Ever since I first learned of Physicist Richard Feynman’s technique to learning things sometime in high school, I found a decrease in the amount of time it would take me to understand and remember something. Near the end of high school when I was reading the works of many philosophers, I picked up to technique which I call the technique of imitative conversation. The last technique is thought experiments.
The Feynman technique’s main idea is that if you cannot explain something simply then you do not really understand it well. The first step to this technique is to get a notebook and write down everything you know about that topic, and every time you learn something new about that topic add it to the notebook. The next step is to rewrite it as if you were teaching it to someone else. Preferably to someone who has no knowledge about it. In the third step return to the areas of that topic you had trouble explaining and gain more knowledge about those particular areas. The last step is to rewrite and simplify all of your notes in such a way that anyone who read it could understand it. If you cannot do that then return to step one.
The next technique is may be harder to understand at first, but it tends to be highly efficient for language-based stuff. Basically, let’s say you wanted to understand Friedrich Nietzsche’s ideas of good and evil. The first step would be read as much of his own works or listen to as much of his lectures as you can. After a while, because humans tend to be good at imitating people even when we do not realize we are imitating, you will be able to have a virtual conversation with the person. Dreams tend to be good examples of this, in dreams, people tend to simulate people well enough that they do not really pick up on the fact that they are not real or that something is off. The main idea is to do this while you are awake. In simple terms if you asked Aristotle what he thinks about stars or something, what do you think he would say? What this technique does is indirectly force you to change your perspective on what you are thinking about. For example, sometimes in chess, when I am solving tactics, I have to ask myself what would Mikhail Tal do? He would probably sac this bishop on this pawn etc. Just by doing that it helps me see solutions to tactics that are way beyond my level, simply because I am changing my perspective. So, if you are trying to solve some maths problem ask, “what would [insert some famous mathematician here] would do?”
The last technique is thought experiments. Sometimes it is way easier to solve a problem by philosophical thoughts then a vigorous proof. For example, in mathematics one plus one if two, you could prove this with mathematics of course however it might be more difficult than it looks. Philosophically it is easy. Say we had a basket with a lid, I grab a potato and throw it in the basket, then I grab another potato and throw it in the basket. Then I lift the lid looking how many potatoes are in the basket and find two. Therefore, one plus one is two. Another example say a person is not wearing their seatbelt because they do not think moving twenty kilometres per hour is dangerous. Well let’s say we had a solid brick wall, and then you run into the wall at twenty kilometres per hour, clearly it is going to hurt. Running into the brick wall is the equivalent of two cars moving twenty kilometres per hour then crashing directly into each other. Conclusion, where your seatbelt.