> In the coming sequence on quantum mechanics, I am going to consistently speak as if quantum mechanics is perfectly normal; and when human intuitions depart from quantum mechanics, I am going to make fun of the intuitions for being weird and unusual.
> This is also the thrust of the original LessWrong Quantum Physics Sequence
Thanks for linking to this! Absolutely agree with his gripes in the first article about the traditional historically-oriented introduction to QM confusing students.
The rest of the articles (still reading them) appear to be pretty much the route taken by Feynman's _QED_ book (which, of course, is fantastic). It's also very interesting how his 1960's Feynman Lectures books seem to tell the student "QM is confusing and weird and hard and scary" roughly every ten pages or so, whereas by the 1980's with _QED_ he dropped the fearmongering language.
> Absolutely agree with his gripes in the first article about the traditional historically-oriented introduction to QM confusing students.
Off-topic but that's also my problem with any introduction to philosophy I've seen. This old Greek said something. This other old Greek thought something else. Some German philosopher said still something else.
Maybe that's what philosophy is all about, in which case I'm perfectly happy not to learn anything about it. But I have the feeling there really is something interesting to be found, if only the books would talk about that instead of painstakingly reconstructing the whole history of the field.
Most of philosophy is for natural reasons at least partially a response to what previous people have asserted, so if you want a good understanding of the field of western philosophy you need the background.
If your complaint was actually about it just being old greek guys and nobody from other places then I can just agree, it's really just western philosophy that's taught under the name "Philosophy"
There are plenty of cases where newtonian or relativistic physics diverge from intuition as well, it's strange that we impart special significance to Quantum Mechanics.
> In the coming sequence on quantum mechanics, I am going to consistently speak as if quantum mechanics is perfectly normal; and when human intuitions depart from quantum mechanics, I am going to make fun of the intuitions for being weird and unusual.