#so if you dont learn new prinicples you have less tools in your belt

[ultimateinferno]

I've reached a point as a scientist where I now have a compulsive need to show my work. Like, before my math teachers would struggle to get me to show my work because a major part of my self-actualization as the Gifted Kid™️ meant that I didn't need to because I simply just knew, like the annoying little shit I was.

Well, fast forward to today, and the math I'm doing is complicated enough and undefined enough for any specific situation where I'm basically rebuilding everything wholesale out of the basic principles every single time (because it's simply easier than memorizing a list of formulas). With that, I'm prone to get something wrong because I mixed up a rule of logarithms or misremembered which infinite series equals what elementary operation. As such, whenever I throw around any number with any confidence around, I always back it up with my work because if someone walks up and calls me the fuck out, they can A) understand how I came to that conclusion, and B) point to where I fucked up in the first place. To which I'll shake their hand, and thank them for saving me the time from redefining everything all over again and then make the applicable change. It honestly makes you look less stupid because it turns big claims into small flubs, and people are way more charitable with those.

When you're a lot more confident in your inabilities, documenting your work makes receiving help way easier, and that genuinely is why math teachers are so niggling about all that. They were always right.