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guslIncidentally, I think reinforcement learning theory explains why I've become such a "bad student", ever since high school, with an up-dip for Freshman and Sophomore years of college.
Beginning student (cup is empty):
* effort is high (working through difficult problems; conceptual work)
* immediate reward is very high (new understanding, new concepts, which inspire new ideas and projects)
Experienced student (cup is full):
* effort is medium (keeping up with terminology, readings, homework; drudgery, but very little conceptual work)
* immediate reward is low (what you discover after working on problems is not groundbreaking, and often roughly what you already expected; also, you realize that the particular things you are learning have no immediate relevance to your life, and that you'd rather look it up when you come to need it.)
By "immediate reward", I mean in the scale of a semester. The reward for good grades seems to only come when you get a job offer or acceptance letter.
As a young student, I was addicted to "conceptual revolutions". To quote Robin Hanson:
Everyone who knows me knows that I'm easily excitable by ideas. But it is a fact of life that "viewquakes" are a non-renewable resource: eventually, the brain's librarian gets tired of resorting everything, one's frame becomes stable (for better or worse), and all new knowledge must fit into it, if it is to be understood. After this point, conceptual revolutions are only allowed at a small scale.
Fortunately, not all my motivation comes from new ideas. I can also get excited by technical challenges, and small-scale reconceptualizations (e.g. unifying concepts). But the latter are best honed through intensive week-long or or month-long projects, not by jumping from problem to problem every half-hour. The expression "jump through hoops" comes to mind, especially when the homework is meant to be challenging.
I am expecting admissions committees to read this. It may not be a satisfactory explanation, but I think it's better than the alternative: bad grades without an explanation.
Beginning student (cup is empty):
* effort is high (working through difficult problems; conceptual work)
* immediate reward is very high (new understanding, new concepts, which inspire new ideas and projects)
Experienced student (cup is full):
* effort is medium (keeping up with terminology, readings, homework; drudgery, but very little conceptual work)
* immediate reward is low (what you discover after working on problems is not groundbreaking, and often roughly what you already expected; also, you realize that the particular things you are learning have no immediate relevance to your life, and that you'd rather look it up when you come to need it.)
By "immediate reward", I mean in the scale of a semester. The reward for good grades seems to only come when you get a job offer or acceptance letter.
As a young student, I was addicted to "conceptual revolutions". To quote Robin Hanson:
I am addicted to "viewquakes", insights which dramatically change my world view
Everyone who knows me knows that I'm easily excitable by ideas. But it is a fact of life that "viewquakes" are a non-renewable resource: eventually, the brain's librarian gets tired of resorting everything, one's frame becomes stable (for better or worse), and all new knowledge must fit into it, if it is to be understood. After this point, conceptual revolutions are only allowed at a small scale.
Fortunately, not all my motivation comes from new ideas. I can also get excited by technical challenges, and small-scale reconceptualizations (e.g. unifying concepts). But the latter are best honed through intensive week-long or or month-long projects, not by jumping from problem to problem every half-hour. The expression "jump through hoops" comes to mind, especially when the homework is meant to be challenging.
I am expecting admissions committees to read this. It may not be a satisfactory explanation, but I think it's better than the alternative: bad grades without an explanation.