The Problem of Teaching Physics in Latin America (1963)
8 comments
·December 14, 2025rramadass
darubedarob
But these are not productive workers of the knowwledge economy. These are producers of paper spam, of fraud and ilusion. Innovation in such s world would grind to a halt while their output would clog the system that brought them forth.
anonymousiam
It's been many decades since I read it, but there was some mention of this in Feynman's first autobiography (Surely You're Joking). He described learning about the problem and investigating the root cause, which is also described in this speech. (The root cause was a focus on the memorization of scattered facts vs. making students understand the subject matter.)
tomhow
Previously:
Richard Feynman on education in Brazil - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2483976 - April 2011 (73 comments)
Aayush28260
This resonated with my own experience: exams rewarded recall, not understanding. I only really “earned physics when I started building things and breaking them. Curious how others here learned to move from memorization to intuition.
WalterBright
Caltech tests were not based on memorization, as they were "open book open note". You had to reason your way to a solution.
But I do agree that real world physics, like designing an actual electronic circuit, have behaviors that are not modeled by the usual mathematical models. For example, resistors vary widely from their marked resistance. And I was told, when building digital circuits, to make sure it worked with chips faster than the spec, as replacement chips are always faster, never slower.
fl4tul4
Fast-forward to 2025.
The same problems still exist, exacerbated by the prevalence of LLMs and no detection mechanisms whatsoever.
The recipe for disaster.
null
The problem of teaching physics in Latin America is only part of the wider problem of teaching physics anywhere. In fact, it is part of the problem of teaching anything anywhere – a problem for which there is no known satisfactory solution.
Even though Feynman wrote this based on his experience in Latin America, i think this is true of many (most?) countries even today.
There is no "True Education" anymore, only the appearance of one with the sole aim of churning out a "Productive Worker"(for a certain definition of the term) for a Economy; no understanding required.
It is interesting to interpret how the above is still applicable in the current technological hoopla of AI/LLMs capabilities.
What do the students know that is not easily and directly available in a book? The things that can be looked up in a book are only a part of knowledge. Who wants such a student to work in a plant when a book requiring no food or maintenance stands day after day always ready to give just as adequate answers? Who wants to be such a student, to have worked so hard, to have missed so much of interest and pleasure, and to be outdone by an inanimate printed list of "laws"?