Hrm... that's odd. My experience in public education, college, and university was that every mathematics book I ever encountered, regardless of the complexity of the subject, was woefully badly written and relied ENTIRELY on proofs. Physics textbooks were absolutely useless, since they made conclusions and derived formula from the very rules they were trying to infer.
While inadequate math books have always been present, they could be repaired, filled in, by a good
teacher, even by the student himself if he was willing to think. But there is now a slew of ignorant books-- some of which have been developed through funding from NSF--which force ignorance, on the teacher and student alike.
Note:
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JS-Kit/Echo comments for article at http://smallestminority.blogspot.com/2008/05/quote-of-week_30.html (5 comments)
Tentative mapping of comments to original article, corrections solicited.
Hrm... that's odd. My experience in public education, college, and university was that every mathematics book I ever encountered, regardless of the complexity of the subject, was woefully badly written and relied ENTIRELY on proofs. Physics textbooks were absolutely useless, since they made conclusions and derived formula from the very rules they were trying to infer.
While inadequate math books have always been present, they could be repaired, filled in, by a good
teacher, even by the student himself if he was willing to think. But there is now a slew of ignorant books-- some of which have been developed through funding from NSF--which force ignorance, on the teacher and student alike.
Not the Barry Garelick?
Yep; it's me.
Welcome to my corner of the web!
Note: All avatars and any images or other media embedded in comments were hosted on the JS-Kit website and have been lost; references to haloscan comments have been partially automatically remapped, but accuracy is not guaranteed and corrections are solicited.
If you notice any problems with this page or wish to have your home page link updated, please contact John Hardin <jhardin@impsec.org>