The Three Body Problem is one of my main reasons for learning Chinese :)
Vernor Vinge single handedly became one of my favourite writers (along side Clarke and Lem) with his short story True Names. I didn't find Rainbow's End as easy a read, I'll probably reapproach it after finishing The Star Diaries or Snow Crash, though.
That's funny. The course I've been doing (dominochinese.com) has approached Chinese from a different angle and it's ridiculously accessible. I remembered and understood more Chinese in a week, than I ever understood of another language (I have attempted learning German, Russian, and Japanese -- in many different learning styles).
The perspective given by the course shows to me that Chinese is one of the most sensible languages on earth. And the fact that we can trace the lineage of the language back to the Bronze age is one hell of a bonus!
Of course traditional learning methods (by rote, etc.) are not going to work for a pictographic language, but mnemonic learning is greatly aided by the story and history of the symbols therein.
> Of course traditional learning methods (by rote, etc.) are not going to work for a pictographic language, but mnemonic learning is greatly aided by the story and history of the symbols therein.
Upvoted just for your last sentence.
I've found that this is true for correctly learning certain topics that appear to be impenetrable to me when using standard reading materials. So what I do now is try to read up on some historical materials to help me understand how the original ideas evolved to what they have become today, before re-attempting to read modern texts.
Familiarity with the topic's history prepares the foundation on which I can mentally hang together the topic's most important ideas, in a way that is coherent for me for future recall.
Exactly. I find a lot of people tend to try and teach things in a vacuum. Not only does that leave you without a mental context for the thing, it is also not how humans operate on a basic level. If you think about the longest cultural memories we have, they are all stories. Humans operate on stories. If you can tell the story of a thing, it is often very difficult to forget the fact entirely.ematic
Indeed, most of the time the initial problem is caught up in the history and story of it, so not only does it give a mental context, but it helps you in applying the thing that you're learning!
For example, Mathematics became much more accessible to me when I learned the historical context for the maths first. Polynomials seemed not only completely useless, but also utterly mystical. Now I will never forget that once-upon a time, ability to solve Polynomials and other similar things were used not only as the measure of a person, but also became a type of challenge, and through that a form of gambling!
Vernor Vinge single handedly became one of my favourite writers (along side Clarke and Lem) with his short story True Names. I didn't find Rainbow's End as easy a read, I'll probably reapproach it after finishing The Star Diaries or Snow Crash, though.