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Re: What has technology subtracted?
Posted:
Jun 15, 2006 12:40 PM
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> If the student does not understand arithmetic, the
> calculator is of no use, at all (except, possibly, for
> occasional, random accuracies).
True for computers as well, especially the kind that come up with a blank command line window and wait for input (instead of launching into some splashy DVD about some computer company that loves you).
The point of automation is a lot of interesting math treats arithmetic as a bulk supplier of operations. We don't just want to add 5 3-digit numbers. We want to add a few hundred thousand floating points, and we *don't* want it to take all day. Even a second might be too long.
We need to get on with the mathematics, not get tripped up in a bunch of stupid arithmetic.
Now the DoD approach to this problem used to be to hire a room full of calculators (that meant human staff) and break a problem into pieces. These humans would to the painstaking operations, and others would check them. Results making out the door were presumably fairly usable, suitable for mass-publishing charts (ballistics mostly).
But when the electronic computer came along, and volunteered to work 24/7 for peanuts (kwhs and a few coders), everything changed.
And now average pizza-lovin' teens have way more computer power than these some decades-ago Pentagoners, and for civilian purposes no less. They're able to "employ" figurative room fulls of operators. All they need to do is manage, give instructions, boss. And that's what the command line is for. And yet we don't show them how to use it. Why? Because civilians can't be trusted? As when we teach driving, we need to teach the rules of the rode. Various ethical codes pertain, many in-common with traditional scholarship, especially where open source is concerned. High volume computing is not "value free". We examine biases. We audit.
I agree with Greg that a strong conceptual basis *does* correlate with being able to do some of the simple "cave painting" examples, the kinds of puzzles offered text books over the centuries (on in games magazines).
But now we have the ability to transfer those very same concepts to a machine executable language (Leibniz dreamed of this, as did Ada). And in order to get the convex hulls we'd like (e.g. the Watermans), we need to work our algorithms to a point that would break any pencil-based process (note: I have nothing against graphite -- carbon is one of my favorite elements).
The Math Wars are obviously a Media War in some dimensions. The entrenched oligopoly seems to think pencil, paper, chalk and chalkboard are the weapons of choice. The Gnu Math underground (a more democratic meritocracy) uses screens (both TV and the kind hooked up to a keyboard (convergent)).
And then there're the fancy new whiteboards, such as the London Knowledge Lab is testing. Perhaps educrats and gnubees will find common ground in that medium, a cross between a projected computer screen and the common chalkboard (but with lots of colored chalk).
We clearly aren't spending enough on education if kids don't have easy optional access to our screens and white boards.
It's OK if our target demographic *chooses* not to access our curriculum, but to have the pencil pushers actively intervene and not give them a choice: what's fair about that? We must circumvent their roadblocks and let students get a taste of what's being held back (the oligopolists fear competition, aren't used to feeling challenged at so basic a level as K12, a supposedly secure bastion).
But we won't accept war chest money from just anywhere.
Some sponsors are desperate for an image overhaul, but want to keep pursuing the same policies behind the new facade.
That's not the kind of sponsor we're looking for necessarily. We'll turn down funders, if we don't think their brands will be an asset down the road.
I wouldn't want Haim to send me a check for example, as that's not really his real name, so I'm sure it would bounce.
We don't want to be phonies in this TV business. It's too Darwinian, too fast paced. If you lie, you die, later if not sooner.
Just saw 'Quiz Show' again last night: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110932/
Kirby
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