Asking The Real Questions
07 Sep 2017
"Remember to ask questions! There's no such thing as a stupid question."
I remember classes with hard topics the most; listening to those professors read off PowerPoint slides was like getting hit in the head with a hammer because I blacked out, but on the bright side, I got the greatest naps in those classes. I specifically remember, after every lecture, the professor would make sure to ask if any students had any questions; he had even stated on the first day of class, that asking questions is essential to passing. Amidst my confused classmates, a student sitting close to the front of the classroom raised his hand. “Ah yes, the sacrificial lamb,” I thought to myself, “good on you, taking one for the TEAM!” After he asked his question, immediately after the professor processed the question, the look of “really? THAT’S the question you’re asking?” slowly emerged on the professor’s face. After years of witnessing cases of stupid question syndrome, I’ve developed a fear of asking a professor a question. Usually, I would deliberate over the problem and solve it myself, but if I honestly don’t know the answer, then I will resort to asking questions. Currently, my methods to getting questions answered is wait for someone else to ask it, ask a classmate, and type up 50 different drafts of the same question and immediately wallow in despair after sending the email to the professor. Although, I disagree when people say there are no stupid questions, I do know that questions are necessary… the smart ones, that is.
The impact of smart questions are greater than the impact of stupid questions. Life is a battlefield, would you rather be the soldier holding an AK-47 or the fool running around, shooting a bb gun. Not only are questions essential to further your understanding of a topic, but they are helpful to other people in the same position as you. However, the answer to your prayers do not come easy. People have to process your question, which means a well structured question is easier to process. Here is an example of a smart question. The title is straightforward, so the reader immediately understands the topic and question. The user explains his current understanding of the problem and what he needs help with. He specifies what type an answer he wants to receive and he is precise in the wording of his questions. The answers to his problem reflected that this was a smart question because the answers are in depth, clearly explaining the answer. The top answer gives concise statements that hit all of the notes the user was asking for. There are also many answers to this questions, which means a lot of people understood what the user was asking. This question and answers will be useful for future people with the same question.
Smart questions can be hard to find, but stupid questions come a dime a dozen. This question, for example, is a badly structured question. Just by reading the title, I didn’t understand the topic of the problem. The user placed his entire code as a picture, making his code look very tiny, hard to read, and not easily accessible by readers. He should have posted a small part of his code that had contained the problem, rather than having the user spend time looking through his entire program to diagnose the problem. The user gives little insight to his program, as if he expects the readers to spend their precious time figuring it out on their own. It doesn’t even look like he tried to solve it himself, all he states is what he wants the program to do and the exact error message he got. This question received only 2 answers, both of which aren’t definitive because they are only giving possible solutions to the user’s problem. Also, the unpopularity of the question shows that people didn’t even bother to answer because the structure of the question difficult to process and just a waste of time.
I realize now that to avoid stupid question syndrome, you should either vow to never ask questions or take time to develop a good question. Since smart questions are easier for people to answer, read, and understand, it would be considerate to ask smart questions.