for the teacher’s past”

“In these lectures, I try to convey to students what I can’t convey in words - the essence of style in science and engineering.”

Hi, Habr.
Remember the awesome article "You and your work" (+219, 2041 bookmarks, 328k reads)?

So Hamming (yes, yes, self-checking and self-correcting Hamming codes ) has a whole book based on his lectures. Let's translate it, because the man is talking.

This book is not just about IT, it is a book about the thinking style of incredibly cool people. “This is not just a charge of positive thinking; it describes the conditions that increase the chances of doing a great job. ”
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We have already translated 3 chapters (albeit in the order of subjective interests):

• Chapter 24. Quantum Mechanics
• Chapter 25. Creativity
• Chapter 30. You and Your Study

Today - Preface and Introduction.
(For the translation, thanks to Savva Sumin, who responded to my call in the "previous chapter.")

Who wants to help with the translation - write in a personal or mail magisterludi2016@yandex.ru

Foreword

After many years of pressure and support from friends, I decided to put in the form of notes the content of a course in engineering that I taught to students at the Graduate School of Maritime University in Monterrey, California. First of all, I focused on those details which, in my opinion, were subject to further processing, instead of leaving the material in the form of several dispersed lectures. In the lecture hall, the content more often followed the interest of the students, and many of the later lectures were the result of the topics they suggested. Also, the content of the lectures changed from year to year, along with the development of relevant disciplines. And the current dependence of engineering on the related scientific fields inclines me to the identification of these terms.

After further thought, I decided that since I tried to instill a certain “style” of thinking in those who are engaged in science and engineering, and “style”, in turn, is an attribute of art - I should adopt the teaching methods used in teaching arts (after students have mastered the basic knowledge). You cannot make a genius artist out of a man just by teaching him words; he learns by trying different approaches to things with which the object of his passion seems to be “surrounded”. Art teachers usually give an advanced student work in peace, and only then they make suggestions — what would they do, what other approaches might be tried; more or less as the student himself realizes these ideas, in his own head - where the learning process should take place!

In these lectures, I try to convey to students what I can’t convey in words - the essence of style in science and engineering. Here I used to some extent a free way of organizing the material, not excluding repetitions, since they are often found in lectures. Consequently, there are digressions and stories in the material - some of which are told two times - which is characteristic of a not fully coherent, “lecture” style of narration.

I used the “narrator's” approach, often emphasizing the moment when the idea was born, being a staunch proponent of Pasteur's statement: “Fortune smiles only to those who are ready for this.” Thus, I illustrate how an individual’s preparedness before a collision with a problem can lead to its awareness, formulation and solution. The tremendous discoveries of science and engineering are too often hidden in a single person to consider these "revelations" as the result of random coincidences.

The teacher should prepare the student for the student's future, and not for the teacher's past. Most teachers diligently avoid the important topic of the future of their own discipline, and when it comes to discussion, they answer: "No one can know the future." It seems to me that the complexity of knowing the future does not relieve the teacher from responsibility to the student, from the obligation to do everything so that the student is ready for the future when it comes. It is obvious that the experience of an individual will not necessarily be identical with the experience of a class of individuals; Therefore, one person’s ideas about the future are, to a large extent, personal and will not be accepted by the majority. However, this fact should not force us to abandon personal history with its strength and ability to influence people's actions in favor of an impersonal assessment of the situation.

Since my classes consist mainly of personnel from the fleet, marine, regular army, air force and coast guard, which has been rigorously selected, a small number of civilians, and also, interestingly, about 15% of foreign military personnel who have been exceptionally rigorous, my students expect a very “technical” future - hence the need to prepare them for their future, and not our past.

The year 2020 seems to be an appropriate point for the concentration of their preparation - a kind of “sufficient sharpness” of foresight. [ approx. translator: complex turnover; The author compares the objectivity of the election of 2020 as a point on which to focus when training technical specialists with the normal human acuity of a person according to the Snellen table (20/20); it is understood that although this point cannot be completely objective, it is likely to be functionally sufficient ]. As graduate students on their way to a master’s degree, they are well acquainted with the basic knowledge of their disciplines. It remains for me to instill "style" in their education, which in practice usually means the difference between an average person and a great person.

The university allowed me great liberty by giving a course without any technical content; It is a kind of “addition” to more technically oriented courses. As a result, my introductory speech, often repeated, begins like this:

“There is practically no technical content in this course, although I will often refer to it and this, I hope, will be a useful review of the fundamental knowledge you have learned. Just do not confuse this repetition with the course content - this is only an illustrative material. Thinking style is what this course focuses on. ”

The subtitle of this book, Learning to Learn, is the main decision that I propose to my students in order to help them cope with the quick changes in their disciplines that they have to go through. This course focuses on how to look at and think about knowledge, it also contains a number of useful retrospectives on the subject.

This course consists mainly of personal experience, which I received and, at least to some extent, “digested”. It is common for a person to remember their own successes, ignoring less significant events, but I cite some of my fabulous failures as good examples of what should be avoided. I believe that personal stories are much, much more effective than impersonal; as a result, the book is saturated in places with a “savor of boasting,” which could not be avoided.

And let me repeat what has already been noted. Apparently, the understanding of art - the essence of which, by definition, defies verbal description - is best imparted by continually iterating over various approaches to the question in the hope that students will learn enough of this art or, if you like, style to eventually significantly increase the value of their future contribution to society. But a completely different description of the course: it contains many things that have no place in the standard courses.

A casual reader should not be frightened by the mathematical component of the book; it does not perform any function other than “decoration” for the purpose of illustration and connection with previously learned material. As a rule, the underlying ideas can be recognized simply from words.

There is a tradition according to which people and organizations who contributed to the writing and publication of the book should be thanked. Of course, AT & T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, New Jersey, and the Graduate School of the United States Marine Corps, and in particular the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, are worth mentioning - without them, writing this book would be impossible.

Introduction

This book focuses more on the future of science and engineering than on their past. Of course, opinions about the future are usually not accurate and, as a rule, are based on the past; however, the past also appears to be considerably less certain - and when it is falsely stated - than is customary to believe. Thus, we are forced to imagine how the future will most likely look.

This course has often been called “Hamming about Hamming,” since it largely consists of my personal experiences, observations, and fragments of reading in a wide range of areas.

At the beginning of the book there is a lot of mathematics, since the future of science and engineering will almost certainly be more “mathematical” than the past, and also because I need to establish the nature of the bases of our views and their possible errors. Only in this way will I be able to demonstrate the weakness of our current assumptions and suggest possible future directions.

If the mathematical component of the course seems too complicated - skip it, if you want to also miss the deepest understanding of the weakness of our current views, which only she can give. The overall result is always described in words, so the content will be complete, albeit somewhat "diluted."

Who wants to help with the translation - write in a personal or mail magisterludi2016@yandex.ru