Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

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Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby jackb » Sun May 24, 2020 9:55 pm

In the B2 level German thread, one of the posts refers to the Universe of Memory (https://universeofmemory.com/).
"How To Learn German From Scratch To a B2 Level In 5 Months" https://universeofmemory.com/german-fro ... -5-months/


The author of that site has a language course called vocabularylabs.com. The blog has content related to increasing memory and retention, in addition to language learning. I had never seen the site before and I find it interesting. His claims regarding language learning make me skeptical, but who knows.

Does anyone have any experience with this course? If so, please leave your impressions of the course materials and methods.
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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby allenthalben » Mon May 25, 2020 3:32 am

The greatest issue is that the CEFR exams were not designed to be a mark of fluency, although they often can indicate that. I do quite fully believe it is possible for someone to pass a B2 exam in six months (why he says /C1 is strange as that claim remains unfounded), if they learn for the exam. Plenty of people who speak a language proficiently may even fail such a test if they do not prepare for what the test demands of you — particularly in terms of writing. When the CEFR started to be used as a benchmark for fluency, the people who developed the system were not happy as the scale was designed on the basis of education and not on real-world uses: why do you think slang fails to appear in the exams?

The site is also full of questionable claims such as 'I have designed my own experiments' — then tell me the details of these experiments? It's such a vague claim and doesn't make much sense.

A lot of what the guy says also isn't particularly ground-breaking nor is it worth paying for IMO. Obviously flashcards with context work better than individual words, because that's how people learn words. There are even parts where he concedes he's making an error but then dismisses it, like when he says listening isn't important "except for prosody, but that's not important" — you can see it's targeted towards a very standardised examination with clear Hochdeutsch.

There are so many claims on this website I take a scunner to, to say the least:

* Yet, I have managed to learn 8 languages and teach three of them in different language schools. > Language schools vary drastically in how much they vet their teachers, it may even have been a voluntary experience. Since teaching a language is done on the basis of a very strict curriculum and grammar rules, this is also not a particularly hard thing to do providing you have memorised the rules and vocabulary for this specific situation.
* I have never lived abroad and I rarely travel. > I had been to Germany three times for only about 20 days in total when I got my C1. It's really not a groundbreaking achievement.
* guarantees 100% retention of any word. > Citation needed, and how exactly are you measuring retention? People are capable of memorising lots of information for very specific purposes e.g. exams, and then frequently forget a large amount once they've sat the exam. We would need to see a detailled study showing people retaining these words consistently over time. If this 'groundbreaking system' is simply 'learn flashcards at increasing intervals in context', then that's not quite so astonishing.
* ​learn over 100000 words for all my languages combined > I would like to know what he considers a word and 'knowing'. If he is counting wordforms such as sehe, siehst, sieht, sehen, sah, sahst, sahen, gesehen then this feat is way less impressive. The breakdown also isn't provided — if it's 30,000 in English, 20,000 in German, and then 50,000 in the other six, this is a much different picture than knowing 12,500 per language. The total or the mean isn't important here, the mode and the median speak more volumes. There's also the issue of active and passive vocabulary. It is less impressive (still impressive) to know 20,000 passive words than 20,000 active ones.
* learn Czech to a B1/B2 from scratch in 1 month and verify it in a language school > What do you MEAN /b2, you're one or the other you cannot be graded as 'inbetween', because if you're not passing B2, a fortiori you are B1 or lower.
* learn Swedish to a B2 level from scratch without ever talking to anyone > Think about how many people learn Latin, Ancient Greek, Old English, Gothic, Sanskrit, and any other extinct language without ever talking to anyone.

What the REDACTED (can we swear on this forum?) (No)the basic course is $189?! Talk about a chicaning charlatan.

Resumptively: This guy dismisses lots of 'specialists' and then provides ''facts'' for which he neither provides detailled explanations for, and seldom a cited study for. His revolutionary method of learning appears to solely be based upon learning flashcards with context, which is already pretty en vogue I would say. The quintessence of his course seems to solely rely upon teaching someone to pass a B2 exam, which, yet again, ad nauseum, is not the same thing as real-world application. I believe being able to get someone to pass this exam is naturally a good thing as it's a barrier for getting into institutions, acquiring citizenship, or finding employment, but he promulgates this idea in a disgusting philodoxical manner as if it means you will be speaking near-native German in a few months. Do not buy the course, all of his ideas are things anybody with an iota of rationality could figure out. I utterly regret giving him the clicks and views on his website.

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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby Kraut » Mon May 25, 2020 11:16 am

I had to look this up:
"philodoxical"
philodox, philodoxical, philodoxy
One who loves his own opinion; an argumentative or dogmatic person.
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allenthalben
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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby allenthalben » Mon May 25, 2020 12:40 pm

Kraut wrote:I had to look this up:
"philodoxical"
philodox, philodoxical, philodoxy
One who loves his own opinion; an argumentative or dogmatic person.


It is one of my all-time favourite words :)
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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby eido » Tue May 26, 2020 2:41 pm

allenthalben wrote:A lot of what the guy says also isn't particularly ground-breaking nor is it worth paying for IMO. Obviously flashcards with context work better than individual words, because that's how people learn words. There are even parts where he concedes he's making an error but then dismisses it, like when he says listening isn't important "except for prosody, but that's not important" — you can see it's targeted towards a very standardised examination with clear Hochdeutsch.

Time for a logical smack-down. I don't mean for this to be an attack on your character, so please don't accuse me of ad hominem.

So, let me ask you a question; this is for discussion purposes only. What is "obvious" about the idea that people learn words with flashcards, especially using context? There are plenty of people on this forum that have gotten by using dictionaries or for instance, @Iversen's famous wordlists. I myself just look up words in dictionaries and then write posts using the offending buggers that won't stay in my brain -- until they do! You go on to say later that such things are in vogue... and they are. But that's because they're a relatively recent invention... AND THEY WORK. Learning vocabulary in context works because you learn the meaning of the word. A lot of people don't know how to search in dictionaries for the appropriate meaning or context of a particular word, and if you have a pre-made deck, all that work's done for you. It's especially great if it's done by a native speaker. Cloze-style cards are a godsend. Anki's software is genius for its ability to make highly customizable cards. Add photos, add audio, change the type of cloze. Cloze deletion, cloze addition, cloze subtraction. You name it, my friend.

I believe you're straying toward ad hominem when you say that Bartosz dismisses things quickly. It's just his style of writing. He's being sharp and snappy. What he's basically saying is, "there are more important things other than prosody."

And I say all this being a fan of the content, but without wanting to disparage the man. I think Bartosz is a stand-up guy, and I wouldn't want his character attacked.

Aside from that, it's unfair to go after someone's person in such a way.

I say this with the utmost care and kindness. No sarcasm involved.

That said, he's probably saying prosody isn't important because it is a standardized exam, but more than that, he wants you to be able to comprehend the language. He wants you to be able to understand it. So you're right about standardization. But Bartosz wants the reader to grasp that this is a step on their journey, and true ability in the language takes time. Most beginners come to his site looking for answers, and he's fending them off with a branch going, "Y'all need to chill, but not too much, because in reality this is all easy. Don't freak out."

He's all about expediency.

One might argue he's the opposite of Benny Lewis. The two are parallel lines. Whereas Benny goes hard in a straightforward manner like a kid in a candy store, Bartosz, our friend, zips across multiple lines a bit haphazardly. The two have different goals. But they both get to the same place.
Language schools vary drastically in how much they vet their teachers, it may even have been a voluntary experience. Since teaching a language is done on the basis of a very strict curriculum and grammar rules, this is also not a particularly hard thing to do providing you have memorised the rules and vocabulary for this specific situation.

This is ad hominem. You are attacking the man's abilities, not the points he makes in his curriculum.
To teach is to learn. It is an acquired skill and very difficult. I'd like to see you teach three different languages at the schools he has. What makes you think he did his job horribly? Did you have a bad experience? And why do you deign to attack the institution of teaching a language? It is incredibly hard! I watched my Spanish teacher teach 30 kids the conjugation for ir repeatedly, year after year, to no avail. These kids were the brightest stars. They were supposed to carry our generation. And yet they couldn't care less about a conjugation table. So much for cultural diversity! Teachers are our backbone, our flesh and blood. It's really hard. No wonder we have a teaching shortage in the United States.
I had been to Germany three times for only about 20 days in total when I got my C1. It's really not a groundbreaking achievement.

You must have done something differently. The point Bartosz is trying to make at this juncture is that anyone can learn a tongue. Borders are no barriers. Kind of like in the movie Ratatouille, where they say anyone can cook. It's a common misconception among beginners, and one that doesn't get torn down often. You are an experienced language learner. Most people are not. Therefore, Bartosz is stepping up to the plate and saying what won't be said. Plus, the author says that he rarely travels. You probably travel more than him. My guess is Bartosz is a bookworm and you like to study communicatively. Two varying approaches. Both work. You just learn differently. So we can't tear down his claims based on something that personal. Plus, language learning companies like to make money off the young and foolish. Because you and I know better about how to comprehend, and truly "get" made-for-learner materials, we have a harder time. We're pickier. We know publishers' tricks, right? But most beginners don't. You probably got your C1 because you were astute. On the other hand, Bartosz had to learn the hard way. So did I. A lot of things aren't fair in life. But we're all united in languages and the human condition.
Citation needed, and how exactly are you measuring retention? People are capable of memorising lots of information for very specific purposes e.g. exams, and then frequently forget a large amount once they've sat the exam. We would need to see a detailed study showing people retaining these words consistently over time. If this 'groundbreaking system' is simply 'learn flashcards at increasing intervals in context', then that's not quite so astonishing.

Here he's describing his method. He has confidence in it. He's trying to sell it to you, using experience he's gathered. The method is based on the flashcards and SRS. It would be really nice to get data, but for now we'll just have to take his word for it.
What's not astonishing about it? Have we ever had a deck of 10,000 words at intervals (increasingly difficult CEFR levels) that use context? Pretty amazing to me.
​I would like to know what he considers a word and 'knowing'. If he is counting wordforms such as sehe, siehst, sieht, sehen, sah, sahst, sahen, gesehen then this feat is way less impressive. The breakdown also isn't provided — if it's 30,000 in English, 20,000 in German, and then 50,000 in the other six, this is a much different picture than knowing 12,500 per language. The total or the mean isn't important here, the mode and the median speak more volumes. There's also the issue of active and passive vocabulary. It is less impressive (still impressive) to know 20,000 passive words than 20,000 active ones.

Were I a betting woman, and I'm not, though I do trust Bartosz, I'd say he's not a liar. He's probably counting the true head-forms of dictionary words. That would make him C2 in all 8 languages he speaks by his own standards, which in my opinion are good. He speaks the bare minimum to get by at the highest level of the CEFR. Impressive. But what would probably be more impressive is knowing more words in a lesser amount of languages, right? I think that's what most people are looking for. That doesn't deny the fact that the man has achieved an amazing feat. I hope to one day be like him.
What do you MEAN /b2, you're one or the other you cannot be graded as 'inbetween', because if you're not passing B2, a fortiori you are B1 or lower.

I think you're being a little too strict with the requirements here. There are plenty of people on the forum that put "~B2" (or something similar) in their signatures or on their profile. It's no different from the author speaking bare-minimum C2. He's holding his students to the same concepts to which he holds himself; standards. There is a range between B1 and B2. It's a grey area, kind of like being in puberty, of being able to comprehend really well, but not knowing many words, or maybe not knowing how to write, and maybe speaking in an advanced way. Awkward and sweaty. But that shouldn't stop learners from the big leagues.
Think about how many people learn Latin, Ancient Greek, Old English, Gothic, Sanskrit, and any other extinct language without ever talking to anyone.

Do they need to? Come on, dude. These languages don't require any speakers, because no speakers remain. You don't see many academics (as nerdy as they can be) speaking in Attic Greek at university. It's all written. All of these languages (for the most part) rely mainly on the written word. Latin is sometimes spoken in church, and Sanskrit is used to study modern Indo-Aryan sort languages. But primarily they're restricted to schools and academia rather than typical speech. My guess, of course, is that Bartosz needed to hear spoken words in order to aid his memorization of the concepts and words he was learning. That's a very difficult task to work with. You can have recordings, and those help, but ultimately speaking is where it's at. That's why his grammar-centric, heavily-academic formula can be pretty appealing. It focuses on all the main concepts -- the bases -- before moving on. That's where I believe you two differ... the mode you use to study. And that's why you fundamentally disagree. It shouldn't be a sticking point, though. Remember Bartosz probably wanted to speak, but he's likely an introvert (a shy one) and circumstances prevented him. In a way, he found an ingenious workaround, hmm?
I utterly regret giving him the clicks and views on his website.

I hope you changed your mind after this. I aimed to have an adult discussion about the guy's methods. These types of things are my passion and I love speaking about them. I hope to find that I didn't offend you in any way, as I specifically wrote my arguments to avoid logical fallacies.
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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby Iversen » Tue May 26, 2020 3:09 pm

I'm mostly with Eido on this. I wouldn't dream of paying for one of Bartosz' courses, but on the web pages he does give me the impression that he has tried to think things honestly through instead of just making an empty sales pitch. For instance when he discusses speech versus writing he ends up giving the advantage to speech, but without dismissing totally the advantages of studying written texts. It won't make me install Skype today, but he has a point. As for his recommendations af Anki, not only for single words but for just about anything which you have to memorize, I wonder why he hadn't thought about wordlists. Anki has the irritating characteristic that it gives you orders and asks you embarrassing questions, whereas my wordlists function like the buffet of a luxury hotel. But he is not the only one who simply adores Anki. At another point he refuses to distinguish between active and passive vocabulary - that's worse. To me there is a whole world of difference between the two, and I can't see why he can't agree on that - but that's a minor flaw which you can dismiss, you don't have to adopt it.

Of course his texts are almost devoid of precise references to anything (even though he often invokes scientific research), but that is a quite widespread phenomenon, and I didn't expect Bartosz to deliver a scientific treatise. So when he fails to do that, but just rambles along like a typical feature article writer in today's newspaper I just read it as an informed opinion (or some might say: opinionated opinion) about language learning, nothing more.
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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby allenthalben » Tue May 26, 2020 4:03 pm

I have a lot of university work to do right now, so forgive me if my replies to your replies are not as lengthy or as quick as normal.

So, let me ask you a question; this is for discussion purposes only. What is "obvious" about the idea that people learn words with flashcards, especially using context? There are plenty of people on this forum that have gotten by using dictionaries or for instance, @Iversen's famous wordlists. I myself just look up words in dictionaries and then write posts using the offending buggers that won't stay in my brain -- until they do! You go on to say later that such things are in vogue... and they are. But that's because they're a relatively recent invention... AND THEY WORK. Learning vocabulary in context works because you learn the meaning of the word. A lot of people don't know how to search in dictionaries for the appropriate meaning or context of a particular word, and if you have a pre-made deck, all that work's done for you. It's especially great if it's done by a native speaker. Cloze-style cards are a godsend. Anki's software is genius for its ability to make highly customizable cards. Add photos, add audio, change the type of cloze. Cloze deletion, cloze addition, cloze subtraction. You name it, my friend.


I believe you may have misunderstood my sentence. I was not denigrating any other method of language learning, nor was I saying that other learning methods are totally ineffective, but that the person's claim that flashcards in context are effective is a rather "yes?". Perhaps I am misjudging the average intelligence of a person, but I would have thought that people could understand that learning a word in a sentence can often be more effective than learning it individually. If other people prefer to learn them outside of context and feel that it is more conducive for them, that is entirely their decision and not one I have criticised. I don't really know how to respond to the rest of your comment because I agree with it.

I believe you're straying toward ad hominem when you say that Bartosz dismisses things quickly. It's just his style of writing. He's being sharp and snappy. What he's basically saying is, "there are more important things other than prosody."


Style of writing is absolutely key for getting one's point across, the website reads like a smeary sales pitch. And I think it would depend on one's individual goals re: how important prosody is. If you want to go out there and speak with people in a capital city without them replying to you in English as soon as they notice your accent, then prosody is of a higher priority.

And I say all this being a fan of the content, but without wanting to disparage the man. I think Bartosz is a stand-up guy, and I wouldn't want his character attacked.

Aside from that, it's unfair to go after someone's person in such a way.

I say this with the utmost care and kindness. No sarcasm involved.


I do not see anything wrong with the man himself, but the way he presents this method and the promises he makes. I get the feeling you have an intimate connection with this person, which is why you want to defend him. It makes sense, but I take much more issue with the person's claims about his course than the person himself. Multiple times in my post I conceded what he has done is impressive.

That said, he's probably saying prosody isn't important because it is a standardized exam, but more than that, he wants you to be able to comprehend the language. He wants you to be able to understand it. So you're right about standardization. But Bartosz wants the reader to grasp that this is a step on their journey, and true ability in the language takes time. Most beginners come to his site looking for answers, and he's fending them off with a branch going, "Y'all need to chill, but not too much, because in reality this is all easy. Don't freak out."

He's all about expediency.


This is regretfully not the impression I think the average user would get from this website. It quite evidently purpots the idea that you can achieve B1/B2 in a very quick amount of time, quicker than it takes most others to do it. I feel there are much better ways to convey the idea that language learning is actually not this impossible task than he does. We both get different impressions from his way of writing which I don't find surprising, and I doubt we could ever mutually agree on it.

One might argue he's the opposite of Benny Lewis. The two are parallel lines. Whereas Benny goes hard in a straightforward manner like a kid in a candy store, Bartosz, our friend, zips across multiple lines a bit haphazardly. The two have different goals. But they both get to the same place.


This is ad hominem. You are attacking the man's abilities, not the points he makes in his curriculum.
To teach is to learn. It is an acquired skill and very difficult. I'd like to see you teach three different languages at the schools he has. What makes you think he did his job horribly? Did you have a bad experience? And why do you deign to attack the institution of teaching a language? It is incredibly hard! I watched my Spanish teacher teach 30 kids the conjugation for ir repeatedly, year after year, to no avail. These kids were the brightest stars. They were supposed to carry our generation. And yet they couldn't care less about a conjugation table. So much for cultural diversity! Teachers are our backbone, our flesh and blood. It's really hard. No wonder we have a teaching shortage in the United States.


You keep using the term ad hominem, but you are misunderstanding the points I make as ad hominems. Quite on the contrary I was attacking the points he was making and demonstrating that because somebody has worked in a language school, it does not make them a master of the language as his writing implies. I am also not even attacking the institution of teaching — I think your close connection with this person is creating a bias in your reponses to me. It is not an attack on teaching to say that language schools teach according to a curriculum, I'm not quite sure how you got that idea. My point was to do with the, not exactly groundbreaking claim, that language schools in various countries do not particularly care for mastery of a language — it is not an issue, but the correlation his writing suggests between working in language school === mastery is the problem.


You must have done something differently. The point Bartosz is trying to make at this juncture is that anyone can learn a tongue. Borders are no barriers. Kind of like in the movie Ratatouille, where they say anyone can cook. It's a common misconception among beginners, and one that doesn't get torn down often. You are an experienced language learner. Most people are not. Therefore, Bartosz is stepping up to the plate and saying what won't be said. Plus, the author says that he rarely travels. You probably travel more than him. My guess is Bartosz is a bookworm and you like to study communicatively. Two varying approaches. Both work. You just learn differently. So we can't tear down his claims based on something that personal. Plus, language learning companies like to make money off the young and foolish. Because you and I know better about how to comprehend, and truly "get" made-for-learner materials, we have a harder time. We're pickier. We know publishers' tricks, right? But most beginners don't. You probably got your C1 because you were astute. On the other hand, Bartosz had to learn the hard way. So did I. A lot of things aren't fair in life. But we're all united in languages and the human condition.


I'm not really sure how to respond to this comment. I don't take issue with the claim that you don't need to go abroad to learn a language and it is of course a claim that needs to be iterated and reiterated so many times, since so many people think it's a necessity, but again this is about how we are both interpreting his writing style. I am interpreting it as 'look how amazing I did!' and you are interpreting it as 'look what you can do!'. I imagine there is truth in both approaches.

I also don't quite appreciate your subtle degrading of my abilities. I had to work very hard for my C1 level as well.

Here he's describing his method. He has confidence in it. He's trying to sell it to you, using experience he's gathered. The method is based on the flashcards and SRS. It would be really nice to get data, but for now we'll just have to take his word for it.
What's not astonishing about it? Have we ever had a deck of 10,000 words at intervals (increasingly difficult CEFR levels) that use context? Pretty amazing to me.


This is the issue I have. If you claim on your website repeatedly about not listening to 'specialists', then your claims too need to be backed up with some kind of evidence. If you want to sell someone a product you absolutely NEED to have data and not just say 'just believe me!'. It wouldn't work for most things in the world, why is this an exception? Of course I don't disagree with the flashcard method as established.

Were I a betting woman, and I'm not, though I do trust Bartosz, I'd say he's not a liar. He's probably counting the true head-forms of dictionary words. That would make him C2 in all 8 languages he speaks by his own standards, which in my opinion are good. He speaks the bare minimum to get by at the highest level of the CEFR. Impressive. But what would probably be more impressive is knowing more words in a lesser amount of languages, right? I think that's what most people are looking for. That doesn't deny the fact that the man has achieved an amazing feat. I hope to one day be like him.


Lmao I have never heard this expression before and I love it.

Again, I didn't deny he had achieved something impressive, hence why I wrote (still impressive). I am merely holding someone to a higher standard for if you are going to claim you know X words in X languages, I want to know how it breaks down. Imagine if I said I know 30,000 words in two languages and it was actually 29,500 in one, and 500 in the other. I have no doubt that for many of his languages it will be a good amount and, again as I said, the feat is impressive. I just take issue with lumping it all together because it distorts the picture. I also don't think you can determine one's C-level purely on vocabulary size, for which IIRC there is no agreed determiner.

I think you're being a little too strict with the requirements here. There are plenty of people on the forum that put "~B2" (or something similar) in their signatures or on their profile. It's no different from the author speaking bare-minimum C2. He's holding his students to the same concepts to which he holds himself; standards. There is a range between B1 and B2. It's a grey area, kind of like being in puberty, of being able to comprehend really well, but not knowing many words, or maybe not knowing how to write, and maybe speaking in an advanced way. Awkward and sweaty. But that shouldn't stop learners from the big leagues.


I also find the ~B2 disingenuous. If you want to grade yourself according to an academic scale, you have to accept that you either achieve a certain level or don't. If I didn't get a first in my degree and got a 2:1, I can't put on my CV "2:1/First". Obviously the grey area exists, and if you said something like "working towards B2" I have less of an issue with it, and of course if someone asked "how close were you to B2 — I was X points away" that's fine. But the B1/B2 blurs the lines and it makes it seem like they are one in the same.

Do they need to? Come on, dude. These languages don't require any speakers, because no speakers remain. You don't see many academics (as nerdy as they can be) speaking in Attic Greek at university. It's all written. All of these languages (for the most part) rely mainly on the written word. Latin is sometimes spoken in church, and Sanskrit is used to study modern Indo-Aryan sort languages. But primarily they're restricted to schools and academia rather than typical speech. My guess, of course, is that Bartosz needed to hear spoken words in order to aid his memorization of the concepts and words he was learning. That's a very difficult task to work with. You can have recordings, and those help, but ultimately speaking is where it's at. That's why his grammar-centric, heavily-academic formula can be pretty appealing. It focuses on all the main concepts -- the bases -- before moving on. That's where I believe you two differ... the mode you use to study. And that's why you fundamentally disagree. It shouldn't be a sticking point, though. Remember Bartosz probably wanted to speak, but he's likely an introvert (a shy one) and circumstances prevented him. In a way, he found an ingenious workaround, hmm?


I don't think you understood my point again. I'm criticisng the message that learning a language without speaking to people is something only this person can teach you and that it's the next big invention. My comment about ancient languages is to show that plenty of people, potentially hundreds of millions over history, have learnt languages without communicating in them. Even linguists who document new languages will have to learn them to a degree without learning to speak them. I don't particularly care for whether someone wants to speak or not in their target language, just the writing that implies it's ground-breaking. Again I think this is an issue of interpretation of style.

I hope you changed your mind after this. I aimed to have an adult discussion about the guy's methods. These types of things are my passion and I love speaking about them. I hope to find that I didn't offend you in any way, as I specifically wrote my arguments to avoid logical fallacies.


You did not offend me. We both clearly differ in how we interpret the writing style of the individual, and I feel sometimes you may have misunderstood my exact point, whether it be because I didn't explain it enough or something else. I feel your connection to the person may be providing bias and it would be hard to remove this bias in said post. I do not think the person's achievements are unimpressive, I just do not agree that such a system should cost someone almost $200.
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Super Challenge Films: 15 / 100
Super Challenge Books: 4 / 50
Output Challenge Words: 630 / 50000
Output Challenge Audio: 35 / 3000

jackb
Orange Belt
Posts: 243
Joined: Thu Jun 06, 2019 2:04 pm
Languages: English (N), French (Intermediate)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=12251
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Re: Vocabularylabs.com/Universe of memory

Postby jackb » Sat May 30, 2020 2:25 pm

I think the problem is that the site is all about the science but there is none to backup the program. Reading and analyzing science is very different from producing it. It's expensive, time consuming, and just plain hard. In the end, why it works doesn't matter. It just matters that it does.

Reading the responses in this thread remind me that people view money and value differently. A course and teacher (I use this term loosely) for $200-$450 that says they can get you to B2 in a couple of months is outrageously expensive to some and a deal to others. DIY'ers, all of them not just language learners, generally find any packaged product too expensive because they can do it better themselves.

In the end, the big red flag for me is that there are no reviews. There is no one saying 'This awesome!!! I learned enough to get a b2 in 5 months!!' or 'I spent $200 on this crap course'.

I still find his site interesting.
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