Comment by gjm11 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by gjm11 | Hacker News Reader

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Quoting a bunch of course titles and brief descriptions, many of which anyone who knows anything about mathematics could readily tell are perfectly reasonable, and then saying "This is why Asia is winning, by the way." -- yeah, I can see how you might call that "anti-math".

The last one sounds pretty hokey. All the others, without exception, sound to me like they're probably worth while, or at least courses matching those descriptions could well be.

Oh, and guess what? #7, the one that they quote as talking about "the natural numbers 1, 2, [and] 3", actually says this: "This course will explore the beauty and mystery of mathematics through a study of the patterns and properties of the natural numbers 1, 2, 3, ...." Apparently the author of the idiotic NYMag article is unable to distinguish between "1, 2, 3, and so on" and "1, 2, 3, and no others", even in a context where it's perfectly obvious which is meant. Obviously this is someone I should trust to tell me what mathematics courses are silly and "why Asia is winning".

Meh:

2. Mathematics and Science as Art in Contemporary Theatre: "Playwrights such as Tom Stoppard, Rinne Groff, Michael Frayn, and others have effectively explored mathematical and scientific themes for artistic purposes. Through readings and exercises, and by conducting labs and staging scenes, this class will gain some first-hand insight into the complementary ways in which science and art aim to seek out their respective truths." [Middlebury]

4. Mathematics and Narrative: "Many literary works (Arcadia, Proof, and Uncle Petros and the Goldbach Conjecture) use mathematics as an integral part of their narrative. Movie and television narratives such as Good Will Hunting and Numb3rs are also mathematically based. Nonfiction works about mathematics and mathematical biographies like Chaos, Fermat's Enigma, and A Beautiful Mind provide further examples of the connection between mathematics and narrative. " [Vassar]

You copied out two of the course descriptions and gave us the meaningless syllable "meh" as the sum total of your analysis. That's not insightful. It's not clever. It's not funny. My guess is that you think these are actually arts courses with the word "Mathematics" in the title. If you can't be bothered to actually write out your conclusion, please don't bother at all. Expecting us to guess what you mean is rude and unhelpful.

You guessed correctly. That is what I believe.

Would 6 grafs of exposition about that really improve Hacker News, or is it better to just get to the point?

By "Meh:", I meant, "there might be something to your point, but here is evidence that may contradict it".

I used "meh", as opposed to "you are a complete lunatic", because I do not in fact believe he is a complete lunatic.

You, on the other hand...

;)

I don't really see any problem with those as electives, rather than core math classes. An upperclassman in a humanities major might take one of those, and get some value out of it.

I agree; they sound like interesting English courses. They're very David Foster Wallace-y. They also look like good examples of "courses liberal arts students take to evade math requirements".

Another way to look at it is "a math class they'll be able to use, rather than a math class they won't use".

I tend to agree with the guy from the TED talk posted a few weeks ago who believes that right now, all our basic maths courses build towards calculus, and that's a waste since most people never use it, and the right fix is to refocus on statistics.

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