2009/9/27 kirby urner <kirby.ur...@gmail.com>: This isn't the kind of critique most people have in mind when they > start questioning the hegemony of the graphing calculator empire. > > Definitely not, but what a great perspective, pun intended.
- Michel 2009/9/27 Charles Cossé <cco...@gmail.com>: > > Hi, this has probably been discussed to death already, but maybe not: The > > point at which fancy graphing calculators become "necessary" (ie as in > one's > > student career) is the point at which the calculator should be abandoned > and > > Python employed. Just a thought ... delete at will ! > > > > -Charles > > > > Hi Charles -- > > Yeah, that's not controversial as far as I'm concerned, like duh > (meaning I agree with you 100%, doesn't everyone?). > > For the humanities trained, I have this deep level criticism about how > the XYZ coordinate people ala Descartes and so on, failed to think > enough about the point of view, i.e. the camera position. > > There's this convention of positive x-axis coordinates going off to > the right, but of course if your camera is on the other side of the > textbook page, so to speak, looking back, then the very same positive > axis is off to your left (unless you're standing on your head, > relative to the starting position). All this stuff becomes more clear > when you run a ray tracing system and actually need to specify the > camera position. > > Then you come to realize that XYZ has a handedness, that both left and > right handed make sense. Current high school textbooks may make lip > service reference to that fact, but students rarely appreciate > handedness as their spatial geometry abilities are artificially > stunted by the graphing calculator curricula which are disappointingly > and narrow-mindedly flatlander (landlubbery). > > This isn't the kind of critique most people have in mind when they > start questioning the hegemony of the graphing calculator empire. It > resonates more with art historians, design scientist engineers etc., > looking for ways to point out shortcomings in the current "analog > math" pipeline (easy as shooting ducks in a barrel (sorry for the > violent imagery, diversity panel watching over my shoulder > sometimes)). > > Here in Oregon, we're working on digital math. We have Intel, other > companies, who think every school deserves a real math lab with lots > of flatscreens and foss. It's economically self-serving to think this > way, but then a lot of our students are interested in being gainfully > employed in as silicon foresters, so it's self-serving for them to > agree with us (same economy, duh). > > Kirby > > > -- > > AsymptopiaSoftware|softw...@thelimit > > http://www.asymptopia.org > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Edu-sig mailing list > > Edu-sig@python.org > > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Edu-sig mailing list > Edu-sig@python.org > http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig > -- "Computer science is the new mathematics." -- Dr. Christos Papadimitriou
_______________________________________________ Edu-sig mailing list Edu-sig@python.org http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
