Physics Taught Me the Chinese Principle of Success
I flunked my first physics exam in college. Yep. I got a 57% on it. I felt horrible about it because I was a physics major. Despite my dismal start to college physics, however, I did go on to get a doctorate in the field. The secret was figuring out for myself what millions of Chinese people learn from an early age. Here’s how it happened.
I flunked my first physics exam in college. Yep. I got a 57% on it. I felt horrible about it because I was a physics major. Despite my dismal start to college physics, however, I did go on to get a doctorate in the field. The secret was figuring out for myself what millions of Chinese people learn from an early age. Here’s how it happened.
After that first physics exam, I flailed about for a while, trying to figure out what I was doing. I was also an 18-year old freshman, still adjusting to life away from home. One thing I tried was not going to class because I just didn’t think it was helping me. I figured I could do better using that time to study and work problems on my own. (Sound familiar?)
You know how that story ends, I’m sure. It didn’t take long before I realized the folly of that approach and went back to class, even though I was still struggling with the concepts and with solving problems. I’d read a homework problem. Then I’d sit there and try to figure out what to do. I’d look back in the chapter and try to find an equation to apply. Then I’d get frustrated and go on to something else.
The Aha! moment
One day, though, something inside me shifted. I was working on a problem in chapter 9, which was on rotation; you know, angular momentum, moment of inertia, torque… I was struggling with this problem when I had a realization that has served me well ever since. It was a true Aha! moment, although I didn’t see how fundamentally important and transformational it was at the time.
As I sat there, getting frustrated with this problem, I came to the point where I was ready to give up and move on to something else. Then it happened. I thought to myself:
OK, this problem is hard, but thousands—maybe millions—of other students have been able to solve this problem before. If they could do it, I should be able to do it, too.
That thought changed my world. Suddenly, I went from having an I-can’t-figure-this-out attitude to a what-do-I-need-to-do-to-figure-this-out attitude. That shift made a huge difference. I ended up getting all A’s that semester, graduating magna cum laude, and getting the PhD in physics largely because of that realization. It’s also been the driving force behind my building a house and building this business.
The Chinese principle of success
I’ve been reading Malcolm Gladwell’s book Outliers lately and just finished his chapter called Rice Paddies and Math Tests last night. In it he discusses the importance of growing rice to the success that China has experienced, not only in math but also in business and just getting things done in general. He attributes a lot of it to the hard work of growing rice and the autonomy the rice growers had in Southern China.
In contrast, the peasants in Europe were caught in a feudal system that didn’t reward hard work. He gave a dramatic illustration of the difference between these two cultures through contrasting peasant proverbs. A Russian proverb, for example, states, “If God does not bring it, the Earth will not give it.” The Chinese say, “No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.”
Chinese rice growers lived in a system that rewarded hard work, and that attitude became deeply ingrained in their culture. If something is hard, you just have to work harder, and the results will come.
My early encounter with physics brought me to this same truth.
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As a young man, algebra was
As a young man, algebra was my stumbling block. “It’s too hard!” I would whine. So I’d go off and do something easier.
As a middle-aged man, I had to once again face the bear of algebra in order to get my degree.
This time, however, I had the same epiphany as you for your physics lessons. Find a way to figure it out. Grind out the homework…don’t skip it. No matter what, don’t give up. Long story short, I made it. Got a “B”, and instead of being bummed about that, I was elated. Nothing beats reaching a milestone in your life where when once you thought something was impossible, it becomes not only possible, but encouragement that you can do so much more.
Great post, Allison. Now you have me interested in learning more physics… 🙂
Cameron T.
Cameron T.: According to Gladwell, giving up too soon is the main reason we’re so much worse at math than China. There’s a lot of really cool physics to learn! What convinced me to be a physics major, rather than chemistry, was the book Asimov on Physics.
Eric: Ah, that would be Eric’s 3rd law of proverbs, right? What are the first two laws? Maybe:
1. An attitude at rest tends to stay at rest and one in motion tends to remain in motion unless acted on by an unbalanced proverb.
2. The acceleration of an attitude change is directly proportional to, and in the same direction as, the net proverb acting on the attitude, and inversely proportional to its obduracy.
“He attributes a lot of
“He attributes a lot of it to the hard work of growing rice and the autonomy the rice growers had in Southern China.”
The most important element Gladwell pointed out is that the rice grower’s labor resulted directly in it being meaningful work, having a clear relationship between effort and reward (page 236). The lower-class rice growers were given autonomy by the ruling class because they could foresee the future demise of the food supply if not. [I’ve been a huge fan of Gladwell even before he had his books published and heartily recommend all 3 – “Tipping Point”, “Blink”, “Outliers”.]
Unfortunately, not many professions today in the USA culture can echo this trait (at least those that are financially rewarding and steady) given our engineering/industrial bent of short-sighted goals, minimizing the human resources involved, and maximizing corporate revenues regardless of the impacts. But Gladwell’s observation is still sound.
Great post, brings back some
Great post, brings back some memories. Had about the same experience in first semester physics. What I learned early in college was not to work harder but to work smarter. Not to say that I do not work hard, but there is a subtle difference. I still use that mantra today!
Dave E.:
Dave E.: Absolutely! They had autonomy and if they did extra work or figured out a smarter way to do something, they benefited directly, whereas the serfs in Europe would only make their feudal lord richer if they worked harder.
Barry: I’d say you have to work both harder and smarter, but you do raise a good point.
What is the picture about?
What is the picture about? Is that you with a mind-numbing physics problem?
Mary Beth:
Mary Beth: Indeed it is! That’s me standing amid the three interconnected ultra-high vacuum chambers I used in my doctoral research.
Physics always threw me for a
Physics always threw me for a loop because no matter how interesting I found the subject it was still very hard. It was hard for me in HS, hard for me in College, and hard for me during Certified Passive House Consultant training. I’ve since realized that part of me likes the challenge. Looking at it as a challenge (that can be won) vs an assignment has always got me through tough subjects.
Ryan S.:
Ryan S.: Yeah, seeing something as a challenge rather than an assignment always helps. The other thing to remember is that we all have different abilities and skills, and sometimes it may be best to stop trying to put a square peg in a round hole and go look for a square hole.
As someone with an
As someone with an architecture degree from a good school, i’ve come to realize that building science is a fascinating subject. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always get the recognition it deserves, but i do occasionally see signs of improvement(albeit at a glacial pace).
And i had a similar experience, except in chemistry. I was awful at high school chemistry (actually got a ‘D’ one quarter). Took a couple chemistry classes at a local community college a couple years ago and loved it (straight A’s). Both classes intense and taught by Ph.d’s. ‘Aha’ moments and life experience are great for breaking through subjects with a hard outer shell.
I failed my first college
I failed my first college physics test too, by a similar margin. And angular momentum in particular really got me frustrated as a concept. Oddly enough, that failure and my angular momentum frustration were so powerful to me when I did break through them that that was how I knew that physics was going to be my field of study.
As a physics tutor I observed a lot of math-phobia, and I think that’s a piece of the reason for quitting too soon. Folks let their anxiety get in the way of thinking rationally. Going into a math problem with this idea in your head that “I’m no good at math!” makes you end up focusing on the “I’m no good” part and quickly turn that into “and here’s *proof* that I’m no good, because I can’t do this problem” and all that noise in your head stops you from dedicating thought to the actual problem in front of you.
To any who have not read it
To any who have not read it yet can I recommend ‘Thinking fast and slow’ by Nobel prize winner Daniel Kahneman, a brilliant and very readable book on problem solving and decision-making: why we are often so bad at these tasks and how we can be much smarter.
Much of behavioural economics, Gladwell, Freakonomics etc derive from Kahneman’s work. Highly recommended and I’m only at Chapter Seven.
The point made by Dave E. that “the rice grower’s labor resulted directly in it being meaningful work, having a clear relationship between effort and reward” is just one of many reasons that climate change is such a diabolical problem for humans to solve.
The relationship between effort (mitigating emissions) and the reward is entirely masked by the invisible nature of the achievement, the immediate costs, the distributed benefits of the results, and the time lag between not emitting CO2 and the still-not obvious results (having a liveable planet for the next thousand years).
Physics problems are tough but I venture to suggest that solving a human-collective action problem on a global scale, doing it without massive economic contraction, and doing it by yesterday is proving a bit harder still.
While we have a chance of at least trying to solve it we should be throwing all of our abilities at it.