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by perl4ever 2193 days ago
I agree with a lot of people that Feynman's descriptions of physics are appealing but I tend to feel (although it could be just me) that it's more about making you feel like it's intuitive than really transferring his intuition to you.

It's sort of like you go skydiving for the first time, and you go on a tandem jump where you're strapped to the instructor, and it's an amazing experience, but you didn't really do anything. Or you ride on the back of a motorcycle, etc...

But Feynman's explanations give me the tantalizing feeling that something even better is possible. One general direction I can imagine is that I suspect a truly intuitive understanding would start with more general math describing any quantum theory and avoid specifics at first that relate to real world physics.

Unfortunately, mathematicians are addicted to using named of other mathematicians as shorthand (as you do in your short comment) and I think that's a sign of where things go haywire for a layperson. As long as you're dropping names, you are on the wrong track as far as explaining goes. Feynman had a much quoted comment that's associated in my mind, about how when you just know the name of something, you know nothing about it.