If you’ve ever heard the phrase, “I will never need to use this ever again,” regarding a theorem of mathematics, or a scientific law, or a fact from the history of a far corner of the planet, consider this from astrophysicist, cosmologist, author, and science communicator Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson:
“…That misses something important. It misses the fact that the act of learning how to do the math establishes a new kind of brain wiring in your mind, a kind of problem solving brain wiring. So it’s not about what you learn, it’s about what methods, tools, and tactics you have to develop in order to solve the problem that you may never see again for the rest of your life, but you will see other problems where these methods and tools will become immensely valuable to you.”
Follow this with a related essential NdGT video: The importance of being science-literate, filmed by MattAttackProduction in 2011. “Science literacy is a vaccine against all the fuzzy thinking that goes on in the world.”
Related brain training:
• How playing an instrument benefits your brain
• How to change anxiety into excitement
• How to get unstuck from negative thoughts and perceptions
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