Do other Python GUI toolkits require this?

[Antoon Pardon]

Who says the axes are labeled "familiarity" and "learning period"? I
just assume they are labeled (y-axis) "Effort" and (x-axis) "Knowledge"
(or "skill" or ....).

You can assume all you want, but no serious person processing numbers
would choose axes like that.

 

[Roel Schroeven]

Antoon Pardon schreef:

No it doesn't imply that at all. A learning curve doesn't show some
goal of a person who was given just so much time to familiarize himself
with some material. A learning curve shows the progres that is made
in familiarizing one self while studying. A steep curve means a
lot of actual learning in a short time.

> No it doesn't. A learning curve is the graph that somehow quantifies
> what is actually learned vs time.

Do you have any reference to back that up?

As I understand it, a learning curve plots the learning effort vs. the
progress made. A steep learning curve means you need to learn a lot in
order to make a little progress.

 

[Jan Danielsson]

How much sense does it really make? Suppose we would talk about
an income curve. Would you not prefer a steep curve over a shalow
one? What about a productivity curve? It is all about the progress
made in something.

I don't think I have seen "steep learning curve" used in that sense
prior to reading your post. I have seen it being used as "what a steep
cliff to climb!" (i.e. would would have been much easier with a
"flatter" one). OTOH, I just went to an (Am.) English school my first
school year, and language is not one of my fields of interest. So I'll
just shut up and go away.

 

[Steve Holden]

How much sense does it really make? Suppose we would talk about
an income curve. Would you not prefer a steep curve over a shalow
one? What about a productivity curve? It is all about the progress
made in something.

So how much sense does it make that a steep curve in earnings and
productivity is good but a steep curve in learning is bad?

Just as much sense as that a motor car is great for driving around in
but bad for being run over by. Context is everything. Do *all* steep
curves have to be good or all bad? What the hell happened to common sense?

But the problem is that even if this would be only a way to communicate
in englishi, a lot of people get the wrong idea about real curves from
this idiom, as this thread shows. So even if you only want to communicate
one specific idea that comes accross as intended, you also propagate
a lot of nonsense with it.

Well, I have to bow to your expertise when it comes to propagating nonsense.

regards
Steve

 

[Antoon Pardon]

Antoon Pardon schreef:


Do you have any reference to back that up?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experience_curve_effects

Where you will also learn that learning curves by what values
are generally plotted go downwards.

 

[Antoon Pardon]

Just as much sense as that a motor car is great for driving around in
but bad for being run over by. Context is everything. Do *all* steep
curves have to be good or all bad? What the hell happened to common sense?

You are just grabbing for straws. Sure context is everything. But you
don't make a case that the context makes a difference here. Are you
suggesting progres in productivity is good but progres in learning is bad?

Just asserting how something can make a difference withouth arguing
how in the particular case it actucally makes a difference is just
a divertion tactic without real merrit.

 

[Christophe]

Nigel Rowe a écrit :

Who says the axes are labeled "familiarity" and "learning period"? I
just assume they are labeled (y-axis) "Effort" and (x-axis) "Knowledge"
(or "skill" or ....).

Which means that something with a 'steep learning curve' requires a lot
of effort to achieve a small amount of knowledge (or skill or ...).

Funny, I would have placed on the x axis the time, and on the y axis
"Knowledge". And Effort = lambda*time where lambda is the amount of
effort per minute you are able to produce. Thus I always found it weird
to call a steep learning curve something hard to learn.

Disclaimer: I have never made any study in that field, never read any
reports or anything like that. It just feels much more natural for me to
place the time on the x axis.

 

[Paul Boddie]

Indeed I have no wish to bow before common usage.

Then nobody will understand you properly if you start referring to a
"steep learning curve" when in their terminology you actually mean a
"shallow learning curve". Certainly, this discussion has alerted me to
a level of ambiguity with the term that would dissuade me from using
it, but then it's a hand-waving kind of term, anyway, which would be
better replaced with a proper description of whatever effect is
supposed to be observable.

It seems to me that the original term isn't directly applicable to
most situations where it is applied in general usage. For example,
someone talking about the learning curve involved in riding a bicycle
is taking a term originally used to describe effects observed when
people carry out the same task repeatedly and applying it to an
activity which involves a number of different cooperating tasks or
processes.

I prefer to think about things and dare to speak out when they don't seem to make sense.

Just repeating common usage propagates a lot of nonsense.

Languages and their constituent parts change over time. Here's a
relevant article on the topic:

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.usage.english/msg/face58f687589a6c

Paul

 

[Steve Holden]

You are just grabbing for straws. Sure context is everything. But you
don't make a case that the context makes a difference here. Are you
suggesting progres in productivity is good but progres in learning is bad?

No, I'm suggesting that in the company of thousands of people, most of
whom agree that a "steep learning curve" means, in the face of all
logic, that something is difficult to learn, you stop banging your head
against the wall and trying to "prove" them "wrong" (presumably because
it's important to you to be "right").

As has been said already at least twice in this thread, language is
about communication. Human beings aren't always entirely rational no
matter how much we may individually strive for correctness, and
sometimes our only options are to either go with the flow or stand
valiantly, pissing into the wind.

Just asserting how something can make a difference withouth arguing
how in the particular case it actucally makes a difference is just
a divertion tactic without real merrit.

In the face of a notion that all steep curves determining "progress made
in something" must be good I stand with my mouth agape. I am aware that
common usage does not concur with academic rigor, but in this particular
instance I'm with the common herd.

regards
Steve

 

[Antoon Pardon]

No, I'm suggesting that in the company of thousands of people, most of
whom agree that a "steep learning curve" means, in the face of all
logic, that something is difficult to learn, you stop banging your head
against the wall and trying to "prove" them "wrong" (presumably because
it's important to you to be "right").

Thousands of people can be wrong. Now I don't particularly want
to prove them wrong. But if instead of ignoring the remark as
I suggested, they start trying to prove they are right, I will
point out where their thinking is wrong.

As has been said already at least twice in this thread, language is
about communication. Human beings aren't always entirely rational no
matter how much we may individually strive for correctness, and
sometimes our only options are to either go with the flow or stand
valiantly, pissing into the wind.

But if a wrong idea is circulating and nobody ever tries to correct it,
people will continue with the wrong idea. All I did was make a simple
remark, that as I suggested anyone could ignore, but that would allow
those willing to learn, to further investigate.

But what a terrible thing that seems to be.

In the face of a notion that all steep curves determining "progress made
in something" must be good I stand with my mouth agape. I am aware that
common usage does not concur with academic rigor, but in this particular
instance I'm with the common herd.

Well that notion is entirely yours. My notion was only that progres in
productivity, earnings and learning was good and thus that curves that
are to be prefered tend to be the same shape for those three subjects.

 

[Diez B. Roggisch]

Michael Bentley wrote:
On Apr 19, 2007, at 4:11 AM, Antoon Pardon wrote:

[...] The
learning curve is rather steep IMO, but worth it.
Just a throw in remark, that you may ignore if you wish, but a steep
learning curve means that the subject is easily familiarized and that
the learning period is short.

You seem to use it as if it is the opposite.
Mathematical absurdities aside, it's the common usage -- but perhaps
you knew that.


Perhaps in Belgium they prefer climbing mountains over walking up and
down gentle hills? Or possibly they will simply pick any nit that is
carelessly left within range?
If it is just a nit, why don't you ignore my remark as I suggested?

Because I suffer from the quixotic urge to help stamp out obsessive
compulsive behavior on c.l.py? This is self-defeating, of course, since
it makes me appear obsessive compulsive in my own right ...

Now suppose I give you a graph that shows you how different people
are making progress. Would you prefer the rather flat curves instead
of the steep curves because the latter gives you the idea of someone
having to conquer huge obstacles or would you choose the steep curve
because they show you someone is getting results fast?

Suppose I should you a hill you have to climb? Would you rather don
mountain boots and crampons to climb 3,000 feet up a vertical cliff or
would you rather amble up, say, Ben Lomond with the other tourists?

So if you have the choice between a steep or a shalow income curve
you will prefer the shalow curve because a steep curve makes you
think about verticale clifs and such?

The analogy with a walk is just silly because curves are not like walks.
Nobody will say something like: I won't invest in that company because
it has a steep profit curve or the reverse: I'll invest in this company
because it has an easy looking downhill going profit curve.

Your whole argumentation bases on the fact that the result of the
learning process, and the success of it, has something to do with the
reached height - or y-axis-value - of your climb.

Which is nonsense. The goal is to go from A - ignorance - to B -
knowledge - which both lie on the X-Axis.

And you really argue that having to go 2 miles OVER THE GROUND on a
shallow slope is worse than walking 2 miles OVER GROUND with the mount
everest between you and your goal?

Diez

 

[Antoon Pardon]

Then nobody will understand you properly if you start referring to a
"steep learning curve" when in their terminology you actually mean a
"shallow learning curve". Certainly, this discussion has alerted me to
a level of ambiguity with the term that would dissuade me from using
it, but then it's a hand-waving kind of term, anyway, which would be
better replaced with a proper description of whatever effect is
supposed to be observable.

Well that I made some people aware was all I intended. Personaly
I don't use the term either unless I have an actual curve to
show which I can use to explain how to interpret it.

 

[Antoon Pardon]

Your whole argumentation bases on the fact that the result of the
learning process, and the success of it, has something to do with the
reached height - or y-axis-value - of your climb.

Which is nonsense. The goal is to go from A - ignorance - to B -
knowledge - which both lie on the X-Axis.

Well if you want to do it that way, nobody can stop you, but people
in the habit of processing numbers usually put the time on the X-axis
like in time spend learning or exercising and put the other value
on the Y-axis.

That is because people prefer a curve going up and down while moving
to the right instead of going left and right while moving up.

 

[Roel Schroeven]

Hendrik van Rooyen schreef:

Mountains ? Hills ? In Belgium ??

Its not called the battlefield of Europe for nothing...

I'm not sure if this adds anything of interest (well actually I'm pretty
sure it doesn't), but our king Albert I was a fanatic mountain climber,
until he died from a fall in 1934.

 

[Tommy Grav]

Well if you want to do it that way, nobody can stop you, but people
in the habit of processing numbers usually put the time on the X-axis
like in time spend learning or exercising and put the other value
on the Y-axis.

That is because people prefer a curve going up and down while moving
to the right instead of going left and right while moving up.

That depends all on what you are plotting. If you are after the
amount of
work it was to go from uneducated to educated then a shallow slope is
preferable (with amount of work on the y axis, and degree of educated
on the x axis). Wether a shallow or steep slope is preferable is all
dependent
on what one is actually measuring.

Cheers
Tommy

 

[Paul Boddie]

Well if you want to do it that way, nobody can stop you, but people
in the habit of processing numbers usually put the time on the X-axis
like in time spend learning or exercising and put the other value
on the Y-axis.

But time wasn't mentioned. You could have knowledge or accomplishment
on the X axis and effort or work on the Y axis. Subjects with more
material to learn could be said to have a "long learning curve"; an
example of such usage can be found here:

http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reviews/3207/5/

But if the nature of the material is not particularly challenging, you
could say that a "shallow learning curve" is involved: you don't need
to think very hard about the material. Conversely, a "steep learning
curve" in the popular sense suggests more effort being expended for a
given measure of material.

Paul

 

[Max Erickson]

Well that notion is entirely yours. My notion was only that
progres in productivity, earnings and learning was good and thus
that curves that are to be prefered tend to be the same shape for
those three subjects.

If we are being pedantic about describing a curve that shows the
progress of a person in learning a topic, there is no arguing with
you, a steep curve describes fast uptake and is a good thing.

If we are being pedantic about what a learning curve describes, it
seems possible that it describes the rate of knowledge uptake
required to master a given topic, and that such a learning curve
could exclude people that were unable to take in knowledge at that
rate(for whatever reason) from mastering that topic, making it
reasonable to describe such a topic as both 'hard' and 'having a
steep learning curve'.


max

 

[hg]

Hendrik van Rooyen schreef:

I'm not sure if this adds anything of interest (well actually I'm pretty
sure it doesn't), but our king Albert I was a fanatic mountain climber,
until he died from a fall in 1934.

--
If I have been able to see further, it was only because I stood
on the shoulders of giants. -- Isaac Newton

Roel Schroeven

You never know ... was it a 'steep curve' ?

hg

 

[Antoon Pardon]

But time wasn't mentioned.

Wel what is the second variable then?

You could have knowledge or accomplishment
on the X axis and effort or work on the Y axis.

What else is effort than the time you spent on it?

And yes you could do that, but in general it is not done because such an
organisation would make your curve no longer a function. Situations could
occur where more effort will result in less knowledge; where new material
seem to conflict with older material resulting in confusion. With an
arrangement of axes like you proposed that would result in an inverted
c like curve.

So you no longer have the familiar up and down movement but a movement
going left and right.

 

[Antoon Pardon]

If we are being pedantic about describing a curve that shows the
progress of a person in learning a topic, there is no arguing with
you, a steep curve describes fast uptake and is a good thing.

If we are being pedantic about what a learning curve describes, it
seems possible that it describes the rate of knowledge uptake
required to master a given topic, and that such a learning curve
could exclude people that were unable to take in knowledge at that
rate(for whatever reason) from mastering that topic, making it
reasonable to describe such a topic as both 'hard' and 'having a
steep learning curve'.

I must confess I don't follow you here. A rate is a single number.
Now some second variable can be a function of this rate or vice
versa but I can't make out what this second variable is supposed
to be from your explanation.