Religion and Ethics Forum

General Category => Science and Technology => Topic started by: Nearly Sane on March 17, 2017, 11:56:10 AM

Title: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Nearly Sane on March 17, 2017, 11:56:10 AM

Enjoyable article


https://aeon.co/essays/theres-more-maths-in-slugs-and-corals-than-we-can-think-of
Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Walter on March 17, 2017, 01:40:29 PM
Enjoyable article


https://aeon.co/essays/theres-more-maths-in-slugs-and-corals-than-we-can-think-of
you're right, very interesting.
I wish stuff like that had been available when I studied A level pure maths and mechanics instead of being trapped in a dusty old chapel extension which doubled as a class room .
Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Udayana on March 17, 2017, 03:21:17 PM
She probably thinks smoking fags behind the bike sheds counts as "doing maths" as well. Why bother with studying or A levels?
Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Walter on March 17, 2017, 03:29:14 PM
She probably thinks smoking fags behind the bike sheds counts as "doing maths" as well. Why bother with studying or A levels?
why indeed?
Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Nearly Sane on March 17, 2017, 03:31:54 PM
She probably thinks smoking fags behind the bike sheds counts as "doing maths" as well. Why bother with studying or A levels?


To quote
'This doesn’t invalidate what goes on in university classrooms or academic textbooks, since society needs professional mathematicians who can work with symbols, people such as Fourier and Bernhard Riemann who developed the maths that assists us to make cellphone calls, or determine the structure of the cosmos, and so much else besides.'

So no.
Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Udayana on March 17, 2017, 04:47:48 PM
Ah ... I see, it's to show people that don't do maths, how clever they are in doing maths without knowing anything about it ... in order to get them to pay some attention to actual maths ?

Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Nearly Sane on March 17, 2017, 04:59:55 PM
Ah ... I see, it's to show people that don't do maths, how clever they are in doing maths without knowing anything about it ... in order to get them to pay some attention to actual maths ?

No. I  doubt anyone who isn't at base interested in the subject is going to read through an article covering Gauss, Feynman and tesselation. I think it's arguing that some applied maths can be fone by observation of how things work, and mo zo don't think that is radical but i think it is contextually well put with an interesting set of connections. It may give people an idea as to how you might get people interested in maths bit i suspect that would be a by product.
Title: Re: Sea slugs and maths
Post by: Walter on March 18, 2017, 04:19:55 PM
No. I  doubt anyone who isn't at base interested in the subject is going to read through an article covering Gauss, Feynman and tesselation. I think it's arguing that some applied maths can be fone by observation of how things work, and mo zo don't think that is radical but i think it is contextually well put with an interesting set of connections. It may give people an idea as to how you might get people interested in maths bit i suspect that would be a by product.
now I'm agreeing with you again , what the......?