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Beating the Averages


This is a review of the reading Beating the Averages by Paul Graham,  which you can read here.  
Our resistance as humans to learn new things is expressed in a function named the learning curve. The learning curve represents in a mathematical form of how we learn through time. It accomplishes this by taking into the equation experience with a particular subject or topic and placing it vs learning. In particular, I like this funciton because it represents one of the author's main points: why we tend to prefer what we already know. What this function represents is that we tend to have some resistance to new knowledge. We may apply this resistance through contradicting knowledge that we might already have, namely, experience in a certain field, maybe because it a new paradigm to see things, very different from what we are used to.

As we grow older, it becomes harder and harder to change the way we see things. The Paul Graham, the author, expresses this himself, he says there is a certain age in which statistically, it is difficult for us to change the way we think. Being open minded about new ways of seeing things will open doors that we might not know they existed before. Paul expresses this by making a comparsion on why we prefer this certain programming language because it does this "x" function, and seeing down the programming languages continuum he asks the question, why would you do that in "Y" language, if it doesn't do this "x" function. But he also says that as you see up on the continuum you might see just weird things. This programmer might think that programming languages that look weird are just about as powerful as the programming language that he uses already. This brings out the second most important point the author makes: resistance of people to new thechnologies because it looks "weird".

If we use this last point in our favor, we might get something out of it. Making risky desicions and gambling on new things is hard. But if we take a shot, we might create a technological barrier between us an the competitors. Because of this barrier and the point that we already discussed in the last paragraph, competitors might think that the programming language or paradigm they are using is as good as mine, because they do not understand it. They might not know it's faster, better or more efficient.

- Diego




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