This is awesome. Even though many think it unpopular, I've always found that a certain measure of rote learning is beneficial, if not straight up necessary.
> Having them memorized and at your fingertips is great for sanity checking ideas.
This is essentially the reason. There are certain idea pathways you simply cannot traverse if you constantly need to check specific values. And I think that it might be possible that your subconscious simply won't "give" you an idea until you have specific facts memorized.
Just think how much more difficult your life would be if you had no concept of a kilometer/mile, and constantly needed to do the math to check how far something is in... meters/yards, or something.
> Having them memorized and at your fingertips is great for sanity checking ideas.
This is essentially the reason. There are certain idea pathways you simply cannot traverse if you constantly need to check specific values. And I think that it might be possible that your subconscious simply won't "give" you an idea until you have specific facts memorized.
Just think how much more difficult your life would be if you had no concept of a kilometer/mile, and constantly needed to do the math to check how far something is in... meters/yards, or something.