[extropy-chat] Maths ability

[Samantha Atkins]

On Mar 5, 2006, at 10:36 AM, Jef Allbright wrote:

> On 3/5/06, ben <benboc at lineone.net> wrote:
>> What?!
>> I'm not sure if i understand what you mean. Are you saying that  
>> you (and
>> Adrian) have some kind of intuition about maths, and answers  
>> spring out
>> at you in the way that, say, spelling mistakes in a sentence can?
>>
>> If so, i find that idea deeply wierd.
>
> I'll jump in to say that I have strong mathematical intuition, but
> it's predominately geometrical (rather than numerical) and this same
> way of conceptualizing for me applies to math, logic, semantics,
> relatedness of concepts, degree of certainty, human relationships and
> actions, business strategy, and more.  It's all graphs, shapes and
> vectors in my imagination.

Yep.  This stuff nearly got me killed in my teens when my math sense  
was at its strongest.  I would get lost in the math and be literally  
in danger of wandering out into traffic oblivious to my "real world"  
surroundings.  It receded with age.  I miss it.

For me it wasn't/isn't precisely visual though.  More like a melange  
of various senses plus flying through complicated spaces/sensations  
alternated with snapping to the grokking of the whole.  If you know  
what I mean.

- samantha