If I understand your idea, you propose that new people will try to think of new ideas, and when they say “How about A?”, someone more “mature” says, “No, that won’t work because of X”, then they say “How about B?”, and get the response “No, that won’t work because of Y”, and so forth, until finally they say “How about Q?”, and Q is something no-one has thought of before, and so is worth investigating.
It could be that a new Q is what’s needed. But might it instead be that “won’t work because of Y” is flawed, and what is needed is someone who can see that flaw? It doesn’t seem like this proposal would encourage discovery of such a flaw, once the new person is accustomed to listening to the “mature” person’s dismissal of “non-working” ideas.
This seems like it might be a situation where personal interaction is counterproductive. Of course the new person should learn something about past work. But it’s easier to question that past work, and persist in trying to think of how to make B work, when the dismissals of B as not workable are in papers one is reading, rather than in personal conversation with a mentor.
If I understand your idea, you propose that new people will try to think of new ideas, and when they say “How about A?”, someone more “mature” says, “No, that won’t work because of X”, then they say “How about B?”, and get the response “No, that won’t work because of Y”, and so forth, until finally they say “How about Q?”, and Q is something no-one has thought of before, and so is worth investigating.
Nope, that is not what I propose. I actually give my mentees pretty minimal object-level feedback at all, mainly because I don’t want them in the habit of deferring to my judgement. When I did give them intensive feedback for a few days, it was explicitly for the purpose of “building a John model”, and I chose that framing specifically to try to keep the “John model” separate from peoples’ own models.
I generally think it’s best to do these exercises with a peer group, not with someone whose judgement one will hesitate to question. (Although of course reading stuff by more experienced people—like e.g. List of Lethalities—or occasionally getting feedback from more experienced people is a useful sub-step along the way.) The target outcome is not that people will ask more experienced people to find holes in their plans, but rather that people will look for the holes in their own plans, and iterate independently.
If I understand your idea, you propose that new people will try to think of new ideas, and when they say “How about A?”, someone more “mature” says, “No, that won’t work because of X”, then they say “How about B?”, and get the response “No, that won’t work because of Y”, and so forth, until finally they say “How about Q?”, and Q is something no-one has thought of before, and so is worth investigating.
It could be that a new Q is what’s needed. But might it instead be that “won’t work because of Y” is flawed, and what is needed is someone who can see that flaw? It doesn’t seem like this proposal would encourage discovery of such a flaw, once the new person is accustomed to listening to the “mature” person’s dismissal of “non-working” ideas.
This seems like it might be a situation where personal interaction is counterproductive. Of course the new person should learn something about past work. But it’s easier to question that past work, and persist in trying to think of how to make B work, when the dismissals of B as not workable are in papers one is reading, rather than in personal conversation with a mentor.
Nope, that is not what I propose. I actually give my mentees pretty minimal object-level feedback at all, mainly because I don’t want them in the habit of deferring to my judgement. When I did give them intensive feedback for a few days, it was explicitly for the purpose of “building a John model”, and I chose that framing specifically to try to keep the “John model” separate from peoples’ own models.
I generally think it’s best to do these exercises with a peer group, not with someone whose judgement one will hesitate to question. (Although of course reading stuff by more experienced people—like e.g. List of Lethalities—or occasionally getting feedback from more experienced people is a useful sub-step along the way.) The target outcome is not that people will ask more experienced people to find holes in their plans, but rather that people will look for the holes in their own plans, and iterate independently.