[Pdx-pm] Lisp class

[Jeff Zucker]

Michael Rasmussen wrote:

> Michael G Schwern wrote:
>  
>
>> The idea what one must learn big, new ideas before a certain age when 
>> your
>> brain meats harden and become forever crystalized against new ideas like
>> some sort of Magic Shell sundae topping is, imo, a load of crap.
>>   
>
>
> You need to look into studies about language acquisition.

Those are studies about natural language acquisition and whatever the 
similarities between natural language and programming languages, no one 
could possibly claim that programming languages are in the same ball 
park of complexity as natural languages.

> At the right age
> range you can't prevent a child from picking up a new language.  As 
> one gets older it becomes more difficult. At some point
>
The point at which one loses that age advantage in language acquisition 
is about 5 years old, so applying it as a comparison of adults to adults 
is absurd.

> it is no longer possible
> for a person to effectivly create new associations between sounds and 
> vocalizations and concepts.   
>
That is absolute bullshit.  It's much easier for a young child to learn 
new natural languages, but I've never seen any evidence that "it is no 
longer possible" as an adult.  This is the worst kind of FUD and I find 
it personally offensive.

> I'm not saying that one cannot lean new concepts, but associating them 
> with
> new symbols becomes more and more difficult.
>  
>
Really? can you name some of these studies which say that this ability 
is progressively degenerative with age beyond a fairly young cut-off for 
early childhood language acquisition?

-- 
Jeff