Monday, July 30, 2018

The problem with grit

Grit is defined as the ability to keep persisting in something, regardless of personal discomfort, until you succeed or die trying. Grit is said to be a good predictor of future success, meaning that grittier kids have something in them that makes them able to take the necessary beatings in life to make it work out in the end. This concept is popularised by Angela Duckworth's TED talk, which I think many of you had seen before.

Let's deconstruct grit.

VALUE JUDGEMENT

Grit involves value judgement. When someone didn't do homework all the time, that is grit. When someone plays truant in school despite knowing all the possible punishment that may come, that is also grit. When a gamer sits at home all day to work on his Xbox, that too is grit. But somehow these activities are perceived unfavourably by society, hence it is not considered as examples of grit. Usually, when we talk about grit, we see them through a lens of what we think is the idealised version of a successful person. Working through the night to do homework, or sucking it up and working OT to do a project, or working over the weekend...these are activities that are judged favourably by society. Hence, when we say someone has grit, it also means that society has judged whether it is worthy or not.

Look at the picture below. 


The person below doesn't have grit because he didn't persist. And he is inches short of hitting pay dirt and would have realised his rewards if he just persists for a little longer. That is a value judgement. Why? Economic work and earning more money is seen as a good thing by society. Nobody talks about the sacrifices these people have to give in order to do these work.

Perhaps the person below gives up digging because he realised that having more diamonds isn't what he wanted in the first place. He already had diamonds, in the form of living, warm-blooded people sitting at the dining table waiting for his return. There's no need for more. But somehow he is defined as a failure in the eyes of society, for having given up early before hitting pay dirt. He doesn't have the grit in him to succeed.

Did we also impose our values onto others when we use the word grit?


WHO BENEFITS?

Who actually benefits from people having grit? To persist in doing something despite it being boring and still continue doing so seems a little psychotic to me. It depends on who says that, isn't it? If it's the employers complaining that workers are not gritty these days, then we need to think why they want employees to do that. Perhaps the conditions are really bad and the salary really low, and since there is nothing material to be hopeful of, they use ideology as a self-control mechanism to exert influence on behaviour. Employers do need employees to have grit if they are going to exploit them by squeezing more of their labour output for the salary given to them.

If it's by teachers, we also need to think hard on who benefits. Maybe grittier students are less troublesome to teach and it's much less work compared to a student who is less gritty. When we frame it like this, the conversation shifts away from asking ourselves why the students are subjected to learning uninteresting things, rather than something that interests them. I've not seen people describing doing something that they are passionate about as grit. The usage of the word implies doing something distasteful in the hope of getting something good in the future.

Usually, grit is determined by people with positions of power and authority. We just need to trace the path to see who benefits to understand why they complain people are not gritty enough. 


MARSHMELLOW TEST

In the 1960s, Mischel did an experiment regarding children and different treats, including the infamous marshmallow. Basically, the children are given a treat, which they can choose to eat right away or wait until the researcher comes back with two. This becomes known as the marshmallow test that is designed to determine self-control and delayed gratification and how it leads to success, better health, happiness and so on. Though it's not specifically used to test for grit, it's related. Grit is how much you can endure shitty situations while waiting for the payload at the end, and that requires a lot of self-control plus the ability to delay gratification. It's commonly concluded that those children who pass the marshmallow test, meaning that they get two treats by waiting instead of satisfying their gratification of one treat right away, are predicted to be more successful in the future.

But there are many reasons for this. It could be a sign of class differences. If you are a child who has access to different kinds of treats all day long, (including marshmallows), you can delay your gratification longer than someone who only eats it once every blue moon. The different access to treats, because of the child's background, could play a part.

And there is a value judgment again when we deem that the child who eats two later is somewhat stronger in willpower than a child who chooses to eat it right now. In an environment where food is scarce, it is irrational to delay satisfying your food craving and hold on for a bigger reward in the future. Due to the difference in the child's background, forgoing present rewards and gunning for a bigger one in the future might not be rational because trusting that the future is going to be better is highly dependent on past experiences by the child. A promise of a better future is going to be harder to fulfil to a child in a lower class than a higher one.


HOW THIS CHANGED ME

In light of these reflections, I want to be less judgemental. I'm a tutor and I face students who don't want to study all the time. Not too long ago, I have a tendency to judge students who are less gritty as having less motivation to do well and thus, a predictor of future failure. I mean it's so easy to blame it on grit and wash my responsibility off because I don't have to do more work for students who are gritty. The truth is a lot more complicated than this. Judge less.

I think being a parent made me a much more empathetic person. I can imagine all the good and bad students as being an innocent baby once. No matter what I do, at the end of the day, show compassion and show love. Long after the incident, that might be all that they remember of your interaction with them.

I also want to stop using grit, because it's so cringe-worthy. It's like the word 'passive income'- everytime someone uses that, my soul dies a little. There's a lot of negative connotation in using the word 'grit', so I'll stop using it.

Wednesday, July 18, 2018

Analyzing an Aphorism

Have you seen this quote before?




On my social media feeds, I've been fed this quote a couple of times this week. The first time I read it, it seems pretty logical. In fact that's the thing I told my wife too when she goes on some bulk purchase to save a couple of dollars. The second time I've seen it, I had a nagging feeling that something isn't quite right. So I went to think and analyse deeper into this statement.

Firstly, what is savings? Savings is what's left of your income after spending. Mathematically, the formula is:

Savings = Income - Expenses

Let's just put a number to these items in order to illustrate the situation better. Let's assume the following:

A) Income = $3000
B) Expenses = $2000
C) Savings = $3000 - $2000 = $1000

The above illustrates the base situation where we did not make the purchases. In our base scenario, our savings is $1000.

Let's analyse 3 possible cases:

1) Discretionary purchases (things you can do without)

For frivolous and discretionary purchases, we usually compare against the case of not buying it vs buying it. Why? Because we can well do without it. If you spend $750, your expenses increases by $2750, so your savings becomes $3000 - $2750 = $250. Between not buying and having a savings of $1000, vs buying and having a savings of $250, you save lesser by $750.



2) Non-discretionary purchases (things you can't do without)

For non discretionary purchases, we usually compare against the case of buying the item at non-discounted price vs buying at discounted price. If u buy at a non-discounted price of $1000, your expenses increases to $3000. Hence your savings becomes $3000 - $3000 = 0. If you buy at a discounted price of $750, your savings becomes $250. Since it's an item that you have to buy anyway, you save $250 if you buy at this discounted price. Notice that we do not compare against the case of not buying it and having a savings of $1000, because it is a purchase that we must make.



3) Investments (things you buy that increases your income)

For purchases that increases your income, the spending of $750 may result in a rise in future income. If your future income increases by more than the amount spent, you save more even after the purchase. If future income increases less than the amount spent, then net net there will be less savings. So, it depends on the investment returns to see if we save more or we save less or we don't save at all.




It's not so simple now, isn't it? As with all aphorism, the simple statement works as a good soundbite - catchy, memorable and impressive. But it simplifies the truth of the matter too much. There's a lot of details that need to be mentioned.


We can put this analysis to the test by analysing the purchase of a car. If a car is a discretionary purchase, the fall in COE has nothing to do with you. Having the cost of the car dropping from 100k to 80k still means that you have to spend 80k. However, if a car is a decision you are going to make anyway, a drop in the cost of the car is great for you. Now you can make the car purchase at a cheaper price, resulting in a net savings of 20k. Finally, if your car can make you earn more income because it extends your range and reach and allows you to save time and energy, it doesn't mean you should commit to the purchase immediately. The next step is to see if the potential increase in income is worth more than the purchase. Frankly, it need not even be just the increase in income, because we could be looking at other intangible stuff that we cannot put a money value to it. If after weighing all the good against the total cost of the car, and you think it's worth it, then we can go on and make the purchase.


Next time when someone says buying something is not a good purchase, you'll have to ask yourself first : out of the 3 scenarios, which one fits your situation the best?

Thursday, July 05, 2018

Learning new things for fun

In the last week or so, I've been learning programming. I've done programming in the past using an ancient computing language typically used in old ancient physics or engineering lab (Fortran, if you must know) back in my university days. This time, it's a new age computing language called Python.

I've never been so excited about learning new things for a long while. One fine day, I just decided I wanted to continue my coding journey, so I just picked a language and started reading about it. I downloaded the python software (free) and started working on it. The time that I usually spent playing games is now replaced with learning and playing with Python.

The very first thing that I did is to code this algorithm I came up with 3 yrs ago here. I've been thinking about this problem for quite a long while (easily 6 to 8 yrs), but chanced upon the most efficient way to mathematically describe the problem 3 yrs ago while teaching some new subjects to a new student. Once I know the math behind it, the next logical step is to code it in this new language.

Next, I tried to code this problem that I knew will be somewhat challenging to me at my current skill level. I want the user to key in the birth month and date, then the program will be able to give the appropriate astrological signs (e.g. Taurus, Aquarius, Libra etc). I like the challenge of transforming a simple idea into something concrete and I was definitely in the flow yesterday as I came up with the process. 3 hrs flew by and I didn't even notice!




A few interesting insight:

1) This is the first few times I do something first before knowing something. What do I mean? I have an objective in mind. I just try coding it immediately. I fail because there are some things I don't know. Then I'll read up and search around, and try again until I succeed. This problem-based learning makes it frustrating but it's this frustration that the thing is nearly within your grasp that pushes you to dig a little deeper. This exponentially increases the way I pick up and retain new knowledge. This iterative process is usually not the way I learn something.

2) I didn't learn this for work purposes, nor for some certification. I did this purely for fun. I'm actually dreaming up interesting projects every now and then, and try seeing if I can succeed. Actually I'm not so interested in the actual coding part, but more about how to come up with the algorithm of doing things. Might be useful in life, but hey, I'm having fun, and that's the most important!

3) A student asked innocently if I teach coding. Hmm, maybe this might turn out to be a money making hobby after all. Totally unexpected and I definitely didn't plan it this way, so it's quite a bonus for me if I did make some income out of it.

4) How come I didn't sign up for those courses at Udemy or skillsfuture? I don't know. I am 'iron-teeth' (colloquial slang for stubborn) perhaps, wanting to do things my own way. I just got a textbook and jumped straight in. I think structured courses makes life easier, but I prefer charging up the hill. The learning is more robust, more practical to my needs and also more open ended. It's important for me to feel like a total newbie trying to master a new skill, based on my own effort. Puts me deep in the seat of a beginner, and so I can understand the difficulties of learning new things. As a tutor, it's important for me to experience being a beginner every now and then. This will put me in the right perspective when I'm teaching.

5) I'm definitely playing. How do I know this? I didn't just code it, I played with the code. I tried ways to make it more efficient, or set my own limiting constraints. Basically I don't just want to see a program done, I want to keep working on it until it's no longer fun. If I just want to get it done, I'll have paid a small sum and used fiver or other freelancing work to outsource it to an expert.


With the internet and google plus youtube, all the information in the world is out there waiting for an interested student to read it and learn.