
The fertility of the older mind - ALee
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20170828-the-amazing-fertility-of-the-older-mind
======
hathawsh
As a child I was obsessively aware of other people's opinions of me, so I was
afraid to make mistakes. Today, I am much better at putting myself in the
learning mindset because I have learned a basic truth: _learning is
essentially the same as temporarily making a fool of myself, but in a safe
place_. That's how we all learned to walk, talk, and read, after all. If we
can learn such complex skills as those then we can surely pick up a lot more
skills, with effort.

I wish I had understood that as a child. I tried to learn to dance and act,
but I mostly failed because I didn't really put myself out there. I did learn
to sing thanks to choirs. I got into computers partly because all my mistakes
were completely private.

There's no reason I can't continue to learn new skills. I just need to shed my
ego and try things without reservation.

~~~
WalterBright
> As a child I was obsessively aware of other people's opinions of me

1\. Young people care what others think of them

2\. Middle aged people don't care what others think of them

3\. Old people realize that nobody thinks about them

~~~
charlieflowers
I was told when I get older all my fears would shrink. But now I'm insecure,
and I care what people think.

\- Twenty One Pilots

~~~
zaptheimpaler
Both of those guys are still in their 20s. Hardly at middle age or old age yet
:)

~~~
charlieflowers
And, the lyric is timeless.

------
gopalv
> Or perhaps children are simply less inhibited and aren’t so scared about
> making mistakes.

Struck a chord there - because I had come to the same conclusion of sorts,
about my ability to practice activities in public.

Riding a bicycle is a fairly hard thing to learn and very easy to practice
(from my experience), but learning to do that when everyone around is falling
off them was much less of a struggle than trying to learn ice skating in my
mid thirties, when everyone at the "cheap skate night" is just gliding by with
no effort.

There's a certain embarrassment which distracts from the task at hand. And
being good at several other things, which are more immediately satisfying to
do also factors into the decision to spend time learning something new which
you'll never be as good as the ones who started when they were 5.

Right now, I'm struggling to learn enough spanish to converse with my kid &
observing language learning first-hand, in third person. The words just come
out without any particular boundaries in production - grammar, conjugations,
gender, whether it is the right word.

Everything is optional and the only discouraging response is skipping the
conversation and trying to ignore it.

~~~
koolba
Learning a language (spoken, not programming) is similar. If you're willing to
sound like an idiot with a bad accent, constantly messing up words and parts
of speech, it's easy to get immersed. If you're self conscious it's
significantly more difficult.

~~~
mseebach
There's probably a corollary to that: first you have to get comfortable, but
to get really good (fluent) you probably have to get pretty self conscious. It
seems to me that most adults learning a new language will retain a fairly
heavy accent and some clumsiness more or less permanently (while of course
being perfectly articulate) unless they work really hard to get rid of it.

~~~
kzrdude
A related thing: I'm skeptical of the popular claim that it's impossible to
lose an accent as an adult. I think adults can still learn to speak very close
to a native accent, if they keep on trying.

~~~
jackvalentine
I didn't realise that was something people thought!

With deliberate practice and a dialect coach you can pick up an accent, I
don't see why the inverse wouldn't also be possible.

~~~
bitwize
In his "Hello, my name is Linus Torvalds" recording from the 90s, Linus has a
pronounced accent. These days he sounds American.

------
kevmo
I am 33, and I have paid a lot of anecdotal attention to what seems to keep my
brain fresh, i.e. able to still learn new skills at a rapid clip. Just by way
of credentials: I was a successful lawyer for a few years of my 20s (rising to
level of federal law clerk), but then taught myself to program and have been
working as a professional programmer since shortly before my 30th birthday.
Even though I am on the older side of the programmer market, my career has
been great, and I've been able to rapidly rise in the ranks. I also know a
fair amount about design and business strategy now.

The secret seems to be: Practice. If you want to be able to do new things, you
need to always be doing new things. I am always trying to learn something new
- mentally and physically. For example, I am very right-side dominant in my
body, but I have lately been trying to open more doors with my left hand,
throw stuff at the trashcan with it, etc.

Always be doing at least one new thing in your life if you want to be doing
new things for the rest of your life. It is OK to fail at a new thing! You
just have to admit failure, pat yourself on the back for your courage, take
stock of what went right and wrong, then pick a new new thing to do.

Relatedly, I have noticed that some people who I considered much smarter than
me as a teenager often no longer appear to be, and I believe it is because
they stopped trying to grow new types of skills and thus let their brains
stagnate.

It is hard to do unfamiliar things, but so worth it.

~~~
chousuke
I'm 31, and I started learning to draw a bit over a month ago. Progress is
slow, but it's been visible.

The kicker was when I realized that talent doesn't really exist; talent is
built. The sort of people who are "naturally" talented at drawing and arts are
likely to be people who are naturally more intuitive (rather than analytical)
and will spend lots of time just grinding away at things instead of trying to
understand them intellectually until they don't _need_ to understand it
anymore. Sort of like a physically fit person would just climb over an
obstacle while an analytical but untrained person might get stuck trying to
figure out a "smart" solution.

I consider myself much more of an analytical person, which is partly why I am
learning to draw. I want to strengthen my intuitive side as well.

It doesn't hurt that the theory of drawing (which includes the physics of
light, human psychology and understanding of form) is actually quite
interesting. Practicing my muscle memory today also lead to a small epiphany
when I realized that instead of focusing on making an ellipsis with my pen, I
have to focus on my shoulder muscles and get them to move my arm elliptically
and drawing then simply happens.

If you're interested in learning to draw yourself, check out drawabox.com

~~~
billti
That's an interesting theory. I've always played a lot of pool, and am good at
math/geometry. Yet when I over-analyze a shot and think about what I'm about
to attempt, I miss far more often than if I just rely on muscle memory/pattern
recognition and take the shot without too much thought.

I think the understanding of angles, intersection points, transfer of energy,
etc. helped me practice as a novice (as well as helped me stay interested).
But to get really "good" at something, you need to work at it until most of
the skills involved are almost subconscious. (Which aligns somewhat with what
I recall from "Thinking fast and slow", which I thought was a great book).

~~~
matt_j
I concur. I play a fair bit of pool, and I play my best when I've had one
drink and I don't think about the shots too much.

If I try to line up every shot perfectly and concentrate on my cue action, I
inevitably make a bad shot.

------
matt2000
As I get older it gets much much harder to feel stupid at something new when
you know what it feels like to be very good at something else. This I feel is
the key reason people stop picking up new skills, it feels miserable to be
back at a beginner level and so much more satisfying to do something you’re
proficient at.

However, if you can recognize this and reset your expectations then you will
probably find you have extensive general skills to bring to bear around
learning and self discipline. Those skills will make the actual learning
process overall much quicker compared to learning your first few major skills,
it just might not feel like it.

~~~
DamonHD
Actually I read your opening line the opposite way you intended, and agreed
with my version of it!

I find myself less stressed by inevitable failures as I know that I have
already proved myself in a number of ways, so anyone who infers idiocy from my
learning stumbles may themselves be the idiot... %-P

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yodsanklai
One issue I'm having when learning new things (at 41) is memory. I don't feel
less sharp than before, but I have a harder time to recall things that I
studied a few months before. For instance, I regularly take coursera classes
but one year later, I don't remember much. I'm trying to take more notes,
hopefully it'll help.

~~~
sowbug
Are you absolutely certain it was better when you were younger? I don't
remember much from high school or college, especially for the classes where I
crammed the night before exams.

If you do remember your studies better from youth, consider that a high school
or college course is typically several months' worth of daily classes, while a
Coursera class is maybe 10 hours total where your brain thinks you're vegging
out at home alone watching TV. If you could somehow spare a full-time semester
today at 41, I bet you'd retain a good amount of what you learned.

------
sireat
I think the article paints too rosy a picture for older minds.

Yes you can learn things as you get older but the bar for your achievements
gets lower and lower as you age.

Let's take chess: There are no cases of a novice starting to learn at the age
of 25 and becoming a grandmaster. You need to do some of that deliberate
practice at an early age. I suspect the case is the same for math,programming,
violin playing etc.

Interesting thread on the topic is here:
[https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/who-is-the-
oldest-p...](https://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/who-is-the-oldest-
person-ever-to-become-grandmaster)

It is not just the case of kids having more time to dedicate to a skill/hobby
because there are people of independent means who pursue chess at an adult age
and still fail to advance.

As you get older your ability to truly master a skill declines.

That does not mean that you can't become a productive programmer at age 60 or
70.

It just means that you will not achieve Bill Joy || Fabrice Bellard || John
Carmack levels of proficiency and I suppose that is ok. :)

~~~
adrianmonk
It's true that as a general rule, if you haven't revolutionized (or greatly
impacted) your field by age 30, you're likely not going to ever do it.

However, that doesn't mean that the mind of people over 30 doesn't work as
well. It may just be that people have different personality types, some people
don't care that much about revolutionizing the world, and those who do care do
not require all that long to do it.

So by age 30 or so, you're left with two self-selected groups: those who
passionately wished to change the world and those who focused on some other
priority in life instead.

~~~
pseud0r
There's plenty of people who does revolutionary work after their 30s.

Look at current nobel prize winners in physics for example. Many of them
weren't young when they did their most important work. I read an article about
this some time ago, but I wasn't able to find it at the moment.

------
mythrwy
When I reached my early 30's I felt I was getting old.

Looking back I believe this is because I was indeed just past the age of
physical prime and could feel the slight slowdown.

When I reached my early 40's all that went away and I kept forgetting I wasn't
in my 20's. (although I certainly am not). I didn't feel "old" anymore, but
did start to realize life was short and think more about the future.

I don't know if starting to feel "old" in early 30's is common or not. But
30's is a great decade. You certainly aren't "old" at that time relatively, no
matter how much you suspect it. I didn't care so much for the 20's. You are
still a kid in many ways with kid habits and not as much control over yourself
as you learn later, but you don't know it. Or at least I didn't.

~~~
cableshaft
Eh, for me the health problems started once I turned 30 (I'm now in my
mid-30s). So yeah, I feel a little old, because I get little reminders
multiple times throughout the day. Nothing too bad, at least not yet, but
enough that I suspect in ten to twenty years I'll be one of those with more
serious problems.

Also even though I'm still pretty darn smart, my mental retrieval speed seems
to be a lot slower than it used to be. Has made interviews in particular
harder to get through.

However, on the plus side, I didn't really start getting comfortable in my own
skin until my thirties either. Started figuring out how to talk to people
without getting nervous or assuming they're judging every little thing I say
and do, started dating a lot more (even though I was in much better physical
shape a long time ago I was too self-conscious or kept making excuses not to
take chances back then), and figured out some activities I really enjoy that I
probably wouldn't have even attempted in my teens and twenties, so there's
that.

------
allsunny
The best time to have learned something new was 10 years ago. The second best
time is now.

------
adamstockdill
Education has no age limit.

~~~
HarryHirsch
Hiring does, though. It's clear that a compliant workforce is considered a
greater necessity than a competent one.

~~~
ConceptJunkie
And a cheap workforce is considered a greater necessity than a competent or
compliant one.

------
deepGem
I think the single largest obstacle for the older mind to learn is time. A lot
more responsibilities curtails your ability to spend as much time as you want
to learn a new skill.

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okreallywtf
One thing I've been trying to do lately is constantly be learning a new
juggling trick. For years I just did what I could already do (which wasn't
much, but 100% more than people who don't juggle at all), but I've been
enjoying breaking down coordination barriers with new tricks (even simple
ones) that are similar to things I have done but just different enough to mess
my mind up.

------
mirimir
> A simple lack of confidence may present the biggest barrier – particularly
> for older learners, past retirement, who may have already started to fear a
> more general cognitive decline.

I see this frequently in teaching. It's a horrible downward spiral. And it's
been hard for me to learn tact, so I don't add to the problem.

------
andrewbinstock
Much of what this article says seems familiar from reading other pieces on
this topic, but what was truly new (to me, at least) was the role that
exercise/activity in making it possible to anchor and retain what is learned.

