My girlfriend was a philosophy/english major and I was an engineering major. I was studying some mathy stuff and she brought up that she feels bad for not being able to discuss this particular interest with me. I told her that’s fine. I’m getting lots out of this study as it is, and that she and I have good conversations about other things.
Her response: “why would you want to learn something, if you’re not going to talk about it?”. I’m perfectly okay with the idea that I can’t talk about math to impress someone. I’ll be able to use the knowledge to impact the physical world in useful ways.
Of course, on a higher level, my goal in learning this math is still based on impressing people, but it’s for impressing them with physical results (or to help me raise my status, which will ultimately impress people) as opposed to having an impressive conversation.
My girlfriend was a philosophy/english major and I was an engineering major. I was studying some mathy stuff and she brought up that she feels bad for not being able to discuss this particular interest with me. I told her that’s fine. I’m getting lots out of this study as it is, and that she and I have good conversations about other things.
Her response: “why would you want to learn something, if you’re not going to talk about it?”. I’m perfectly okay with the idea that I can’t talk about math to impress someone. I’ll be able to use the knowledge to impact the physical world in useful ways.
Of course, on a higher level, my goal in learning this math is still based on impressing people, but it’s for impressing them with physical results (or to help me raise my status, which will ultimately impress people) as opposed to having an impressive conversation.